The event brought together representatives of ESG and legal departments of large companies, as well as experts in the field of sustainable development:

- Elena Dubovitskaya, Director, Center for Sustainable Development, SKOLKOVO School of Management

- Natalia Dorpeko, Executive Director, Association "National Network of the Global Compact"

- Oksana Gogunskaya, General Director, JSC Kontur

- Elena Myakotnikova, Director of Sustainable Development, RUSAL

- Irina Arkhipova, Director of Corporate Relations and Sustainable Development, Kraft Heinz East

- Nadezhda Filatova, lawyer, GC Delo Group

- Margarita Gaskarova, editor-in-chief, Legal Insight

- Vladislav Berezovsky, Development Director, Carbon Zero

- Polina Sukhova, Head of claims service, Moskvich

Participants discussed, in particular, the following issues:

• ESG principles are an integrated part of the business strategies of many Russian and international companies operating in Russia;

• the legal framework for ESG in Russia, which includes mandatory regulations (for example, in the field of waste management, environmental regulation and workers' rights), incentive mechanisms (for example, in the field of support for renewable energy sources), as well as legal infrastructure and “soft law” ( for example, taxonomies of green and social projects, information letters from the Bank of Russia in the field of accounting for ESG factors for public companies and financial organizations);

• companies, as part of their “super-efforts”, implement climate projects, make transactions with certificates of origin of energy and carbon units, implement significant social initiatives (for example, in the field of demography and charity), and also integrate ESG into corporate and operational management;

• the involvement of lawyers is important for the implementation of ESG, for example, in terms of structuring investment projects with positive environmental and social effects, developing a contractual framework for the implementation of ESG initiatives, developing a legal framework for integrating ESG into corporate governance, interpreting and improving legislation, as well as in terms of response risks associated with administrative and judicial disputes;

The AEB will continue to provide a platform for professional dialogue on various aspects of ESG, such as carbon regulation.