Gabriel Zgunea, Corporate Intelligence Agency: In general, in ESG, everyone cosmeticizes nicely
Gabriel Zgunea, Corporate Intelligence Agency: In general, in ESG, everyone cosmeticizes nicely
3-4 minutes
Author: Radu Pircă 13.06.2023
ESG fraud in Romania? Answers from Gabriel Zgunea, CEO of the Corporate Intelligence Agency, a company specialized in providing risk management and intelligence services for the private sector.
"The most common type of fraud in Romania is private corruption, especially in the area of kickback, bribery," said Gabriel Zgunea at the ESG Compliance & Fraud Risk Management Conference 2023, an event organized by Govnet. "In the ESG area everybody cosmetizes very nicely the company and the data to report. Everybody fulfills all the check-box requirements that theoretically need to be ticked. Practically, a lot of it is ticked for the sake of being ticked."
The CEO of the Corporate Intelligence Agency also gave an example: a large wine producer from across the Prut that has all the certifications, "ticks an extraordinarily nice declaration". But almost 501TPTP3T of the wines they put on sale that they claim were sourced from their vineyards come from Portugal, from producers who have no connection to ESG standards. "On a minimal check they didn't even know what it meant".
"Whoever swears in red that by 2030 it will be the cleanest and greenest creates room for less well-intentioned managers to take advantage, gain a competitive advantage over their competitors and mislead their partners." Gabriel Zgunea, CEO Corporate Intelligence Agency.
The Corporate Intelligence Agency has been doing supplier chain audits for companies for almost 2 years. Unfortunately, says Gabriel Zgunea, things almost never 100% turn out the way the supplier claimed.
This is also the case for investment funds that want to invest in companies. Checks show that these companies "get so cosmeticized that when you do an on-the-ground, grass-roots investigation, you almost don't know which company you're looking at. When you read what they've said versus what's on the ground, it's like you're somewhere else," said the CEO of the Corporate Intelligence Agency.
