Social Sustainability in the Fashion Industry: Inditex and Adidas’ compliance with CSRD and ESRS in Own Workforce
Kari, Alina (2025)
2025
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Julkaisun pysyvä osoite on
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2025051913283
https://urn.fi/URN:NBN:fi:amk-2025051913283
Tiivistelmä
Fashion is a broad concept. It includes various industries and sectors with complex supply chains across the world. Fashion industry is one of the largest industries in the world, and it is also widely criticised regarding its sustainability. Sustainability traditionally is defined with the term ESG, which stands for Environment, Social and Governance. To avoid facing criticism about sustainability, companies disclose sustainability information regarding its operations in all ESG aspects. This is usually done with the help of voluntary guidelines and frameworks, or more recently, regulated with mandatory frameworks such as the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD).
This thesis explains the theory of sustainability reporting covering all aspects of ESG and how it has evolved during the past decades. Furthermore, the theory of sustainability reporting frameworks and guidelines such as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), are presented, before going into more detail about the new EU directive CSRD.
CSRD includes a set of European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), that provide a structured framework for sustainability reporting. This thesis analysed compliance with the standard S1 Own workforce in companies Adidas and Inditex, with a specified focus on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI).
The research was conducted by analysing sustainability content of case companies’ public annual reports and sustainability statements, from the financial year 2024, which were then further compared to previous reports from 2021, 2022 and 2023. The required DEI disclosures are presented, in addition to analysing the evolution of such disclosures from previous years before the mandatory regulation. The analysis between companies reporting highlighted the differences between Adidas and Inditex S1 reporting.
Results showed that while both companies succeeded in complying with the S1 standard, the approaches were different. Inditex took the reporting to a more detailed level and showed earlier adaptation to the directive than Adidas, which did a major structural change in its reporting only for the year 2025. Nevertheless, both companies show strong continuing commitment to DEI in their operations.
This thesis explains the theory of sustainability reporting covering all aspects of ESG and how it has evolved during the past decades. Furthermore, the theory of sustainability reporting frameworks and guidelines such as Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR), United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs) and Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), are presented, before going into more detail about the new EU directive CSRD.
CSRD includes a set of European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), that provide a structured framework for sustainability reporting. This thesis analysed compliance with the standard S1 Own workforce in companies Adidas and Inditex, with a specified focus on Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI).
The research was conducted by analysing sustainability content of case companies’ public annual reports and sustainability statements, from the financial year 2024, which were then further compared to previous reports from 2021, 2022 and 2023. The required DEI disclosures are presented, in addition to analysing the evolution of such disclosures from previous years before the mandatory regulation. The analysis between companies reporting highlighted the differences between Adidas and Inditex S1 reporting.
Results showed that while both companies succeeded in complying with the S1 standard, the approaches were different. Inditex took the reporting to a more detailed level and showed earlier adaptation to the directive than Adidas, which did a major structural change in its reporting only for the year 2025. Nevertheless, both companies show strong continuing commitment to DEI in their operations.