The implementation of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015 made Environmental, Social, and Corporate Governance – or ESG – paramount for investors across the world. Although Impact Investing and ESG Investing were, back then, niche investment strategies, the UN’s SDGs marked the onset of a paradigm shift in the investment landscape – establishing the first voluntary link between sustainability and financial services.

So where does emerging Europe stand when it comes to ESG integration? Does the region lag behind Western Europe?

Marek Dietl, the CEO of the Warsaw Stock Exchange, speaks with Andrew Wrobel about how perception plays an important role across emerging Europe, and says that companies are far more ESG-compliant than they are given credit for. The Warsaw Stock Exchange’s ESG Index and the ESG guidelines created by the Budapest Stock Exchange, ahead of that prepared by Euronext, the biggest stock exchange in Europe, are only a couple of examples of the region’s focus on sustainable development.