Dr. Rachel Widdis:

The Senator's questions were pragmatic. I will talk about three companies I spoke to this week, if that is not problematic. The first company that has been voluntarily implementing these measures is now wondering what it does next and is looking at all of the options, including plausible information and what a KPI on that would look like. They asked me to think about what all of these options could look like. It is confusing. They do not know what is happening or how to move their due diligence forward. That company is very pragmatic.

The second company said it will sit on it until it is clear. It plans to do exactly nothing until it knows what the final directive looks like. All that time, energy and momentum is gone. People are losing their jobs in the field. The people coming out of universities wanting to work in the area of sustainability are now thinking there are no jobs. This backlash is having a real effect. The uncertainty is huge.

The EU subsidiaries of US companies are generally large, sophisticated companies, most of which have been implementing voluntary due diligence at a high level for years. I have worked with them, if that is helpful.