Introduction

The request for information includes an introductory section that states the objective of the request for information and describes how responses will help the Board in determining its future work programme. The introduction also explains the difference between the IFRS Foundation's five-yearly review of structure and effectiveness that is currently underway and that includes a consultation on sustainability reporting and the IASB's agenda consultation. The IASB's agenda consultation seeks feedback on the priorities of activities within the current scope of the Board’s work, whereas the Trustees’ consultation seeks feedback on a potential expansion in the role of the IFRS Foundation. The IASB is currently working on its management commentary project and could do more on sustainability aspects, should stakeholders wish so, as long as this is connected to financial statements. While there is some connecting middle ground, respondents should not confuse the two initiatives. As the IFRS Foundation Trustees move forward quickly with their initiative, their decisions would be available before the Board makes decisions on its future agenda.

Request for information

The request for information consists of three parts: (1) strategic direction and balance of the Board's activities, (2) criteria for assessing the priority of projects that could be added to the work plan, and (3) financial reporting issues that could be added to the Board’s work plan.

Strategic direction and balance of the Board's activities

Part one of the request for information regarding the strategic direction and balance notes that the IASB's work is currently following six lines:

• New IFRS Standards and major amendments to IFRS Standards
• Maintenance and consistent application of IFRS Standards
• The IFRS for SMEs Standard
• Digital financial reporting and the IFRS Taxonomy
• Understandability and accessibility
• Stakeholder engagement

In this part of the request for views the IASB is seeking stakeholders’ views on whether the Board should increase, leave unchanged or decrease its current level of focus on each line of work. And while there is a little room for additional work, respondents are asked to assume that the Board’s overall level of resources will remain substantially unchanged during the 2022 to 2026 period.

Criteria for assessing the priority of projects that could be added to the work plan

Part two of the request for information regarding criteria for assessing the priority of projects that could be added to the work plan notes that the Board will use a specified list of seven criteria to assess the potential financial reporting issues that could be added to its work plan to develop new IFRS Standards and major amendments to IFRS Standards. They are:

• The importance of the matter to investors
• Whether there is any deficiency in the way companies report the type of transaction or activity in financial reports
• The type of companies that the matter is likely to affect, including whether the matter is more prevalent in some jurisdictions than others
• How pervasive or acute the matter is likely to be for companies
• The potential project’s interaction with other projects on the work plan
• The complexity and feasibility of the potential project and its solutions
• The capacity of the Board and its stakeholders to make timely progress on the potential project

The criteria are derived from the Due Process Handbook and the 2015 Agenda Consultation. The relative importance of any specific criterion will vary depending on the particular circumstances. Generally, the Board will evaluate potential project for its work plan primarily on the basis of whether the project will meet investors’ needs, while also taking into account the costs of producing the information.

Financial reporting issues that could be added to the Board’s work plan

Finally, part three of the request for information regarding financial reporting issues that could be added to the Board’s work plan refers to 22 projects that have frequently been suggested to the Board for consideration. The request for information seeks stakeholders’ views on what priority they would give each of the potential projects — high, medium or low — and whether their prioritisation refers to all or only some aspects included in the project description. Respondents are also invited to suggest additional issues that they believe the Board should add to its work plan for 2022 to 2026.

Appendices

For reasons of readability, some of the information referred to in the request for information has been relegated to appendices:

• Appendix A describes the active projects on the Board’s work plan as of March 2021
• Appendix B describes the 22 financial reporting issues that were frequently suggested to the Board for potential potential inclusion in its work programme
• Appendix C describes additional financial reporting issues that were suggested to the Board by only a small number of stakeholders

Comment deadline and next steps

Stakeholders are invited to provide feedback on the request for information by 27 September 2021. The Board expects to discuss the feedback in the second half of 2021 and to publish a feedback statement summarising the feedback and announcing the work plan for 2022 to 2026 in the first quarter of 2022.

Additional information

The following additional information is available on the IASB website and on IAS Plus:

• Press release on the IASB website
• Access to the request for information on the IASB website
• Investor Perspective article on the Agenda consultation (link to IASB website)
• Video with an overview of the Agenda consultation (four minutes, link to IASB website)
• Video on the strategic direction and balance of the Board’s activities (three minutes, link to IASB website)
• Video on potential projects that could be added to the IASB work plan (two minutes, link to IASB website)
• IFRS in Focus newsletter
• Our IAS Plus project page on the Agenda consultation 2020

The new Board members are Olivier Scherer (accountancy profession se​​​at, French); Michael Fechner (corporate sector seat, German); Roman Sauer (insurance sector seat, German); Serge Pattyn (user seat, Belgian); and Gerhard Prachner (AFRAC, Austria). Serge Pattyn has also been appointed EFRAG Board Vice-President.

The new members will begin their three-year terms on 1 May 2021. They replace Hans Buysse (EFRAG Board Vice-President), Luca Cencio​​​ni, Benoit Jaspar, Claes Norberg, Laurence Rivat and Mark Vaessen.

For more information, see the press release on the EFRAG website.

The IFRS Foun­da­tion is seeking two Trustees: one from the Americas and one from the Asia-Oceania. Trustees’ re­spon­si­bil­i­ties include oversight of the organisation in the public interest, its strategic direction, ap­point­ments to the Board, the IFRS In­ter­pre­ta­tions Committee and the IFRS Advisory Council, and ensuring the financing of the organisation and approving its budget. The role de­scrip­tion notes:

Please click to access the press release on the IASB website.

The podcast discusses:

• Extensions to comment periods for three of the Board’s current consultations.
• Goodwill and Impairment project.
• Primary Financial Statements project.
• Request for Information Comprehensive Review of the IFRS for SMEs Standard.
• Equity Method research project.

The podcast (14 minutes) can be accessed through the press release on the IASB website.

Please click to view the detailed notes taken by Deloitte observers for the IASB regular meeting and supplementary meeting.

We do not support the proposals in the ED for reason cited by Ms Flores in her alternative view. We are concerned that the method proposed results in recognition of a lease liability for the expected variable payments not based on an index or rate, which is inconsistent with the general requirements in IFRS 16 and that the ED will be difficult to implement. In addition, we propose that a practical alternative would be to require that the “deferred gain” that results from the mechanical application of the existing requirements in IFRS 16:100 be recognised in profit or loss over the lease term on a straight-line basis (or another systematic basis) and presented as a reduction of the lease expense and suggest that no amendment be made at this time to specify the method that should be used by a seller-lessee to measure the proportion of the previous carrying amount of the lease asset that relates to the right of use retained.

Please click to download our full comment letter.

The letter notes the developments of the last few months beginning with the WEF publication Measuring Stakeholder Capitalism: Towards Common Metrics and Consistent Reporting of Sustainable Value Creation, then citing the IFRS Foundation consultation on setting up a global sustainability standards board and the statement of intent of CDP, CDSB, GRI, IIRC, and SASB to work together towards a comprehensive corporate reporting system.

The letter states that the same global standardisation and coordination as is already in place for financial reporting is needed for ESG reporting as well so that that companies of any industry or country are comparable and can be held accountable to investors. The letter outlines three steps for achieving this:

1. An independent global standard setting body should develop ESG standards that can be adopted worldwide. The letter notes that the IFRS Foundation is well positioned to do this and that the WEF supports the proposal to establish a Sustainability Standards Board (SSB) that would sit alongside the International Accounting Standards Board (IASB).
2. For the standards to be enforced in individual capital markets, regulatory authorities must endorse their use. The letter cites the support of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) for the IFRS Foundation initiative and the suggested "building blocks" approach and welcomes the statements.
3. For the IFRS Foundation standard setting process to best succeed, it should build on the main reporting initiatives already in use. The letter points at the work of CDP, CDSB, GRI, IIRC, and SASB and notes that the WEF's work has included helping to facilitate the collaboration among the five organisations and that the WEF looks forward to working even more closely with them in support of creating sustainability reporting standards through the SSB.

The WEF, which is also a member of the recently announced IFRS Foundation sustainability working group, concludes its letter by stating:

These, then, are the steps we need to complete to get to system change on ESG metrics. We support this process and the organizations that are working to achieve it. Concretely, we look forward to supporting the IFRS’s Sustainability Standards Board, as appropriate, during its establishment and as it delivers on its mandate. We will promote opportunities for high-level public-private dialogue to strengthen strategic alignment on these objectives and will mobilize corporate support at the chief executive level in the global business community. We also encourage capital market regulatory bodies to work with the IFRS Foundation and IOSCO to support the Sustainability Standards Board.

Please click to access the full letter on the WEF website.

For more information, see the press release on the IASB's website.

Below is an analysis of all changes made to the work plan since our last analysis on 19 February 2021.

Stan­dard-set­ting projects

• Disclosure Initiative — Subsidiaries that are SMEs — The issuance of an exposure draft is now expected in Q3 2021 (previously H2 2021).
• Disclosure Initiative — Targeted Standards-level Review of Disclosures — This project is now in the exposure draft feedback stage and discussions on the feedback is expected in H1 2022. The exposure draft was issued on 25 March 2021.
• Rate-regulated activities — The comment letter deadline has been extended to 30 July 2021.

Main­te­nance projects

• Deferred Tax related to Assets and Liabilities arising from a Single Transaction (Amendments to IAS 12) — The issuance of IFRS amendments is now expected in May 2021 (previously Q2 2021).
• IFRS 16 and COVID-19— This project expects to issue IFRS amendments in March 2021.
• Lease Liability in a Sale and Leaseback — Feedback to the exposure draft will now be discussed in May 2021 (previously Q2 2021).

Research projects

• Extractive Activities — The decision of the project’s direction is now expected in May 2021 (previously Q2 2021).
• Goodwill and Impairment — The discussion of the feedback on the discussion paper will continue in April 2021 (began in March 2021).
• Second Comprehensive Review of the IFRS for SMEs Standard — The next project step will be the issuance of an exposure draft (no date given).

Other projects

• IFRS Taxonomy Update — 2020 General Im­prove­ments and Common Practice — This project is removed from the work plan due to the issuance of the IFRS taxonomy update on 24 March 2021.
• IFRS Taxonomy Update — Amend­ments to IFRS 17, IFRS 4 and IAS 16 — This project is removed from the work plan due to the issuance of the IFRS taxonomy update on 24 March 2021.
• IFRS Taxonomy Update — Common Practice (IAS 19 Employee Benefits) — This project is removed from the work plan due to the issuance of the IFRS taxonomy update on 24 March 2021.

The above is a faithful com­par­i­son of the IASB work plan at 19 February 2021 and 26 March 2021. For access to the current IASB work plan at any time, please click here.

Against the backdrop of the final reports on possible EU non-financial reporting standards, participants discussed their expectations for future cooperation and the need and importance for EU sustainability reporting standards to build on as well as contribute to international standard-setting initiatives.

Please click to access the corresponding press release on the EFRAG website.