The Hague, March 2, 2022. The Rijksdienst voor Ondernemend Nederland (RVO) is taking an important step forward in stimulating Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR). Namely, a system is being developed that will make the effects of its policy in this area more transparent. The RVO is receiving help in this process from consultancy firm Empact, which proved to best meet the RVO’s expectations during the tender process.
With a multidisciplinary team of scientists, IT specialists and CSR experts, Empact is going to develop a Monitoring, Evaluation and Learning (MEL) system that will allow the RFO to measure the effects of its policy to stimulate the CSR efforts of grant and funding recipients. Currently, it is only the case that organizations receiving subsidies must commit to, for example, OECD guidelines and UN human rights treaties. However, to what extent this actually achieves the intended effects is not clear because it is not yet measured.
With having the MEL system developed and, in the second phase, put into operation, the RFO will have direct insight into the effectiveness of its efforts in this area via a dashboard. In this way, it can make its own policies even more effective. Also, the RFO will soon be able to proactively and very specifically direct and help organizations improve their performance. Martin de Jong, Founder of Empact, sees this as a logical step: “We have seen for years that there is an increasing need to determine the actual effect of government policy. Very nice that RVO is joining this movement and has given us the confidence to carry this out.”
Empact is a boutique management consulting firm specializing in connecting CSR and organizational goals. In doing so, Empact specifically enables clients to independently implement their policies