The Generate Value Through TESG pillar, which is part of the 2040 Strategy “Energy that Transforms”, manages Ecopetrol's sustainability agenda, contributing to the fulfillment of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and the generation of value for the Company in its three (3) business lines, understanding the impacts it generates on its stakeholders and managing the challenges and opportunities offered by the environment in the context of the energy transition.
In Ecopetrol, TESG is understood as “the contribution and generation of responsible, safe and efficient operations, harmonizing the relationship with the environment and stakeholders; under a framework of transparent and ethical governance, making use of technology for the development of innovative solutions to current and future challenges”.
The “T” in TESG is materialized in the Science, Technology and Innovation (ST+i) agenda, which seeks the great solvers for current and future challenges in environmental, social, and governance (ESG) matters, through cutting-edge knowledge, applied innovation and digital reinvention, renewing processes and products with state-of-the-art technology.
At Ecopetrol, materiality is the principle by excellence to identify and prioritize the most relevant environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues for the Company, considering the changing expectations of its stakeholders and the market.
This result leverages the Generate Value Through TESG pillar of the 2040 Strategy, as it allows the company to focus its efforts and resources on the management of the priority (material) issues and to provide effective accountability to its stakeholders.
In the last update, carried out in 2023, Ecopetrol used the Double Materiality methodology, in which it analyzed (i) the impact of the Company on its environment and (ii) the ESG risks and opportunities of the environment on the Company, resulting in the definition of four (4) cross-cutting issues and 14 material issues:
The cross-cutting issues identified acquire a strategic and enabling character of the material issues. Thus, they frame and leverage the management of the 14 material issues, which are on the same scale of importance and priority for Ecopetrol.
From each of these material issues, Roadmaps are derived, which are the instrument that allows establishing the ambition, technical goals and technological vision of each one of them, as well as monitoring their plans in the short, medium and long term. In this way, material issues support the Generate Value Through TESG pillar of the 2040 Strategy: “Energy that Transforms”.
Additionally, an analysis was developed to determine and map the existing relationship between the identified elements.
The following diagram shows the type of relationship that exists between the different ESG issues (very strong, strong or medium), in relation to the nature and actions developed and managed from each of them.
This information highlights the importance of managing the elements in an integrated manner, bearing in mind that the actions developed within the framework of one of the issues may have effects on another, achieving, for example, maximizing results or reducing efforts.
In 2023, Ecopetrol's stakeholders were updated. This exercise helps the Company to establish more effective relationships, based on the generation of trust and mutual benefit, since it allows an effective and timely understanding not only of their interests, expectations and concerns, but also of the way in which they influence and are impacted in the framework of Ecopetrol's operations, which in the end becomes the essential input for the design of the relationship plans that the areas develop with the stakeholders.
To establish the results of the update, the existing stakeholders until 2023 were reviewed, as well as their subgroups and associated value promises, which allowed identifying new actors and prioritizing them for their involvement, based on the criteria of influence, dependence, power, legitimacy and urgency, established in the AA1000 AccountAbility Stakeholder Engagement Standard methodology.
Ecopetrol's stakeholders groups and subgroups are: