A group that aims to improve corporate reporting on sustainability issues has released the latest version of its reporting guidelines.
At its annual conference in Amsterdam Wednesday, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) published an updated edition of its Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, which aim to help companies and other organizations report on their economic, environmental, social and governance performance. The GRI says that the guidelines, which were first published in 2000, have been significantly revised and enhanced in an effort to boost sustainability reporting.
The updated guidelines includes new disclosures on governance, ethics and integrity, supply chain, anti-corruption and emissions; an intensified focus on materiality; a new index that aims to help communicate external assurance; among other things. The GRI says that they have also increased user-friendliness and accessibility.
“The emphasis on what is material encourages organizations to provide only information that is critical to their business and stakeholders. This means organizations and report users can concentrate on the sustainability impacts that matter, resulting in reports that are more strategic, more focused, more credible, and easier for stakeholders to navigate,” it says.
Nelmara Arbex, deputy chief executive at GRI, who led the development of the latest version, said, “In today’s world, the increasing demand for sustainability information is inevitable. Increasingly governments, stock exchanges, investors, and society at large are calling on companies to be transparent about their sustainability goals and performance. But this demand is also a demand for sustainability related information that matters.”
“The robust sustainability report of today must be far more than a compliance exercise. It is a tool for demonstrating the effort reporters have made in integrating sustainability into their core business strategy, with benefits for business and society alike,” Arbex added. “The GRI guidelines are designed to support organizations in this strategic journey – to help them to measure and manage change, and to communicate their understanding about the connections between sustainability and business.”
The GRI says that Wednesday’s launch follows two years of extensive consultation and dialogue, involving working groups from across the world, comprising 120 experts from labour, business, and civil society; and, two public consultation periods in 2011 and 2012, which generated more than 2,500 responses.