What is a Sustainability Report?
A Sustainability Report essentially sums up a company’s propensity to develop while reconciling contemporary environmental, social and economic demands - the "Triple Bottom Line (People, Planet & Profit)" of sustainability. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) details one of the world's most prevalent standards for corporate sustainability reporting. More than 1,500 organizations across 60 countries use the GRI guidelines to report their sustainability initiatives.
Why Report?
A sustainability report accomplishes the following:
- Provides detailed information about the company’s challenges and achievements to shareholders, employees, clients and other stakeholders and the public alike.
- Fulfills an inherent commitment and responsibility to the environmental and society.
- Serves as an effective marketing tool, while associating the company with sound environmental management and sustainable activities.
- Tracks the progress of integration of sustainability principles into company planning and execution
- Takes first steps towards setting and achieving future objectives in a sustainable way
Features
A typical report compiled by us at Ecozen Solutions in accordance with GRI norms has the following salient features:
- Responds to client & stakeholder feedback
- The sustainability report is part of a feedback loop that addresses the reasonable interests of everyone, from stakeholders to employees, customers, suppliers, and investors. The documentation of what stakeholders say and how those concerns are translated into action are critical elements which differentiate the autocratic organization of the past from the evolving sustainable company of the 21st century.
- Reflects on learning and progress
- The sustainability report reflects on current challenges while highlighting incremental progress. Balanced case studies and strategic management narratives in the report plainly state the company’s decision-making rationale. Transparency in communication and qualified disclosure effectively mitigates accusations of “greenwashing” or inaction.
- Facilitates Comparison
- An effective sustainability reports displays information in accordance with conventional standards, encouraging comparison. Key social and environmental performance indicators are called out clearly and presented in finite terms. The most relevant indicators in the sustainability context are presented consistently over time. Comparing Sustainability Reports thus provides crucial insights into the critical differences between the functioning of two companies.
- Indexing by key performance indicators
- Savvy readers are concerned only with topics and indicators of greatest interest to them. Effective reports provide an at-a-glance index listing the degree of completeness and references to key performance indicators like carbon emissions, water resources, employee diversity, etc.
Our Offering
Ecozen Solutions provides clients with complete support to develop an effective GRI certified report. Our team engages in extensive data collection on the concerned performance indicators and presents it in a design lucid to the critics and appealing to a common eye. On request of clients we help process the Application Level certification.
For more details on Global Reporting Initiative and Sustainability Reporting - Click here
Check how helpful would a corporate sustainability report be for your business, by answering the following questionnaire
Does your firm contains sustainable development to be a priority?
Has your firm taken measures to ensure sustainable development?
Has your firm taken initiatives to decrease the adverse impact on/conserve the environment?
Does your firm have an employee welfare and safety policy?
Does your firm have a well defined management approach?
Do you think your benefit from a comprehensive evaluation of your firm on its sustainable practices?
How important is Marketing to your business?