Sustainability Intelligence

Source:

http://www.sustainalytics.com/sustainability-intelligence
Sustainalytics is an award-winning global responsible investment research firm specialized in
environmental, social and governance (ESG) research and analysis. The firm offers global
perspectives and solutions that are underpinned by local expertise, serving both values-based and
mainstream investors that integrate ESG information and assessments into their investment

decisions.

Sustainability Intelligence
Our Sustainability Intelligence Service provides companies with valuable insights about where to
focus their sustainability efforts in order to create the greatest value.
When integrated into the business planning process, Sustainability Intelligence provides the
quantitative and qualitative data required to prioritize competing sustainability initiatives.

Sustainability Intelligence components include:

SUSTAINABILITY MARKET INTELLIGENCE

Technological trends

Societal trends
Political trends
Government regulations
Environmental trends

SUSTAINABILITY STAKEHOLDER INTELLIGENCE

Customer buying behaviour

Community expectations
Employee morale and expectations
Investor relations considerations
Supply chain processes/requirements

SUSTAINABILITY COMPETITOR INTELLIGENCE

Company sustainability profile

Best practices
Performance gaps
Overall and metric-by-metric rankings
Sustainability performance measured against peers

GLOBAL REPORTING INITIATIVE TRAININGS

A process-driven approach to reporting and materiality analysis

Training on sustainability reporting drivers, practices, case studies and trends
Development of a skill set to lead the evolution of sustainability reporting in
organizations

Reports:

Canadian Commercial Real Estate Sustainability Performance Report. Learn how the
sustainability of Canada's commercial real estate sector compares to its international
peers.
Discover why Corporate Responsibility is Here to Stay by Simon MacMahon and
Michael Jantzi in the Conference Board's Spring Review on CSR.

To learn more about how our Sustainability Services can work for you, please contact us.
Related pages:

Competitor Intelligence
The Sustainalytics Sustainability Intelligence Service has developed customized evaluation
frameworks for more than 40 different industries. Using these frameworks as a base, we further
customize the evaluation in relation to specific regions, company sizes and stakeholders, as per

the results of stakeholder analysis. This customized sustainability evaluation framework is then
applied to the company and its peers in order to evaluate absolute and relative ESG
performance. This analysis provides companies with benchmarks, market intelligence, and a
concrete understanding of industry best practices. These results are generated in three steps.
CORPORATE SUSTAINABILITY PROFILE
Our expert analysts score a company profile by ESG dimension, category and individual metric
to provide objective, actionable data.
GAP ANALYSIS
The sustainability performance of a company is compared against local and global peers. These
comparisons provide detailed evaluations of competitor policies, practices and performances, and
are completed with scores at the overall and per metric level. This identifies gaps between the
companys practices and industry best practices.
SUSTAINABILITY BEST PRACTICES
Sustainability best practices and international standards are identified with as much detail as
possible with special attention given to performance areas that are linked to high stakeholder
expectations. The examination of current industry best practices is an invaluable way to evaluate
potential sustainability initiatives.
Striving towards best practices and adherence to international standards is perhaps one of the
safest corporate strategies. Both stakeholders and society-at-large seek out and reward companies
whose values align with their own.

https://www.globalreporting.org/information/sustainability-reporting/Pages/default.aspx

Sustainability report
http://www.slideshare.net/eccinternational/corporate-sustainability-reporting
A sustainability report is a report published by a company or organization about the economic,
environmental and social impacts caused by its everyday activities.
A sustainability report also presents the organization's values and governance model, and
demonstrates the link between its strategy and its commitment to a sustainable global economy.
An increasing number of companies and organizations want to make their operations sustainable
and contribute to sustainable development. Sustainability reporting can help organizations to
measure, understand and communicate their economic, environmental, social and governance
performance. Sustainability the ability for something to last for a long time, or indefinitely
is based on performance in these four key areas.
Systematic sustainability reporting helps organizations to measure the impacts they cause or
experience, set goals, and manage change. A sustainability report is the key platform for
communicating sustainability performance and impacts whether positive or negative.
To produce a regular sustainability report, organizations set up a reporting cycle a program
of data collection, communication, and responses. This means that their sustainability
performance is monitored on an ongoing basis. Data can be provided regularly to senior
decision makers to shape the organization's strategy and policies, and improve
performance.
Sustainability reporting is therefore a vital resource for managing change towards a
sustainable global economy one that combines long term profitability with ethical behavior,
social justice and environmental care.
Sustainability reporting can be considered as synonymous with other terms for non-financial
reporting; triple bottom line reporting, corporate social responsibility (CSR) reporting, and more.
It is also an intrinsic element of integrated reporting; a more recent development that
combines the analysis of financial and non-financial performance.
The uptake of sustainability reporting is increasing among organizations of all types and sizes.
To learn more about how sustainability reporting is developing worldwide, visit the Report or
Explain and Report Services pages.
Major providers of sustainability reporting guidance include:
The Global Reporting Initiative (The GRI Sustainability Reporting Framework and Guidelines)
The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD Guidelines for
Multinational Enterprises)

 The United Nations Global Compact (the Communication on Progress)

The International Organization for Standardization (ISO 26000, International Standard for
social responsibility)
International Integrated Reporting Council IIRC
The successful company of tomorrow will have an integrated strategy to achieve financial results
and create lasting value for itself, its stakeholders and society. The value created by this
company cannot be expressed by isolated financial and a sustainability reports, with no
clear links between the single bottom line and the sustainability impacts caused or the
value created in order to generate its financial results.
GRI co-founded the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC) because the future of
corporate reporting is the integration of financial and sustainability strategy and results. An
integrated report should be the result of such an integrated reporting process.
Understanding the links between financial results and sustainability impacts is critical for
business managers, and increasingly connected to long- and short-term business success. To
understand these links, organizations must identify the material sustainability topics to monitor
and manage to ensure the business survives and expands. This step is at the core of the
sustainability reporting process provided by GRIs Sustainability Reporting Framework.
GRI offers companies guidance on how to identify material sustainability topics to be monitored
and managed, and to prepare for the integrated thinking process, which is the foundation for
integrated reporting.
Integrated reporting as proposed by the IIRC is a form of corporate reporting that provides a
clear and concise representation of how an organization creates value, now and in the future. An
integrated report is one that could bring together material information about an
organizations strategy, governance, performance and prospects.
The IIRC will propose the elements to be presented in an integrated report through the Integrated
Reporting Framework they are now developing.
The process to establish this internationally accepted Integrated Reporting Framework is at its
beginning with IIRC, and has already attracted important players in the corporate reporting
field, such as reporting standard setters, large auditing companies, accountancy boards,
large companies, financial market institutions, and NGOs.
Before the IIRC was established, pioneering companies and experts disseminated and developed
the concept of integrated reporting. One of the most active integrated reporting communities is
in South Africa, and its contributions have helped shape the beginning of the integrated reporting
concept. In 2010, the Johannesburg Stock Exchange introduced a listing requirement that
companies must produce an integrated report or explain why not.

WHO SHOULD REPORT

Sustainability reports are released by companies and organizations of all types, sizes and
sectors, from every corner of the world.
Thousands of companies across all sectors have published reports that address some or all of the
disclosures in GRIs Sustainability Reporting Framework and Guidelines. Public authorities and
non-profits are also big reporters. GRIs Sustainability Disclosure Database features all known
GRI-based reports.
Who should start reporting? Everyone. GRI works to make sustainability reporting a standard
business practice. For this to happen, growth in reporting needs to be exponential. GRIs
guidance is designed to be used by all companies and organizations, and can play a major role in
the future of organizational reporting.
An effective sustainability

reporting cycle should benefit all reporting organizations.

Internal benefits for companies and organizations can include:

Increased understanding of risks and opportunities
Emphasizing the link between financial and non-financial performance
Influencing long term management strategy and policy, and business plans
Streamlining processes, reducing costs and improving efficiency
Benchmarking and assessing sustainability performance with respect to laws, norms, codes,
performance standards, and voluntary initiatives
Avoiding being implicated in publicized environmental, social and governance failures
Comparing performance internally, and between organizations and sectors
External benefits of sustainability reporting can include:
Mitigating or reversing negative environmental, social and governance impacts
Improving reputation and brand loyalty
Enabling external stakeholders to understand the organizations true value, and tangible
and intangible assets

 Demonstrating how the organization influences, and is influenced by, expectations about
sustainable development
Many GRI publications examine organizations' experiences with sustainability reporting,
including the benefits they have experienced.
Since 1999, GRI has provided a comprehensive Sustainability Reporting Framework that is
widely used around the world. The cornerstone of the Framework is the Sustainability Reporting
Guidelines. As a result of the credibility, consistency and comparability it offers, GRIs
Framework has become a de facto standard in sustainability reporting.
Sustainability is a journey. Along the way, organizations need to set goals, measure performance,
and integrate a sustainability strategy into their core planning. GRIs Reporting Framework
allows all organizations to take the first steps towards a sustainable global economy.
Some of the distinctive elements of GRIs Framework and the activity that creates it include:
Multi-stakeholder input. GRI's approach is based on multi-stakeholder engagement; this is
considered the best way to produce universally-applicable reporting guidance that meets the
needs of all report makers and users. All elements of the Reporting Framework are created and
improved using a consensus-seeking approach, and considering the widest possible range of
stakeholder interests.
Stakeholder input to the Framework comes from business, civil society, labor, accounting,
investors, academics, governments and sustainability reporting practitioners.
A record of use and endorsement. Every year, an increasing number of reporting
organizations adopt GRIs Guidelines. From 2006 to 2011, the yearly increase in uptake ranged
from 22 to 58 percent. New audiences for sustainability information, like investors and
regulators, are now calling for more and better performance data. Annual growth in the number
of reporters is expected to continue, as GRI works for more reporters and better reporting.
Governmental references and activities. GRI was referenced in the Plan of Implementation of
the UN World Summit on Sustainable Development in 2002. Use of GRIs Framework was
endorsed for all participating governments. Several governments consider GRIs Framework to
be an important part of their sustainable development policy, including Norway, the Netherlands,
Sweden and Germany.
Independence. GRIs governance structure helps to maintain its independence; geographically
diverse stakeholder input increases the legitimacy of the Reporting Framework. GRIs funding
approach also ensures independence. GRI is a stichting in Dutch, a non-profit foundation
with a business model that aims for a degree of self-sufficiency. Funding is secured from diverse
sources; governments, companies, foundations, partner organizations and supporters.
Shared development costs. The expense of developing GRIs reporting guidance is shared
among many users and contributors. For companies and organizations, this negates the cost of

developing in-house or sector-based reporting frameworks.

Bridge building. GRIs basis in multi-stakeholder engagement contributes to its ability to build
bridges between different actors and sectors like business, the public sector, labor unions and
civil society and to mediate
How is GRI governed?
GRI is an international, multi-stakeholder, network-based organization. Each of its three governance bodies the
Board of Directors, Stakeholder Council and Technical Advisory Committee plays a lead role in developing GRIs
Sustainability Reporting Framework and deciding GRIs direction.
The governance bodies unite senior people with diverse skills, education, life experience and cultural backgrounds,
and typically include representatives from up to 30 countries at any one time.
GRIs governance structure is designed to maintain multi-stakeholder representation. The Technical Advisory
Committee (TAC) oversees the development of GRIs Reporting Framework content. The Stakeholder Council (SC)
provides advice on strategic and policy issues, and debates proposed changes to the Framework content; as
representatives of GRIs wider network, they provide a balanced, expert view that lends credibility to GRIs
guidance. Following recommendations from the TAC and SC, the Board of Directors makes the final decision about
the release of Framework material.
Board of Directors: The Board of Directors is the final decision-making authority at GRI.
Technical Advisory Committee: The Technical Advisory Committee provides expert sustainability reporting advice
and oversees the development of the Reporting Framework.
Stakeholder Council: The Stakeholder Council is the main multi-stakeholder forum in GRIs governance structure.

Obs. Sweden model

http://www.government.se/content/1/c6/20/44/34/bd7320d8.pdf