Leading sustainability and integrated reporting organisations plan to provide joint market guidance, in an effort to achieve comprehensive harmonisation.
By Paul A. Davies and Michael D. Green
A group of leading sustainability and integrated reporting organisations — including the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), the Climate Disclosure Standard Board (CDSB), the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), the International Integrated Reporting Council (IIRC), and the Sustainability Accounting Board (SASB) — have pledged to work together on the harmonisation of sustainability standards. In the document, which was published on 11 September 2020, the organisations commit to collaborating together by providing joint market guidance on sustainability standards while also building a shared vision of how such standards could complement generally accepted financial principles.
Background
A number of initiatives have accelerated progress towards a comprehensive environmental, social, and governance (ESG) corporate reporting system in the past year. In particular, regulators and policymakers have demonstrated a growing appetite to address the connection between financial risks and ESG-related concerns. Recent examples of initiatives in this area include: