2Sustain

Two powerhouses in the field of corporate sustainability –the United Nations Global Compact and the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) – have announced an agreement to align their work in advancing corporate responsibility and transparency.

With this new collaboration, the organizations will be able to further develop their combined strengths – the Global Compact’s strategic advancement of key sustainability issues, and GRI’s reporting framework.

Under the terms of the new agreement:

• the GRI will integrate the Global Compact’s ten principles and issue areas in the next iteration of its Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, and

• the Global Compact will adopt the GRI Guidelines as the recommended reporting framework for the more than 5,800 businesses that have joined the world’s largest corporate responsibility platform.

In addition to creating a reporting framework that will be implemented universally, the new collaboration is also intended to provide a benchmark for financial analysts and other stakeholders to better analyze and identify risks and opportunities as they relate to environmental, social and governance (ESG) issues.

“As corporate responsibility has moved into the mainstream of business strategy and operations, the convergence of the two corporate responsibility initiatives with the broadest reach is a crucial development,” says Georg Kell, Executive Director of the UN Global Compact. “Together, the Global Compact and GRI have a unique opportunity to provide a clear roadmap to sustainability and change business practices on a global scale.”

Kudos to these organizations for joining forces on this important initiative. For quite some time, corporations and various stakeholders have been clamoring for a level playing field and more transparency related to ESG issues. This new collaboration is bound to strengthen the quality of corporate sustainability reporting and provide the clarity companies need to better navigate the rapidly evolving ESG landscape.