ESG, SDG, GRI, and more: What do the sustainability acronyms all mean?
Sustainability has been a hot topic over the past decade, not least due to the urgent need to strengthen climate resilience. When it comes to sustainability reporting, disclosures, organisations, and metrics, there are a lot of acronyms, from ESG to GRI to COP. They may provide frameworks and guidelines, help set goals, and assess how businesses may be affected by things like climate change or impact the environment and society.
For companies that are just beginning to engage in sustainability reporting, it can be discouraging. Hence, here’s a list of commonly used acronyms and terminologies, what they stand for and mean.
1. ESG: Environmental, Social, Governance
These are criteria or categories for people to evaluate an organisation’s performance, impacts and how far advanced they are with sustainable development. Environmental factors may include greenhouse gas emissions, waste management and energy efficiency, social factors may refer to underpaid labour, workplace health and safety and the protection of human rights, while governance factors might relate to stakeholder engagement, transparency and anti-corruption.
2. SDGs: Sustainable Development Goals
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) were adopted by the United Nations in 2015 as a universal call to action to end poverty, protect the planet, and ensure that by 2030 all people enjoy peace and prosperity. The 17 SDGs are integrated, recognising that action in one area will affect outcomes in others. Some of the 17 goals include gender equality, quality education, climate action, zero hunger, affordable and clean energy.
3. GRI: Global Reporting Initiative
GRI is an independent, international non-profit organisation that helps businesses and organisations worldwide account for their impacts by providing them with the tools to communicate those impacts. The GRI Standards are the world’s most widely used sustainability reporting standards, adopted by 73% of the largest 250 global companies and by 68% of a wider sample of 5,800 businesses around the globe.
4. ISSB: International Sustainability Standards Board
On 3 November 2021, the IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards) Foundation Trustees announced the creation of a new standard-setting board, the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB). The ISSB’s aim is to deliver a comprehensive global baseline of sustainability-related disclosure standards that provide international investors and other capital market participants with quality, reliable information about companies’ sustainability-related risks and opportunities (climate and other ESG matters), to help them make informed decisions.
5. COP: Conference of the Parties
For almost three decades, the UN has been bringing together almost every country on the planet for global climate summits, so as to find ways to reduce greenhouse gas emissions globally in an equitable way and fight climate change. This annual meeting is also called the COP. The latest COP summit, referred to as COP27 as it was the 27th UN climate change conference, took place in November 2022, in Egypt.
6. ESRS: European Sustainability Reporting Standards
The European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) are widely regarded as a key step towards holding all large EU companies accountable for their sustainability impacts. Under the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD), the ESRS will apply to 50,000 companies across the EU from 2024.
7. Circular Economy
A circular economy is an alternative to a traditional linear economy that involves sharing, leasing, reusing, repairing, refurbishing and recycling existing materials and products as long as possible, thus reducing pressure on the environment. This helps to drive greater resource productivity, creating a more competitive economy and addressing resource scarcity.
78% of the world’s 250 largest companies report in accordance with the GRI Standards
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References:
This article is based on published information by Insider, IFRS and Aventis Learning Group. For the sake of readability, we did not use brackets or ellipses. However, we made sure that the extra or missing words did not change the publication’s meaning. If you would like to quote these written sources from the original please revert to the following links:
https://www.ifrs.org/groups/international-sustainability-standards-board/
https://aventislearning.com/top-8-most-used-sustainability-acronyms/