ESG reporting (a.k.a. Sustainability Reporting) refers to the disclosure of data covering a company’s operations in three areas: environmental, social and corporate governance. It provides a snapshot of the business’s impact in these three areas for investors, customers and wider stakeholders. The value of ESG reporting is that it ensures organizations consider their impacts on sustainability issues and enables them to be transparent about the risks and opportunities they face.
There are many competing standards for ESG/Sustainability reporting including the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB), Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) and many others. However, there is now movement towards a global standard coming out of the recent COP26 conference in 2021.
The IFRS Foundation, which oversees accounting standards in more than 140 nations, mostly in Europe and Asia, announced the creation of the International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) at COP26. The foundation will oversee the ISSB as it does the International Accounting Standards Board, formed two decades ago. It expects to release two reporting protocols on disclosures in the second half of 2022.