The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) operates as an international non-profit organisation and its Sustainability Reporting Standards were the world’s first blueprint for reporting corporate impacts. The standards were developed in partnership with leading international organisations including the United Nations Global Compact (UNGC), the SDGs the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD), the UN Environmental Programme (UNEP), ISO and the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP and amalgamated their principles into one reporting framework.
The GRI standards can be used by any organisation – large or small, private or public, regardless of sector, location, and reporting experience. The use of these reporting standards provides clear and comparable communication to stakeholders on the business sustainability strategy and its implementation. This allows potential investors, public bodies and NGOs to easily compare different companies and measure their progress in key areas relating to sustainability. Moreover, these standards help companies with defining materiality and set priorities, creating accountability while identifying and managing long-term risk.
Last month, the GRI released an update to the standards, requiring companies to report on due diligence in managing their sustainability impacts, including on human rights. As the importance of sustainability grows, so does the importance of adopting the GRI standards as a mechanism for reporting sustainability actions. For example, regulators are studying making it mandatory for companies considering a public listing to adopt sustainability reporting standards. In 2018, the World Federation of Exchangespublished a revised sustainability reporting guidance (WFE ESG Guidance and Metrics) for member exchanges, which is fully aligned with the GRI Sustainability Reporting Standards.