ESG Acceleration Webinar: Strengthening Your Double Materiality Approach

This webinar presents a novel approach to conducting a double materiality assessment. While the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) requires companies to conduct a double materiality assessment to identify and disclose their most significant ESG impacts, the double materiality approach also has the potential to bring strategic value of the process. By incorporating a strategic lens into the assessment, companies are able to identify opportunities to enhance their sustainability performance, strengthen stakeholder relationships, and ultimately drive business growth. The webinar will pay special attention to the challenge of assessing a company’s societal impact.

A Greener Manufacturing Approach using LCA

Understanding the environmental impact of products and services is a daunting and complex task but using a Life Cycle Assessment (LCA) is a great starting point and a helpful tool to assist your organization in asking accurate questions. In this article, Simon Gandy, Technical Director at SLR with more than 20 years of experience advising clients on matters of LCA explains how a high-level, streamlined LCA can be used to determine the impacts of your organization's product, processes, and services and provides a practical downloadable application in the form of a four-step plan for greener manufacturing.

Co-Creating Impact Summit 2021

The Co-Creating Impact Summit, organized by Novartis, gather experts inside and outside of Novartis to continue the company's work of improving its impact on the society and the planet. The summit will bring together thought-leaders and experts from academia, institutions, business, and the financial markets to discuss the expanding spectrum of impact challenges and opportunities. The all-day virtual event will explore ways of reimagining and resetting capitalism, including impact-based decision-making, impact investing, social impact of access to health care, the integration of financial and sustainability reporting, and the crucial role of leadership.

Updated GRI Standards: What Are the Implications for Materiality?

Last October, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) announced the biggest update of its standards since 2016. Beyond legal requirements, the GRI has been identified as one of the most comprehensive and internationally recognized sustainability standards setter for corporate reporting. Scheduled to be applicable by 2023, these changes require companies to increase their level of transparency and to dedicate further resources into non-financial reporting. One of the key updates is the introduction of sector standards, providing additional guidelines for comparability of companies from the same industries. Another important change in the GRI Universal Standards is the revised approach on how organization should conduct their materiality assessment. This article focuses on the proposed changes and what it means for companies which have selected the GRI Standards as their ESG reporting framework.

How to Strengthen ESG Reporting with the Updated GRI Standards

In the corporate world, sustainability reporting requirements are continuously increasing through national and international directives. In the EU, the upcoming Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) will impact the reporting guidelines of a large number of European companies. Beyond legal requirements, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) and the Sustainability Accounting Standards Board (SASB) have been identified as the most comprehensive and internationally recognized sustainability standards setters for corporate reporting. At the end of 2020, GRI counted more than 38,000 GRI reports from organizations, including 73% of the world's 250 largest companies.

Impact of Sharpened ESG Reporting Requirements

Non-financial reporting regulations are evolving at a high pace – especially in Europe. Spurred by the need to redirect finance towards achieving the EU Green Deal and the Paris Agreement, companies will have to become more transparent on their environmental and social impacts, and their strategy to mitigate ESG risks. But before you can ‘talk the walk’, you’ll need to figure out how to walk, and where towards. This article gives a brief overview of the implications of the most important European non-financial reporting requirements for companies operating in Europe, and how to get ready for them.

Job Alert: Business Consultant Sustainability

Finch & Beak is a leading European consulting firm in the field of strategy, ESG and sustainability. Over the past 24 years, we have worked with more than 150 corporate clients across Europe, trained over 5000 managers, and worked with top-level business schools from around the world. To help our fast-growing client portfolio accelerate its sustainability performance, we are expanding our Rotterdam team and are looking for a Business Consultant.

The Future of Post: Transforming beyond GHG

The postal industry is experiencing a transformational shift, caused by rapid globalization, the outbreak of the coronavirus pandemic and the immense growth of e-commerce. Postal companies provide an indispensable service to society each day. However, with home parcel delivery growing by 16.5% in 2020, their impact on society and the environment also increased significantly. Moreover, the UN estimated that more than 70% of the world’s population will live in densely populated areas by 2050. Increasing demand for freight transport will require effectively managing these impacts, to turn them from risks into opportunities.

Rethinking Value, Emerging Risks and Revealing ESG Leaders

Early February, the S&P Global Sustainability Yearbook 2021 was published - highlighting the sustainability leaders and key industry trends, which have emerged from the 2020 Corporate Sustainability Assessment (CSA). In addition, the Yearbook provides interesting reflections on the new challenges and trends brought about during the last year. This article gives a brief summary of the take-aways from the Yearbook, with a deeper view on rethinking value, and identifying and managing emerging risks.

Register Now for the New ESG Acceleration Webinar Series

Join us for 2021's first instalment of Finch & Beak's ESG Acceleration Webinar series, aimed at speeding up sustainability performance and building resilience in the decade to deliver - especially during these challenging times. In February and March we'll focus on the social aspects of ESG with cases and guest speakers from S&P Global and the postal industry. Join us as we dive deeper into the business case for social impact, Human Resources-related criteria in the Dow Jones Sustainability Index assessment, and the organizational development of ESG.