SustainabilityHQ.com Weekly Highlights June 18, 2014

What Matters in Corporate Sustainability Reporting?
New Analysis Report From G&A Institute Answers Questions

The S&P 500 Index®  managed by S&P Dow Jones Indices (McGraw Hill Financial) is closely followed – this important benchmark reflects the conditions of the large cap public companies in the US equities market and the national economy.  (Ticker: SPX)  More than US$5 trillion in assets are benchmarked to the index, and $1.6 trillion in index assets of the total – this captures 80% coverage of available market capitalization.

The “big names” in the S&P 500 include Apple, ExxonMobil, Microsoft, IBM, Wal-Mart Stores, Wells Fargo, Pfizer, Coca Cola, Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Labs, McDonald’s, Caterpillar, Ford Motor, Honeywell…and many more.

The Governance & Accountability Institute team has been closely monitoring and analyzing the S&P 500, and in 2011 and 2012 performed research to answer the question…”Corporate Sustainability Reporting – Does It Matter?”  The team looked at the important third party recognitions earned by corporate sustainability leaders (and the answer was, yes sustainability disclosure and reporting does matter).  For the 2013 examination, G&A’s Louis Coppola, as report architect, looked at the S&P 500 and beyond, to global peers, to research the question…what matters in corporate sustainability reporting.

That is – what is considered to be material for company managements and the report readers (shareholders, internal and external stakeholders) and therefore included in the reports using the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) framework for their reporting. As we announced recently in our “Flash Report,” 72% of the S&P 500 companies were publishing a report in 2013. What did those companies and 700 others consider to be “material?”

The report just being released by G&A answers the question.  Louis and the G&A team examined the reporting of 1, 286 companies in the 35 sectors as classified by GRI, analyzing all 84 indicators of the framework.  This comprehensive effort provides a clear picture of what companies using the GRI framework for their sustainability / corporate responsibility reporting consider to be “most” to “least” material and everything in between.

More information is available at:  www.ga-institute.com/sustainability-what-matters
The complete analysis for each sector is available for purchase at:
www.ga-institute.com/getall84

This is just a sample of some of the articles from this weeks SustainabilityHQ Highlights.  You can view the full Highlights by using the following links. Sustainability | ESG, Highlights for the Week of June 18, 2014