When talking about sustainable development, many companies have difficulty defining their areas of action. In which directions should I focus my efforts? How can I determine what I can improve internally to make processes more sustainable? And what should I do to reduce any negative impacts, in socio-environmental terms, caused by the operation of my business?

But, in this post, we will deal with the second stage of the process. How to measure the results achieved through investments in sustainable policies and how to disseminate this information to other companies and society? One of the best and most used initiatives is the GRI – Global Reporting Initiative.

This is a global model of indicators. From the beginning, the GRI helped standardize companies' sustainability reports. However, because it is global, it cannot encompass the particularities of certain countries that present greater socio-environmental diversity and, consequently, idiosyncrasies in their management. This is the case of Brazil.

This challenge forces us to think about alternatives to make the GRI more useful and adaptable to the reality of Brazilian companies.

Continue following the text and understand the discussion better!

What is the GRI

The GRI is based on the quantitative and qualitative description of the socio-environmental risks and impacts related to the operation of a company. Used for over twenty years, it is constantly updated to adapt to the needs and interests of all parties involved.

The vast majority of countries in the world, and especially Brazil, produce their reports based on the GRI. Especially in Europe, there is a great similarity between ecosystems, which makes GRI indicators useful and suitable for almost all nations.

Why do you need to update indicators?

However, as you can imagine, the impacts on nature vary according to the type of business operation in force and the ecosystem in which the company is located. Some countries have particular characteristics in terms of environmental impacts.

Companies regularly deal with areas sensitive to biodiversity and directly connected to their production processes. It is up to these companies to repeatedly prove their proactiveness in adopting nature conservation practices. These companies sometimes do not find precise indicators in the current GRI report to evaluate their positive experiences and contributions to reducing negative impacts, which can go far beyond compliance with legislation and compliance with standards.

Suggestions for changing and optimizing the GRI report

Responding to the demand of large companies operating on national soil, CEBDS proposed a series of revisions and adjustments to the indicators contained in the GRI. The objective is to establish guidelines that adapt to the operational practices of corporations and present them to the global and Brazilian GRI. This way, more companies will be able to optimize their performance in relation to biodiversity conservation and decision-making processes.

Check out the following list of the 8 most prominent suggestions for change:

• – Provide clear guidelines on the origin of environmental impact;
• – Prioritize the description of the actions taken by the company to manage impacts on biodiversity;
• – Structure a Working Group to prepare a booklet on biodiversity indicators in megadiverse countries;
• – Ensure that indicators provide useful information to interested parties;
• – Define criteria for comparison purposes between companies;
• – Promote alignment efforts with other company reports;
• – Incorporate specific indicators for Ecosystem Services;
• – Improve the indicator for exposing environmental protection costs.

Companies that already work with sustainability reports recognize the importance of the GRI. Other companies that are taking their first steps towards sustainable development can also participate in this process of adapting the report to the reality experienced by Brazilian institutions.

If you want to understand more and participate in the discussion, learn more about CEBDS. The Council promotes several practical suggestions aimed at optimizing company performance from the perspective of sustainable development.

Participate!