Download Measure What Matters Aligning sustainable development measures across Background

Chris West – Stockholm Environment Institute
For further information contact: [email protected]
Measure What Matters
Aligning sustainable development measures across
corporate, national and international scales
Background
For too long, governments and
businesses have used profit and GDP
growth as the sole measure of success.
Such narrow visions of ‘progress’ have
pushed our environment to its limits
and have increased the gap between
the richest and the poorest.
Next year the United Nations will decide
on a new set of Sustainable
Development Goals (SDGs) which could
transform our global and national
priorities. The goals will be applicable to
all countries, rich and poor, and will
recognise the two-way relationship
between flourishing natural systems
(natural capital) and healthy
communities (social and human
capital). But, the SDGs will only be
transformative if they also prompt
national governments, businesses and
institutions to shift their priorities.
Over the last few decades there has
been a proliferation of sustainability
indicators at the global, the national
(Beyond GDP) and the corporate level
(sustainability reporting metrics). But to
date, these new indicators have been
developed in isolation from each other.
The lack of coherence between
indicators emerging at different levels of
decision making risks derailing the shift
to more sustainable economies.
Activities
Measure What Matters is a three year
initiative with a mission to bring greater
alignment between corporate, national
and global actors as to how to better
measure progress, using the health of our
planet and the well-being of our
communities as our yardstick rather than
economic productivity alone.
We are:
• Identifying gaps between different
indicator sets at the corporate, national
and global level.
• Conducting consultations on
opportunities for measurement
alignment in key focal areas.
• Providing guidance to decision makers
on design principles for indicators
which complement measurement
priorities across scales.
• Encouraging stakeholders to co-develop
the SDGs, alternative GDP indicators
and enhanced corporate reporting.
Project Partners
Example: Biodiversity & Natural Capital
Outcomes
Natural capital is integral to global sustainability, with natural resources critical particularly in low-income countries – to economic growth and development. At
business scales, significant risks associated with natural capital also exist due, for
example, to reliance on threatened ecosystem services or dependence on natural
materials that may become scarce or costly in future.
We have undertaken analysis in four key
areas which have close ties to
sustainable development: Water
sustainability, the protection of
biodiversity, income equality and
employee well-being.
The wide benefits that humankind receives from natural capital necessitate the
conservation of the biodiversity that underpins ecosystem service provision.
However, the impacts that we have on biodiversity – and the benefits we receive
from it – are measured rather informally across scales and with little
standardisation. All companies have an impact on nature either directly or
indirectly via supply chains. However, it is estimated that less than 10% of the
largest EU companies regularly disclose environmental information, and when
information is released this may vary widely between companies (for example, see
the figure below).
Our analysis has highlighted a number
of areas where attention should be
focused to develop meaningful
measures for sustainable development
so that they are relevant, and promote
action, across scales. These include:
The Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD) acts as an international and national
focal point for some data collection, but this data is generally only available at
scales which give relatively little insight into the cause and effect relationships
between human activities and negative biodiversity impact which would help in
the design of successful mitigative action. Furthermore, important datasets which
underpin many management decisions, such as the IUCN Red List, are subject to
data gaps and biases.
An ambition to produce greater indicator alignment and better data raises
important questions which form part of our consultations, such as: Which aspects
of biodiversity should be accounted for, and valued, when we do not fully
understand links to ecosystems service provision? What indicators do we need to
make sure that cause and effect relationships are resolved? What role should
business play in the provision of biodiversity information, and how can they be
incentivised to collect and report this data?
• More explicit links to cause and
effect relationships and how
measurements help to manage risks
and opportunities.
• Enhanced data at local scales,
embedded with a ‘systems’
approach.
• Greater data transparency.
• Development of shared definitions of
success, shared language sets and a
greater standardisation of
terminology.
• Development of meaningful
measurements for impacts along the
supply chain.
• Investment in recognised ‘focal
points’ for data collection and
dissemination.
Next Steps
• Online and offline consultations on
our topic areas and our
recommendations.
• Engagement with measurement
practitioners at international,
regional, national and business levels
to disseminate our findings.
Find us at:
Relative disclosure of biodiversity information within a small sample (25) of large multi-national
corporations – divided into operating sectors - reporting to the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). A score
of 100% means all companies in the sector reported against the indicator. EN11: ‘Operational sites…in
or adjacent to protected areas and areas of high biodiversity value’; EN12: ‘Description of significant
impacts…on biodiversity’; EN13: ‘Habitats protected or restored’; EN14: ‘Total number of IUCN Red List
species and national conservation list species with habitats in areas affected by operations’.
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