GRI and the camouflaging of corporate unsustainability

TLDR

Sustainable development has become a key focus for corporate leaders, with social and environmental accounting used to assess organizational sustainability performance. The Global Reporting Initiative provides standardized guidelines that help firms disclose their environmental, social, and economic impacts to enhance accountability. Despite adopting GRI standards, many firms fail to act responsibly on issues such as greenhouse gas emissions, social equity, and human rights.

Abstract

Sustainable development or sustainability concept has become increasingly relevant in corporate executive's agenda after Brundtland Report was launched in 1987. Social and environmental accounting and reporting plays a relevant role in this context to analyse sustainability performance of the organizations. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) sustainability reporting guidelines were developed as a way of helping organizations to report on their environmental, social and economic performance and to increase their accountability. However, evidence from practice seems to show a different reality. Some organizations that label themselves as GRI reporters do not behave in a responsible way concerning sustainability question, like gas emissions, social equity or human rights.