Materiality is the threshold at which topics become important enough to be disclosed. To investigate whether companies are reporting information that meets investors’ needs, GRI and RobecoSAM studied 129 sustainability reports from three sectors, mining, metals and electric utilities and uncovered a number of findings:
Alyson Slater, Knowledge Director, GRI: “Conducting a thorough materiality assessment, based on multi-stakeholder standards, is the best way a business can ensure it discloses the information its investors and other stakeholders need for informed decision making. This is about much more than producing a sustainability report. Determining the business’ most important sustainability topics informs overall strategy, risk and opportunity management and even product design. This study also highlights how important it is for companies to do their own materiality assessment to identify issues, which may not yet be financially material but could be in years to come.”
Christopher Greenwald, Head of SI Research, RobecoSAM: ”This research and our experience from the annual assessment for the Dow Jones Sustainability Indices again underscores the growing importance of materiality for both companies and investors. Some companies are unclear about the expectations of investors when conducting a materiality analysis and this research helps to clarify their needs. While investors require consistent data on the most material issues, they are also increasingly requiring a greater understanding of how companies connect their sustainability priorities to their long-term corporate strategy.”