Now available - "Carrots and Sticks II", a joint report from UNEP, GRI, KPMG Global Sustainability Services and Stellenbosch University Business School.

Launched at the GRI Amsterdam Conference in May 2010, "Carrots and Sticks II - Promoting Transparency and Sustainability" builds on the work of Carrots and Sticks for Starters (2006). It provides an up-to-date overview of mandatory and voluntary approaches to sustainability reporting and assurance, covering most OECD countries as well as an expanded group of emerging market economies. From its investigation of 30 countries, Carrots & Sticks II found 142 country standards and/or laws with some form of sustainability-related reporting requirement or guidance. Of these, approximately two thirds can be classified as mandatory and one third as voluntary. This expanded report was published with the GRI and Unit for Corporate Governance in Africa as new partners.

The groundbreaking study "Carrots and Sticks for Starters" was published by UNEP and KPMG in 2006. The title "for starters" signaled that the comprehensive sustainability reporting regulation debate is still young; the main course still has to be prepared. Since then, the global financial and economic crisis has sparked renewed focus on regulation, including corporate governance and disclosure requirements. As a response to this, governments have been increasingly engaged in mandating sustainability reporting and in issuing related guidance. This trend was discussed at the 2010 GRI Amsterdam Conference in a debate facilitated by Angela Cropper, Deputy Executive Director of UNEP and member of the GRI Governments Advisory Group.

The Carrots and Sticks series provides readers with an easy reference and overview of basic legislative and voluntary requirements, in a format that allows comparison of approaches across regions and countries. It also examines the advantages and disadvantages of both voluntary and mandatory approaches to sustainability reporting, and provides a introductory guidance to public officials entering the reporting landscape.

Public officials are starting to discover how sustainability and social responsibility poses new challenges to all organizations. The ISO 26000 process on "Social Responsibility" has targeted all types of organizations, both private and public, and its recently agreed text includes guidance on different ways of measuring and communicating progress.

Within the UN system, UNEP is supporting the introduction of measures such as environmental management, sustainable procurement and sustainability reporting, all within the Sustainable United Nations initative. UNEP DTIE has introduced its own sustainability reporting system, using the GRI Guidelines and its public sector supplement (more below).

To facilitate debate on the role of government in both reporting on its own operations and advancing reporting by others, UNEP occasionally hosts meetings with representatives from public authorities. From 30 - 31 May 2005, we hosted a "Sustainability Reporting: Public Policy Trends" workshop in cooperation with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) in Paris. The meeting served to assess new trends in reporting policy and legislation in selected OECD and emerging market countries and progress made by public authorities introducing sustainability reporting on their own operations. Our aim was to facilitate:

• Improved understanding of public initiatives to advance sustainability reporting, including the experience gained in various countries / regions with different forms of legislative, regulatory and voluntary approaches;
  
  
• Conclusions on ways of improving the usability of sustainability reporting, including the link with financial reporting and the link between micro (e.g. company) and macro (e.g. national) level reporting; and
  
  
• Shared learning experiences on introducing sustainability reporting in the public sector (local, national, regional, international organisations).

Conclusions from the meeting are available in the meeting report (PDF - 63 KB). And, as a follow up, UNEP started the Carrots and Sticks publications with KPMG.