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What does GRI reporting tell us about corporate sustainability?
The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) is a non-profit organisation that provides a framework for
reporting on sustainability that may be utilised by any company. The GRI was founded in 1997 by the
Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES) and Tellus Institute, both located in the
United States, with backing from the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). The
Secretariat is based in Amsterdam Despite its independence, the GRI maintains a UNEP cooperating
centre and collaborates with the United Nations Global Compact. GRI's mission is to standardise
sustainability reporting by offering advice and assistance that enables enterprises to report
transparently and accountably as drivers of the transition to a sustainable global economy.
Materiality, stakeholder inclusion, sustainability context, and completeness are the principles used to
establish report content.
Materiality: A report's information should encompass subjects and indicators that represent the
organization's major economic, environmental, and social consequences, or that would have a
significant impact on stakeholders' evaluations and decisions.
Stakeholder inclusion: Stakeholder inclusion requires the reporting organisation to identify its
stakeholders and explain how it has reacted to their reasonable expectations and interests in its
report.
Sustainability Perspective: This refers to the report's presentation of the organization's performance
in the context of long-term sustainability. Sustainability reporting, according to the concept, is how
an organisation contributes to the improvement or degradation of economic, environmental, and
social circumstances, developments, and trends at the local, regional, or global level, or how it
aspires to contribute in the future.
Completeness: By completeness, we mean that the coverage of the material topics and Indicators, as
well as the definition of the report boundary, should be sufficient to reflect significant economic,
environmental, and social impacts, as well as enable stakeholders to assess the reporting
organization's performance during the reporting period. The dimensions of scope, limit, and time are
the most important aspects of completeness.
While evaluating CAPGEMINI’s GRI-structured Sustainability Reports. The goal was to see how much
the reports actually addressed the firms' sustainability performance. The evaluation is based on four
basic criteria:
(1) The appropriateness of the chosen KPIs
(Indices of consumer value, environmental harm,
and societal harm) – Capgemini's top aim
continues to be bringing its emissions in line.
Capgemini revealed its new target in its 2020-21
report to achieve carbon neutrality for its
operations by 2025 and to become a net zero
business by 2030. Capgemini's top aim continues to be bringing its emissions in line. Introduced a
ten-point action plan to meet all aspects of the net-zero goal. Their programmes are largely aimed at
reducing carbon emissions, with carbon offsets being utilised exclusively for residual emissions.
Measuring emissions, transitioning to renewable resources, and reducing business travel emissions
are all important KPIs.
(2) Level clarity – (In comparison to other firms in the same industry, how well do the major
metrics describe the relative degree of sustainability) Given key metrices across the globe are
measured and compared against last year report of 2019, however using only carbon footprint as the
key parameters restrict the articulation of actual performance.
(3) Improvement clarity. (How effectively do primary indicators accurately reflect progress?
Trends are documented, and the trends are benchmarked) – Under Capgemini’s ten-point action
plans, the goals are appropriately benchmarked with stipulated time in either cardinal or ordinal
scale. E.g.- Improve the sustainability of offices and reduce absolute scope 1 & 2 emissions by 75% by
2025 and 80% by 2030.
(4) View of the system. (Have benchmarks been defined in such a way that they can be
measured) – Capgemini’s set their benchmark in clear understanding as well as record data to back
up the progress against set benchmarks.
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Should Capgemini adopt/continue this initiative?
Capgemini CSR revolves around three
fundamental principles: people, profit, and the
environment. All of this is to our workers',
clients', suppliers', partners', and
shareholders' benefit. Its performance report
for 2020-21 focuses on measures to achieve
carbon neutrality from its own activities by
2025 and to become a net zero firm by 2030.
They are taking a variety of steps across the
board. They've devised a ten-point action plan
to address all of the issues that must be
addressed in order to attain net zero
emissions. Their programmes are largely
aimed at reducing carbon emissions, with
carbon offsets being utilised exclusively for
residual emissions. The objectives with are
science-based targets that correspond to the
1.5-degree scenario. The reduction objectives
are based on the baseline year of 2015.
Capgemini sustainability report 2020-21 based
on GRI framework includes - Capgemini’s net
zero aim, a ten-point action plan, and a
sustainability report based on the GRI
methodology are all included in the report.
Modules to assist clients in lowering their
footprint, Improved Carbon accounting, breakdown of their 2020 emissions, Key metric views by
region, carbon emissions by scope, energy utilisation and travel emissions breakdown, assurance
statement and benchmark
Capgemini's use of the GRI reporting methodology improves the quality of provided data, as well as
its presentation. To enable a reasoned assessment of overall performance, the report combined
balanced data and reflected good and negative elements of the organization's performance.
Comparability is aided by articulating performance in figures and graphs. This implies that the data is
collected, collated, and published consistently. The reported data is presented in a way that allows
stakeholders to track changes in the organization's performance over time and compare it to that of
other companies. In addition, the report provides appropriate control benchmarks. Timeliness, It
implies that reporting takes place on a regular basis, and information is made available in a timely
manner so that stakeholders may make informed decisions. The frequency of reporting as well as the
proximity to the actual events reported in the report are both considered when determining the
publication date. The data presented in report has been reviewed by Mazars with a reasonable level
of assurance hence it also ensures reliability.
Capgemini discloses disclosures that create the broad context for understanding corporate
performance, such as strategy, profile, and governance, using the GRI framework. The report also
includes indicators that elicit similar information on the company's economic, environmental, and
social performance, as well as how an organisation treats a certain collection of subjects in order to
offer context for understanding success in a specific area.
The GRI Reporting Framework provides tools for management, increased comparability, and lower
costs of sustainability, brand and reputation enhancement, differentiation in the marketplace,
protection from brand erosion caused by suppliers or competitors' actions, networking, and
communications for reporting organisations such as Capgemini. The GRI Reporting Framework serves
as a valuable benchmarking tool, corporate governance tool, and conduit for long-term
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communication with reporting companies for report users. Therefore, its highly recommended that
Capgemini should continue with the GRI framework for reporting on sustainability.
