Thread by @bbaue

@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat Epigraph:

"Sustainability requires contextualization within thresholds. That’s what sustainability is all about."

Allen White, Co-Founder, Global Reporting Initiative, 2013

sustainablebrands.com/read/new-metri…

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat I respectfully write with a simple request:

issue robust guidance on applying the Sustainability Context Principle.

I submit the following simple rationale [in 15 points]:

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat 1. The Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) introduced the Sustainability Context Principle in its second generation of Sustainability Reporting Guidelines (G2) in 2002.

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat The essence of the Principle guided reporting organisations to discuss "the performance of the organisation in the context of the *limits & demands* placed on economic, environmental, or social resources at a macro-level."

r3-0.org/wp-content/upl…

NB: Pls post G2 on GRI site

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat 2. The Sustainability Context Principle has remained *fundamentally unchanged* for nearly two decades.

3. GRI has provided *insufficient guidance* on implementing the Sustainability Context Principle throughout this entire period, until the present.

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat 4. Evidence of this fact is contained in exhaustive empirical research by Anders Bjørn et al, who “systematically reviewed references to ecological limits in 40.000 CR reports” issued from 2000–2013.

sciencedirect.com/science/articl…

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat This research found only about “5% of companies referred to ecological limits in any year,” and of these 5%, “only 31 companies planned to align performance or products to limits.”

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat 5. A 2019 @UNRISD report on Sustainable Development Performance Indicators did the math: the research database used by Bjørn et al covered 12k companies, so 31 companies represents a mere 0.258% of reporting companies who “planned to align performance or products to limits.”

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD See this figure for visual perspective on how this percentage compares to its reference universe.

unrisd.org/baue

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD 6. So, after the Principle existed for a decade, *essentially no companies applied Sustainability Context* as intended — to discuss “performance of the organisation in the context of the limits & demands placed on economic, environmental or social resources at a macro-level”

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD 7. In the Public Comment Period for G4 in 2012, 66 prominent sustainability experts in the Sustainability Context Group submitted a Public Comment asking GRI to “undertake improvements to the Sustainability Context Principle in G4.”

r3-0.org/wp-content/upl…

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD The Comment continued:

"Although GRI’s Guidelines currently do advocate for the inclusion of Sustainability Context in organizational reports, they fail to provide specific guidance for how to do so…”

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD "Rather than devise a specific procedure for how to implement Sustainability Context ... GRI should provide related guidance in the form of functional specifications, or criteria, for how to do so, in keeping with its charge of providing broad, non-prescriptive direction."

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD Signatories of the Comment included @AlanAtKisson
@JanBebbington @sbertels @robert_costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation Co-Founder Bart Houlahan @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel GRI Co-Founder Allen White of @TellusInstitute & @AndrewWinston (among many others)

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston 8. GRI *opted against* acting on this input, and instead, left the Sustainability Context essentially untouched, with no further guidance provided then, or since.

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston 9. In 2017, after a GRI representative spoke at the @r3dot0 Conference, r3.0 engaged with GRI to propose collaborative Research and Training on Sustainability Context, and on the Global Thresholds & Allocations Council.

r3-0.org/gtac/

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston The ultimate result of this proposal was, again, inaction from GRI, either in collaboration or on its own.

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston 10. During this nearly two-decade period between 2002 and the present, @sthlmresilience has introduced research finding that humanity is overshooting 4 of the 9 Planetary Boundaries…

nature.com/articles/46147…

science.sciencemag.org/content/347/62…

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston @sthlmresilience and @KateRaworth has built upon that research base to demonstrate the humanity is shortfalling on all 12 of the Social Foundations encompassed in what she calls the Doughnut.

www-cdn.oxfam.org/s3fs-public/fi…

thelancet.com/journals/lanpl…

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston @sthlmresilience @KateRaworth So all told, humanity is transgressing 16 of 21 critical sustainability thresholds.

11. *Organizations that use GRI Guidelines and Standards clearly play a decisive role in these sustainability threshold breaches.*

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston @sthlmresilience @KateRaworth 12. As a provider of Guidance and Standards, *GRI also can choose to play a decisive role in addressing these threshold breaches.*

13. *GRI cannot do so by continuing to cleave to the status quo.*

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston @sthlmresilience @KateRaworth 14. Therefore, *GRI will need to shift significantly, by providing robust guidance on its Sustainability Context Principle.*

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat @UNRISD @AlanAtKisson @JanBebbington @sbertels @Robert_Costanza @volansjohn @BCorporation @DebLeipziger @aheadahead1 @mwmce @MaWackernagel @TellusInstitute @AndrewWinston @sthlmresilience @KateRaworth 15. I will end by quoting climate activist @GretaThunberg:

"If you really understood the situation and still kept on failing to act, then you would be evil. And that I refuse to believe.”

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@r3dot0 @GRI_Secretariat Somehow, the first tweet got deleted, so here it is again:

.@r3dot0 Urges @GRI_Secretariat Global Sustainability Standards Board to Provide Robust Guidance on Sustainability Context

medium.com/@r3dot0/r3-0-u…

A Public Comment on this doc:

globalreporting.org/standards/medi…

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