Those familiar with the Global Reporting Initiative Reporting Guidelines will know that a good understanding of what is material to reporting organization is essential to writing a good report. Under the new G4 guidelines, still currently in draft form, the elimination of application levels means that a thorough materiality assessment is necessary to know what must be reported and what can be omitted from a company’s report. Without this, the report cannot be said to meet the guidelines.
To this end, GRI suggests mapping the value chain of the organization’s products or services and identifying the aspects. From there, the material topics can be determined.
ÉEM recently completed a value chain diagram for TC Transcontinental, focusing on environmental impacts. This was then used to present the actions that TC Transcontinental had taken to mitigate the environmental impacts. Click here to see the diagram.