Stepping Forward: Corporate Sustainability Reporting in Canada

A comprehensive survey of corporate sustainability reporting in Canada, published in November 2001 by the business consultancy Stratos, concluded that there is a wide range of good practices in the reporting of environmental, social and economic performance by Canadian corporations, but that there is still much room for improvement. A total of 35 company reports were assessed and scored on a variety of criteria, grouped into ten categories:

1. Context and coverage;
2. Leadership and direction;
3. Policies, organization and management systems;
4. Stakeholder relations;
5. Environmental performance;
6. Economic performance;
7. Social performance;
8. Integrated performance;
9. Extending influence upstream and downstream;
10. Trust, accountability and accessibility.

Stepping Forward found that:

• The number of reporting companies in Canada is growing, with 57 companies identified that publish detailed environmental, social or sustainability reports – but the vast majority of Canadian companies do not;
• Most of these were in the resource sectors with the highest proportion of reporters in the electric utilities and forestry sectors, and a striking absence of reporters from the agriculture, pharmaceutical and manufacturing sectors;
• Around 25% of the largest 100 Canadian companies produce sustainability reports, placing Canada in the middle of the pack relative to European and US companies;
• The quality of reports, based on the Stratos 'GRI plus' methodology, varies widely - both between companies and across the ten assessment categories listed above. Only a quarter of the reports scored more than 70 out of 156;
• Increasingly, reporters are covering the multiple dimensions of sustainability (environmental, economic and social) in their reports; however, many reports side-step tough issues and focus only on 'good news';
• Reporting of environmental performance data varied widely, and in many cases was patchy; companies generally focused on reporting emissions, and less on production inputs and impacts 'beyond the facility gate';
• On the social side, encouraging examples of performance indicators are in use by a number of companies; however, most still need to look beyond health and safety and community philanthropy to a broader coverage of social and ethical issues;
• The next step is for reporters to move beyond reporting on regulated risks to a more outward-looking focus on business challenges and opportunities associated with corporate sustainability.

Click here to download a copy of the report from the Stratos website.

And click here for the 2002 update to that report.