Sustainability standards revised for int'l applicability

The International Financial Reporting Standards Foundation issued a set of documents detailing changes to the standards it inherited from the U.S.-based Sustainability Accounting Standards Board to make them more relevant to a global audience.

The revisions aim to help preparers apply the SASB standards regardless of their geographic location, operating footprint or applied GAAP, the IFRS Foundation said in an email Wednesday, but they don't substantially alter the SASB standards' structure or intent.

The foundation oversees the International Sustainability Standards Board along with the International Accounting Standards Board. Last year, SASB and the International Integrated Reporting Council, their parent the Value Reporting Foundation, as well as the Climate Disclosure Standards Board were consolidated together to form the ISSB under the auspices of the IFRS Foundation in an effort to unite the various sets of sometimes conflicting environmental, social and governance standards (see story). In May, the ISSB announced plans to make the SASB standards it inherited more applicable across the world (see story). The revisions came after feedback received in response to an exposure draft that was released in May. 

The IFRS Foundation's SASB Standards Team released the revisions Wednesday in what it refers to as "blackline documents." Further comments on them are not being requested at this time, but the documents will be available online until Nov. 10 for information purposes to allow stakeholders to familiarize themselves with the revisions.

However, the revisions won't be considered to be final until they're ratified and issued by the ISSB, which is expected to happen in December. In the meantime, the team said that stakeholders can submit any "fatal flaws" identified in the blackline documents (that is, any unacceptable defects that would seriously impair application) through a form provided on the web page.

The documents cover a wide variety of industries and sectors, including airlines, automobiles, coal operations, consumer goods, finance, food and beverages, health care, media and entertainment, technology, telecommunications, transportation, waste management, water utilities and more. 

The detailed standards bolster the more general sustainability and climate disclosure standards that the ISSB finalized in June (see story).

"The SASB Standards play an important role in helping companies applying the ISSB's general requirements standard (IFRS S1) identify sustainability-related risks and opportunities, beyond climate-related aspects (which are addressed in IFRS S2), and provide disclosures aligned with investor needs," the SASB Standards team said in the email. "With over 3,000 companies in more than 70 jurisdictions, including 74% of the S&P Global 1200 Index, already applying the SASB Standards, this initiative aims to ensure their ongoing effectiveness in supporting industry-specific sustainability disclosures."