Reporting using the UN Sustainable Development Goals

By Phoebe Davey March 03, 2022 4 min read

The UN 2030 Agenda, adopted in 2015 after agreement by all 193 member states, focuses on 17 critical issues in 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). These goals address action against the world's most urgent issues for economics, society and the environment. Cooperation and collaboration between government, the public, the private and public sectors are essential to meeting these goals.

In the words of the recent Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, the window of opportunity for action is “brief and rapidly closing.” Business is key to achieving a more sustainable future and embedding the SDGs within your sustainability strategy and reporting is a first step.

When including the SDGs in reporting, prioritising goals based upon where your company can have the most impact enables real change.

This could also be understood as:

Looking at the SDGs you are currently having the most negative impact on as a company,
Looking at the areas you can have the most positive impact,
Accepting the need to do better,
Then, addressing this through your actions and practices.

It is crucial that you engage with your stakeholders to understand what they think are your key opportunities for impact. They can also help identify key areas of risk and enable continuous improvement to your strategy.

For example, for the gaming industry, Responsible Gaming can be seen as an essential part of Goal 3: Good Health and Well Being. Also, target 3.4 within this goal that, ‘By 2030, reduce by one-third premature mortality from non-communicable diseases through prevention and treatment and promote mental health and well-being’.

Anti-corruption and fraud policies are essential to prevent the industry from being linked to fraudulent crime. This comes under Goal 16: Peace, Justice and Strong Institutions, and the target 16.5 ‘Substantially reduce corruption and bribery in all their forms’.

Understanding which of the SDGs are most material to you, aligning your goals with their targets and then linking these to your own KPIs is a good way to help address these global challenges. However, it is important not to try to shape them to fit your own targets and to actions you already do. They should drive ambitious change for your business.

By including a core data-driven approach, easier measurement of quantifiable change can be achieved. Through linking the SDGs to your own objectives and KPIs, accurate data and metrics can be gathered, but also gaps can be identified. This is essential as it enables authenticity and transparency when reporting, important to everyone from investors to employees to consumers. Identifying gaps where you have not met your goals allows growth too, as your strategy develops to become more refined in moving towards creating net-positive impact.

Therefore, in striving to be a purpose-led company driven by sustainable practices, the inclusion of the SDGs in your strategy and reporting is key. The best place to start is by identifying the SDGs most material to you and including their targets within your own. Then using your KPIs to measure your achievement in meeting these goals, using gap analysis and effective stakeholder engagement to create better actions, to in turn, improve every year until the fast looming 2030.

Sources:

IPCC, ‘Climate Change 2022: Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability’ Link

UN Global Compact, ‘UN SDGs Explained for Business’ Link