Our thinkstep-anz team is constantly looking at ‘what’s next’ to help you succeed sustainably. As our strategy experts will tell you, the best sustainability plans include a roadmap: where we are now, what's coming, and what’s some way down the track.
In this blog we look at some global sustainability trends and developments that are relevant for businesses in Australia and New Zealand. They'll all build on work many of our clients are already doing.
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ProductCircular Economy Supply chains (EU) |
CarbonSpend-based EFs to support Scope 3 |
StrategyEmbodied carbon |
Reporting and communicationClimate-related financial disclosures Transition plans Nature-related disclosures |
Circular economy: New ISO Standards to grow trust
Keen to become more circular but confused about how to measure and record your businesses’ efforts? The International Organization for Standardisation (ISO) has released its first standards on the circular economy. The standards provide a clear and structured approach for businesses looking to move towards a circular economy:
✅ ISO59004 provides the important definitions and the six principles that underpin the transition from linear to circular.
✅ ISO59010 provides the framework to guide businesses through the transition by continuous improvement.
✅ ISO59020 provides a common reference for the circularity metrics that enable the measurement and assessment of circularity performance throughout the transition.
Together the standards give you the tools needed to embrace a circular economy effectively and communicate their journey without ‘greenwashing’. By having a recognised standard, businesses can also place more trust in established metrics including the Ellen MacArthur Foundations Material Circularity Indicator which already aligns with the standards. Jim summed up what you need to know about the standards.
Read our blog: Unlocking the potential of the circular economy
Carbon: spend-based emissions factors
Our new Emission Factors for New Zealand can help you speed up your Scope 3 reporting. They build on the financial data you already have and link that data to the emissions from a good or service per dollar spent.
Read more our free paper here. Spend-based emissions factors for New Zealand
Strategy: A lot of action on embodied carbon in Australia
Big news for embodied carbon in Australia! The Building Ministers’ Meeting agreed to include a voluntary pathway in National Construction Code (NCC) 2025 for commercial buildings to measure and report on embodied carbon using the National Australian Built Environment Rating System (NABERS) method.
Emission factors
In the same week, NABERS released a national emission factors database we helped to develop. It includes data from EPDs for more than 2,500 products. This valuable resource will provide consistency across reporting on embodied carbon emissions in the built environment.
The database will be integrated with the upcoming NABERS Embodied Carbon tool, currently in its pilot phase. This tool will enable new buildings and major refurbishments to measure, verify, and compare their upfront embodied carbon with similar buildings.
ASBEC’s decarbonisation dilemmas
We also worked with ASBEC to develop an Issues Paper: Embodied Carbon Emissions in Australia's Build Environment. The project aims to deliver a comprehensive policy framework that supports action on reducing upfront embodied carbon emissions. ASBEC is now asking for stakeholder feedback. Have your say before 24 July!
Product: supply chains and new legislation
Are you 100% sure you know what’s in your supply chain? Do you fully understand the work practices involved? Yes and yes? Then you’re in good shape to keep selling to the European Union when the new European Supply Chain Act takes effect. No and no? Then you’ve work to do!
New EU legislation will require many suppliers to EU companies to better manage their social and environmental impacts. Here’s the acronym: Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD or CS3D).
Even if you don’t trade with the EU, expect to see more focus on supply chains, right around the world. Why? Because supply chains are notorious sources of social and environmental ‘hotspots’. Wages below subsistence. Forced labour. Treacherous working conditions. Toxic chemicals. Polluted waterways. Deforestation. The list goes on.
Read our blog: Another great reason to understand your supply chain
Reporting: climate-related financial disclosures and transition plans
Climate-related disclosures are mandatory for many organisations in Aotearoa New Zealand from 2023/2024 and in Australia from the following year.
In New Zealand, year one of disclosures focuses on identifying the risks and opportunities involved and the general approach to tackling them. Year two ups the ante: businesses need to produce a transition plan which shows how they’ll act on the risks and opportunities they identify: who, how and when.
In Australia, your transition planning kicks off from year one. In both cases our advice is the same. Start your transition plan as soon as possible. Climate disclosure and the action involved in adapting to and mitigating climate change need to go hand-in-hand! And remember to review that plan regularly. Good governance matters too.
Read our Need to Know guide: Climate-related Disclosures
Reporting: nature-related disclosures
Nature is in the business news – with good reason. In the next few years, businesses need to be able to answer these two questions. How is your business reducing your impacts on nature? How will changes to nature affect your business?
Who’ll be asking these questions? Governments, regulators and financiers like lenders. They’re realising that centuries of degrading nature (the ecosystems that make up land, oceans, freshwater and the atmosphere) is not only depleting biodiversity. It’s having financial and economic impacts on businesses too. Expect to see nature-related disclosures coming soon.
Read our Need to Know guide: Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD)
Read our blog: Building the case for nature in Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand