Sustainability Frameworks and Standards in Practice

Organisations reporting on climate and nature work with several frameworks at once. The overlaps and the gaps between them are where reporting teams carry the most risk. This course sets them side by side in three groups. The target-setting frameworks: the Science Based Targets initiative (SBTi) and its nature counterpart, the Science Based Targets Network (SBTN). The disclosure frameworks: the Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures (TNFD), GRI, and the ISSB standards. The regulatory and methodological stack: the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) with the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS), the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD), the GHG Protocol, and ISO. The goal is for teams to lead on sustainability and critically appraise standards instead of seeking compliance without sound directionality.

The course first sets out the sustainability goal as a reference frame, then introduces each framework in the order it emerged, so participants can see which need or gap each one answered. For each framework it covers the scope, whether it is a disclosure standard or a methodological one, whether it sets a threshold, and the opportunities and difficulties it brings. For each, it also names what the framework leaves open or unaddressed.

The morning covers the state of climate and nature, the frameworks and the reporting layer above them. In the afternoon participants map their own framework stack, run a gap analysis against it, and test whether their approach adds up to the sustainability goal or only to compliance.

Participants leave with a map of their stack, a list of its gaps and overlaps, a view of which framework should drive which decision, and a clear account of what each framework contributes. The course favours no single framework or method, APres™ included.