ESG Reporting and Sustainability Support for SMEs and Supply Chains

Working with a sustainability consultant offers numerous benefits for businesses aiming to enhance their environmental, social, and economic impact. A consultant provides expert guidance in auditing, identifying and implementing sustainable practices that can lead to cost savings through energy efficiency, waste reduction, and optimised resource use. 

Sustainability and ESG consultants help businesses navigate complex regulations and standards, ensuring compliance and therefore reducing legal risks. They can also help to improve a company’s overall reputation by aligning its operations with socially responsible practices, which can attract eco-conscious customers and investors. Sustainability consultants also focus on long-term strategic planning, enabling businesses to strive towards achieving key environmental improvements.

Sustainability consulting is typically divided into three primary categories: audits, testing, and verification; technical or educational assistance; and strategic planning. While these services all align with overarching sustainability objectives, each one focuses on distinct areas of a company’s operations.

An ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) consultant, a sustainability consultant, and an environmental consultant all focus on helping businesses operate more responsibly, but they focus on different areas of corporate responsibility;

ESG consultants focus on a company’s performance across three core areas—Environmental, Social, and Governance. They help businesses assess and improve their practices in areas like carbon footprint, diversity, ethics, and corporate governance. The objective of an ESG consultant is to align the company’s operations with investor expectations, regulatory requirements, and broader social responsibilities..

A Sustainability Consultant typically takes a broader view, aiming to support businesses in developing sustainability strategies and practices that focus on long-term environmental, social, and economic sustainability. This can include everything from reducing waste and energy use, to ensuring sustainability within the supply chain and promoting social responsibility within the company.

Environmental consultants specifically focus on the environmental aspects of a business’s operations. They assess environmental impact, help support compliance to environmental regulations, and develop strategies to mitigate negative environmental effects, such as pollution, waste, and resource depletion.

An ESG strategy provides your business with a practical plan to put the three pillars of sustainability – Environmental, Social and Governance – at the heart of your operation. It provides businesses with a framework to set their priorities and collect data to track and report on progress. The strategy allows companies to measure their impact on each of the pillars and identifies ways to mitigate risks and drive positive interventions that benefit the triple bottom line of people, profit and planet. 

Although sustainability is about more than decarbonisation, working towards meeting our Net Zero commitments is critical. To be a sustainable business you should measure, track and report on your Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions. You can then set ambitious but achievable targets to reduce your carbon footprint. This will not only help you respond to pressure from regulators and customers but will also give you a competitive advantage by reducing costs and driving efficiencies.

The first step to becoming a sustainable business is to understand your current position. You can achieve this by taking a deep dive into your operations and analyse everything you do through a sustainability lens. Understand the impacts you are having and what is important, or material, to your various stakeholders. Use this to shape your priorities so that you can devise a strategy that reduces negative impacts on people and planet whilst highlighting opportunities for positive interventions.

Carbon calculations are what we use to measure the carbon footprint of your business. It is important to establish this baseline of Greenhouse Gas (GHG) emissions so that you have the information you need to set targets for decarbonisation and track progress along your sustainability journey. Calculations are split into three scopes encompassing the direct emissions your business causes through its operations, emissions from the energy you buy and indirect emissions from further down your value chain. There are a variety of carbon calculation tools and platforms available to provide you with the insight you need to make more sustainable choices and support the transition to Net Zero.