With Sustainability Analytics, Big Data Can Save the World Posted on : Nov 22 - 2022

In the coming years, environmental, social, and corporate governance (ESG) data will be as central to making business decisions as financial and marketing data is today. Pressure from regulatory agencies and consumers alike will require brands and manufacturers to accurately report and substantiate the environmental and social impact of their products across the supply chain. This is a scary thought for many companies because, frankly, getting accurate data from raw materials partners, manufacturing partners, logistics partners, and other players in the value chain can feel like the corporate equivalent of herding cats.

The same can hold for many manufacturing facilities and other value chain partners: without a clear understanding of why data is requested and proper incentives, it’s difficult to get the data you need to support accurate and actionable sustainability insights. Hopefully, the day isn’t far off when demonstrating lower environmental and social impact will become a competitive differentiator for manufacturers and other value chain partners, but to get there it will take strong relationships to make decisions based on shared data around carbon emissions, energy consumption, wastewater, and other data points. In the meantime, however, companies need to approach ESG data collection and collation strategically.

5 Things You Can Do Right Now to Sustain the Momentum

Sustainability analytics requires a lot of data from many different sources. Some of that data already exists and is standardized, while other data is coming from new sources with no established standards. In order for companies to collect and organize ESG data in a meaningful and efficient way, I recommend that companies start doing five things as they begin building out their sustainability insights platform. View More