This book unpacks how emerging and established digital technologies (DTs) - from artificial intelligence and blockchain to cloud platforms and the Internet of Things - can transform sustainability reporting and data management, enhance decision-making, and improve accountability across value chains.
As global sustainability expectations intensify, digital technologies (DTs) are becoming essential tools for efficiently and effectively managing, measuring, and communicating sustainability performance and impact. This book unpacks how emerging and established DTs - from artificial intelligence and blockchain to cloud platforms and the Internet of Things - can transform sustainability reporting and data management, enhance decision-making, and improve accountability across value chains.
Drawing on insights from extensive interviews and cross-sectional surveys of sustainability, accounting, auditing, data science and technology professionals, this book delivers a practical and evidence-based roadmap of how DTs are being leveraged and could be better leveraged in internal and external sustainability reporting-related activities. It explores how DTs can enhance the efficiency and effectiveness of collecting, analysing, and assuring sustainability-related data, while also supporting scenario planning, target setting, and improving the accessibility and usability of disclosures for stakeholders. The book further examines the key drivers, opportunities, and challenges shaping the use of DTs in sustainability reporting and offers a valuable reference for practitioners and finance professionals through a concise mapping of relevant digital tools and platforms. It also explores the evolving roles and competencies required of accounting and finance professionals to effectively contribute to sustainability reporting and lead technology-enabled sustainability performance.
This is a must-read for:
- Sustainability managers and leaders seeking more efficient, credible, and future-ready sustainability reporting practices
- Policy makers and regulators navigating the digitalisation of corporate transparency and compliance
- Technology providers aiming to align product innovation with the fast-evolving needs of sustainability reporting
- Educators and students in accounting, finance, sustainability, and data science fields preparing for the future of sustainability-driven business
- Researchers exploring the intersection of digital innovation, regulatory change, and reporting of sustainability risks, performance and impacts
1. Introduction
2. Sustainability Reporting: Origins, Progress to Date,
Current and Emerging Challenges
3. Sustainability Disclosure Digital
Taxonomies
4. The Digital Disruption and Digital Transformation of
Sustainability Reporting
5. Current and Emerging Uses of Digital Technologies
in Sustainability Reporting
6. Overcoming Barriers to Digital Technology
Adoption for Measurement and Reporting Sustainability Performance and Impacts
7. Harnessing Digital Technologies for Sustainability: Benefits and Drivers
of Adoption
8. Digital Technology Advancements and the Future of
Sustainability Reporting
9. Bridging Finance, Sustainability, and Digital
Transformation: The Evolving Role of Finance Professionals Appendix 1:
Details of the interviewees Appendix 2: Survey Instrument Appendix 3:
Sustainability reporting specific DT products currently on the market and
some of the key DTs incorporated into each product Appendix 4: Generic DT
products (i.e. not purpose built for sustainability reporting) cited as being
used in sustainability reporting activities Subject Index
Subhash Abhayawansa is Professor of Accounting at Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, Australia.
Carol Adams is Emeritus Professor of Accounting at Durham University, UK, and Chair of the Global Sustainability Standards Board, GRI.
Richard Busulwa is Senior Lecturer in Accounting at Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, Australia, and Co-Founder of Digitalkeys.io.
Mark Shying is Industry Fellow at Swinburne University of Technology, Hawthorn, Australia.
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