Grant Thornton Advisory (GTA) underwent a rigorous ESG assessment process by EcoVadis, in which our company was awarded a bronze medal.

This process included an assessment of GTA internal policies, procedures, the data reporting process and activities in the following areas: 

• Environmental practices
• Labour and human rights
• Ethics
• Sustainable procurement

The EcoVadis assessment framework is tailored to each company’s activity, size and the location, where it operates, to fully understand its real impact in each individual area.  In particular, the evaluation focuses on the formal internal policies, activities and specific procedures that the evaluated company has in place for each area and in which key performance indicators are set.

Sustainability topics are assessed against international sustainability standards, the International Labour Organization (ILO) Convention, the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), ISO 26000, the CERES Roadmap, the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights and the UN Global Compact's Ten Principles.

GTA strengths according to assessment include:

Environmental practices:

• Events and training to raise staff awareness of waste reduction and waste sorting
• Materiality analysis in sustainability reports

Labour and human rights:

• Labour and human rights policy on employee health and safety
• Individual development and career plan for all employees
• Employee training on health and safety risks and good working practices

Ethics:

• Incident Response Procedure (IRP) for handling breaches of confidential information
• Fraud, Money Laundering and Conflict of Interest Policy
• Whistleblower procedure for stakeholders to report information security concerns

Sustainable procurement:

• Sustainable procurement policies on suppliers’ social practices

Based on the EcoVadis assessment, GTA has identified key themes to focus on and is currently developing new policies and procedures in all of these areas.

Grant Thornton Advisory offers consulting services in the area of ESG strategies and reporting. If you are interested, take a look at our services or contact our specialist.