Demonstrating Achievement of Sustainable Development Goals: The Role of Third-Party Certification

While the United Nations’ Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) successfully encapsulate the interrelated aspects of sustainability, they are necessarily high-level principles, open to interpretation. As always, the devil is in the details.

One of the keys to transforming these sustainability principles into action is the development of clear standards, or codes of practice, against which companies can measure their own performance, manage risks at the supply chain and operational levels, and identify opportunities for improvement. Third-party certification adds value to these efforts by providing a useful independent perspective to support internal decision-making and investments, clear procedures to address stakeholder issues, market credibility to support public claims based on verified performance, and market differentiation from competitors.

As a sustainability-driven benefit corporation, SCS works across the natural resource, product manufacturing, green building, food and agriculture, and energy industry sectors to develop leadership standards and provide rigorous third-party auditing and certification. This cross-disciplinary work has given SCS unique insights into the challenges faced by companies in achieving their sustainability goals, as well as the latest innovations in operations and technology to overcome these challenges.

We’ll be featuring case examples of certified company innovations in pursuit of these important goals throughout the year. Please stay tuned!