Sustainability accounting

Sustainability accounting (also known as social accounting, social and environmental accounting, corporate social reporting, corporate social responsibility reporting, or non-financial reporting) was originated about 20 years ago and is considered a subcategory of financial accounting that focus on the disclosure of non-financial information about a firm's performance to external parties such as capital holders, mainly to stakeholders, creditors and other authorities. These represent the activities that have a direct impact on society, environment, and economic performance of an organisation. Sustainability accounting in managerial accounting contrasts with financial accounting in that managerial accounting is used for internal decision making and the creation of new policies that will have an effect on the organisation's performance at economic, ecological, and social (known as the triple bottom line or Triple-P's; People, Planet, Profit) level. The topic is fairly new and being led in Europe.

Sustainability Accounting is a tool used by organisations to become more sustainable. The most known widely used measurements are the Corporate Sustainability Reporting and the triple bottom line accounting. These recognise the role of financial information and shows how traditional accounting is extended by improving transparency and accountability by reporting on the Triple-P's.

As a result of the triple bottom level reporting, and in order to render and guarantee consistency in social and environmental information the GRI (Global Reporting Initiative), was established with the goal to provide guidelines to organisations reporting on sustainability. In some countries guidelines were developed to complement the GRI. The GRI states that "reporting on economic, environmental and social performance by all organizations is as routine and comparable as financial reporting".

In order to help finance teams and accountants embed sustainability into their accounting, The Prince of Wales set up The Prince's Accounting for Sustainability Project (A4S) in 2004.

The concept of sustainability accounting has emerged from developments in accounting, with roots, in a broader sense over a period of the past forty years, and in the narrow sense, over the past ten years. The development reveals two distinct lines of analysis. The first line is the philosophical debate about accountability, if and how it contributes to sustainable development, and which are the necessary steps towards sustainability. This approach is based on an entirely new system of accounting designed to promote a strategy of sustainability. The second line is the management perspective associated with varied terms and tools towards sustainability. This could be seen as an extension of or modification to conventional financial cost or management accounting. The former may be more appealing: To develop sustainability accounting de novo allows a complete reappraisal of the relative significance of social, environmental and economic benefits and risks and their interactions in corporate accounting systems. The development which leads to sustainable accounting could be distinguished in several time periods in which a number of trends were evident: 1971–1980, 1981–1990, 1991–1995 and up to the present. These periods distinguish in volume of empirical studies, normative statements, philosophical discussion, teaching programmes, literature and regulatory frameworks.

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