This report offers lessons learned on how interoperability of sustainability standards in the metals, minerals and metals (MMM) sectors can help standards systems in other sectors. In particular, it explores how MMM, forestry and agriculture standards can enhance collaboration and improve sustainability impacts through interoperability.

Benchmarking guide for analysing or evaluating sustainability initiatives or performance.

This desk research is an output from the Delta Framework, an ISEAL Innovations Fund supported project that is developing a cross-commodity framework for sustainability monitoring and reporting.

The document at the bottom of this page provides a high level summary of what polygon location data is and why it is of significant value to sustainability standards. It aims to encourage decision makers within systems to consider the operational collection and use of polygon data within their organisations.

Six years ago, ISEAL published a comprehensive review and synthesis of existing literature and evidence of the business benefits of using sustainability standards.

The presentation given by Kristin Komives and Vidya Rangan at the Global Sutainability Standards Symposium 2019, running through the current state of available evidence on the impacts of sustainability standards and similar systems.

Improving the flow of sustainability information through a new standardised metadata set

There is now wide recognition that the ongoing pandemic has had a profound impact on women across all dimensions of economic and social activity. From shifting gender roles within the household to effects on women’s active role in the economy and the real health and well-being effects of the pandemic, there is a growing concern that women are ‘losing out’ severely. From the standpoint of sustainability standards and systems, the pandemic has opened up the opportunity to review many streams of work, including how they conduct their assurance activities.

This case study forms part of the Rainforest Alliance project Use of Risk Maps for Child and Forced Labour in Risk-Based Assurance Processes, supported by the ISEAL Innovations Fund. The project sought to test the prototypes of sectoral risk maps for child labor and forced labor in Kenya, Côte d’Ivoire, and Honduras.

This research aims to contribute evidence of the Impacts of Voluntary Sustainability Standards as well as provide a working definition for the concept of systemic impacts.

FPIC-360° is an Equitable Origin initiative in partnership with the Roundtable on Sustainable Biomaterials (RSB) and the Coordinator of Indigenous Organizations of the Amazon River Basin (COICA).  The FPIC-360° Tool for monitoring and verifying free, prior and informed consent (FPIC) is a multi-pronged tool, founded on the premise that FPIC can only be conducted responsibly and successfully if the Indigenous Peoples affected by a proposed project are co-owners and implementers of the entire process, from design, through implementation and monitoring phases.

This report looks at the issues facing small certified producers and their expectations and experiences of certification, and explores how standards can address producers’ needs and priorities.

This document provides practical guidance for sustainability systems to support them in generating valuable and actionable insights from data. Utilizing concepts in data science, it is intended for sustainability systems seeking to maximise the value of their data, combine data sources, and enable improved data-driven decision making procedures.

Learn how a partnership between the government of the world’s largest coffee producing state – Minas Gerais – and the world’s largest voluntary standard for coffee, UTZ Certified, enables producers access to high-value markets while scaling-up more sustainable production practices.

A concise document that outlines the key lessons learned from the VIA Initiative.

This document summarises the results of a pilot project coordinated by ISEAL to face the challenge of communicating the impacts of standards. It also reflects on the value of this pilot as a rich learning experience for all the individuals involved.

An introduction to the new GIS self-starter kit, which gives a glimpse of the possibilities of GIS and how the tools can be integrated into audit routines. The self-starter kit explains what GIS is, introduces some commonly used GIS software and applications and describes how to use them.

A conversation with Danielle Burt on the Gender Equality and Empowerment Benchmark developed by the World Benchmarking Alliance (WBA). Sanjiv Singh (ASI), Chris Grieve (EDGE Certification) and Magali Barraja (BSR), on the discussion panel, will share their thoughts on this initiative.

Rainforest Alliance reports on and receives feedback for their public consultation on the new sustainable agriculture standard.

Credible sustainability standards have created tried and tested structures for operationalising sustainability across various regions, sectors and supply chains. How can governments and businesses capitalise on their success to proactively drive sustainability? Join ISEAL, ISEAL members, and other benchmarking experts as we discuss how rigorous, transparent and consistent benchmarking can help to operationalise due diligence requirements and make sustainability tools more accessible. Our experienced panellists discussed the aims behind the development of these benchmarking frameworks, how to ensure they encourage adoption of credible standards among governments and businesses, and possible paths forward – as well as referencing available tools and guidance.

This resource includes the recording, slides and agenda of the first learning workshop of the remote auditing project.

This resource includes the recording and slides of the second learning workshop of the remote auditing project.

An introduction to the World Benchmarking Alliance.

Understanding whether sustainability standards make a difference on the ground is an ongoing concern for sustainability standards and for the many businesses and governments that rely on them to operationalize sustainability in supply chains and landscapes.

The shift in recent years towards a more sustainable global economy has seen an increasing focus on how businesses address human rights and potential labour exploitation in their supply chains. Companies are now expected to go beyond public commitments, and face the task of operationalising human rights policies in a transparent fashion. Credible standards organisations have proven to be important tools to bridge the implementation gap of these policies, raising the question of how standards systems are equipped to identify forced labour and what happens when cases are detected.