This Additional Notes on the Contextualization of AWS Guideline Implementation in Indonesia is developed by AWS Indonesia as part of a set of reports from the 'Boosting sustainability practice and performance at landscape level through good water stewardship 2020-2022' project.

Bonsucro and Responsible Jewellery Council engaged Business & Human Rights consultancy twentyfifty Ltd to conduct a research project on learning and good practice from the experience of ISEAL Community Members in implementing Human Rights Due Diligence (HRDD) in line with the UN Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGPs). This briefing note is intended to give a summary of the key findings from this.

ISEAL's Annual Report 2022 reflects on the year’s most significant developments and achievements to support credible practices, together with the financial statements for the year ended December 2022. ISEAL's Annual Review 2022 summarises key achievements from the Annual Report.

The Good Practice, Better Finance project is an ISEAL Alliance (ISEAL) funded project that aims to develop and test methodologies, as well as improve monitoring tools, which would allow for improved access to affordable finance for farmers. This improved access would be through reward systems based on the integration of farmers’ risk management and sustainability strategies with financial institutions’ own risk assessment frameworks.

ISEAL’s 2020 Annual Report reflects on the year’s most significant developments and achievements to support credible practices. Download a pdf of the report.

This research briefing aiming to inform practice is based on primary research by ISEAL over the last two years and is part of ISEAL’s project with IDH on strengthening sustainability standards to advance living wage goals. This report was written by Kate Robinson of The Outcome Gap, with editorial support from Vidya Rangan, at ISEAL.

ISEAL submitted feedback into the Canadian Competition Bureau's public consultation on the Competition Act's new greenwashing provisions that will inform future enforcement guidance about environmental claims.

This document is specifically aimed at Oversight and Assurance Providers to ISEAL member schemes or other sustainability systems that have or are commencing on a process to align their certification of commodities and chains of custody models with emissions reporting good practices.

This document represents a short ‘start here’ level introduction to the ‘Accounting & Reporting the Emissions of Certified Commodities’ suite of guidance documents. This document is specifically aimed at Certificate Holders and potential applicants for certification (henceforth ‘CH/A’) with ISEAL member schemes or other sustainability systems that have or are commencing on a process to align their certification of commodities and chains of custody models with emissions reporting good practices. The CH/A community for each scheme will reflect the nature of the work entailed.

This report has been developed to support voluntary sustainability standard setting organizations (VSS organizations), businesses, or industry groups that operate, or are seeking to partner with local third-party organizations to develop company or multistakeholder grievance mechanisms in accordance with the principles set out in the United Nations Guiding Principles on Business and Human Rights (UNGP).This document will illustrate how third-party partners can support these organizations in the design and implementation of grievance mechanisms, and provide a practical framework for selectin

Voluntary sustainability standards (VSSs) are increasingly directly and indirectly referenced in trade policy. They are integrated into various policy instruments, including market access and due diligence regulations, FTAs, public procurement policies, and export promotion strategies. This report details the use of VSSs and serves as a practical guide for how to assess the credibility of various VSSs and make informed decisions on which standards to integrate into trade policies.

The ASC have developed an Improver Programme (IP) comprised of a set of procedures and tools to ensure that ASC standards or best practice improvements are consistently and effectively implemented by the producers. The IP model encourages uptake by groups of farmers and provides processes for group engagement in the improvement project. This document summarises joint efforts from ASC and SFP to develop a joint monitoring and evaluation framework for this new IP model. 

As part of its ongoing engagement with EU policymakers, ISEAL submitted targeted input to the European Parliament on the Omnibus Package, specifically addressing the proposed amendments to the Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD).Our recommendations aim to support the directive’s simplification objective while ensuring that effectiveness, inclusiveness, and alignment with international standards are not compromised.

The ISEAL-funded research project Integrating new data to improve risk assessments and detection of forced labour in agricultural supply chains (2017 – 18) is an attempt to build the evidence base around monitoring and remediating forced labour in agricultural supply chains.

This report assesses leading metrics for measuring and reporting performance over time and across multiple spatial scales. It examines six critical sustainability issues: deforestation, biodiversity, water use, forced labour, poverty, and greenhouse gas emissions. The research supports sustainability systems in making data-driven outcome claims and provides insight into evaluating metric suitability. The report focuses on applicability of metrics and data sources, best practices, and associated limitations and trade-offs.

The Landscape Monitoring Framework of the socio-economic dimension (LMS) is a tool that provides practical guidance to assess the socio-economic status of a landscape to monitor progress and facilitates action for development. The LMS targets the stakeholders of the landscape initiative, and in particular the initiators of the initiative, as the main user group.

Sustainability systems are market-based tools designed to address the most pressing social and environmental challenges of our time. They define responsible practices, assess the implementation of these practices, and measure and communicate results. Sustainability systems are used in most sectors worldwide to improve social and environmental performance. Download this one page, full description of a sustainability system.

This guide supports sustainability systems and their assurance partners make decisions about when remote auditing practices are appropriate and desirable, and how to use new technology and data to both inform and then operationalize that choice. It aims to give practical advice based on experiences to date, both on the types of tools and data sources available, as well as some key considerations for successful integration of remote audit technology into assurance processes.

ISEAL’s 2019 Annual Report reflects on the year’s most significant developments and achievements to support credible practices. Download a pdf of the report.

The context in which sustainability systems operate significantly influences the scale, depth and durability of their impacts. This is an important consideration when designing new strategies to improve sustainability performance. To provide support in this area, we have developed the following resources:

Aquaculture improvement projects (AIPs) have recently emerged as a new form of market-based and non-state governance in the aquaculture sector (Bottema, 2019). They embody multi-stakeholder efforts that leverage the influence of the private sector to drive improvements in aquaculture production and ensure that these changes endure through improved policy and management strategies (Sustainable Fisheries Partnership (SFP), 2019).

The last five years have seen a growing number of initiatives focused on increasing demand for sustainable palm oil in emerging economy markets. This report and case studies summarise key reflections and insights from an ISEAL-led project to understand strategies and activities adopted in key Asian countries to boost the demand for sustainable palm oil over the last five years.

This report summarizes the key lessons learnt by each of the key stakeholder groups from participation in the ASC Improver Programme pilot. The ASC standards set principles, criteria, indicators, and measurable performance levels for environmentally and socially responsible aquaculture. However, producers carry the responsibility to implement these standards at their farms, where smaller operations may have financial or technical constraints.

ISEAL has contributed to the European Financial Reporting Advisory Group's (EFRAG) public consultation on the amended European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) exposure drafts.ISEAL welcomes EFRAG's efforts to simplify the ESRS and reduce datapoints while retaining the core objectives of the EU Green Deal. ISEAL notes how voluntary sustainability systems (VSS) strategically algin with EFRAG's ESRS objectives.