ISEAL’s focus on transparency, evidence and continual improvement is shaping how sustainability systems support greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions reductions.

By driving more meaningful GHG monitoring and reporting through evolving standards, sustainability systems can help governments and businesses to do better.

Kristin Komives, Director of Programmes at ISEAL, discusses how sustainability systems are advancing practice and helping to achieve change at scale.

Meeting climate objectives through credible practice

Climate change underlies the fundamentals of so many global systems. We need to avoid thinking about climate as a separate thing, a separate sustainability topic. It should be an underlying element to all of our work: climate change affects livelihoods and business resilience.

Credible standards, assurance, outcome measurement, and claims provide a foundational strength to guide the climate agenda. They shape how climate action is measured, using checks and balances to ensure that emissions reduction efforts are true to companies’ claims. 

Providing a structure for credible action is a critical part of driving change. Companies need to know they have a clear path to achieve legal compliance, to reach and then surpass their own climate objectives.

Credible sustainability systems are well-placed to guide this journey. 

Sustainability systems in focus

GHG emissions measurement and reduction are a central concern for our membership. We have some members working primarily in the climate space, with systems that exist to certify good practice on climate. These systems have the whole concept of GHG emissions reduction and removal baked into their approach. 

We also have members that certify products, processes, or infrastructure, and who focus on a broader sustainability agenda in which climate action is an important part.

Further, some standards include metrics-based systems that measure and track achievement of specific quantitative targets.

Others identify and require the implementation of production practices that have been proven to reduce GHG emissions. Most members with both types of systems have or are building processes to track and report GHG performance.

Our membership is also pushing boundaries – helping define credible ways to track, account for, and share credit for interventions far upstream in supply chains and sourcing landscapes. 

GHG in the real world

Supported by the ISEAL Innovations Fund, Gold Standard and SustainCERT, with other partners, worked to clarify the role of sustainability systems in the ‘climate mitigation hierarchy’ Scope 3 emissions accounting and reporting.

Guidance was developed for sustainability systems interested in creating a transparent reporting system for GHG emissions, aligned with key reference frameworks such as the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHG) and the Science Based Targets Initiative (SBTi). 

Since then, our members and their partners have built on this guidance to refine the approach and support corporate GHG emissions reporting aligned with SBTi, GHG, and emerging legislation. 

Better Cotton, Bonsucro and Gold Standard have also worked on advancing greenhouse gas accounting and reporting for agricultural supply chains, specifically cotton.

Their project explored existing principles for GHG data collection, accounting and reporting in agricultural commodity production, and how this can be applied interoperably and inclusively.

Tackling the challenges behind GHG emissions tracking

We focus on making our members’ systems better, more reliable, and more transparent in their measurement, verification, and reporting methodologies.

We know that sustainability systems may be collecting primary data from the factories or farms they’re working with, but to feed the models that generate emissions estimates, you need other reference data. Much needs to be improved in terms of the availability and quality of this data.

Without good quality secondary data, models can produce distorted results, and it becomes difficult to show the value of climate-friendly practices and products. 

Another problem is how to pass data through the supply chain to enable accurate reporting and avoid double counting. 

Traceability and Chain of Custody (CoC) models are very complex, and there is not yet consensus on the links between Scope 3 emissions reporting and mass balance or book and claim CoC models.

ISEAL’s Chain of Custody guidance is helping to build consensus around model definitions. We are working with many actors in the climate ecosystem to bring alignment around how these models interact with GHG accounting and claims. 

Sustainability systems want to support companies that buy certified products. They want to help those companies report on the impact that buying certified products has on their footprints. 

But they are also interested in ensuring that the factories, farms and forest managers driving change on the ground benefit from sharing GHG emissions data.

There are costs associated with making changes to reduce emissions – from investment in better materials or equipment to adjustment of production practices. Our members are now asking how they can use and leverage data to bring more value back to those producers.

Strategic support: the ISEAL Innovations Fund

ISEAL with its Innovations Fund is playing an active role in advancing action. 

We are starting a collective effort with many members to test and refine mechanisms that deliver additional benefits to producers for the climate outcomes they achieve, and the GHG emissions data they provide.

This effort builds on innovations developed by our members and their partners with support from the ISEAL Innovations Fund. For example, the Sustainable Rice Platform (SRP), Mars Food and Nutrition, Regrow Ag, LT Foods, and Gold Standard are collaborating on a new ‘Low-Carbon’ Assurance Module (LCAM), set to run until October 2025.

This will extend the scope of the SRP’s Assurance Scheme, enabling companies to make verifiable sustainability and carbon claims in their value chains. 

This innovative carbon module will measure and validate the Scope 3 greenhouse gas reductions achieved by rice farmers through adoption of the SRP Standard for Sustainable Rice Cultivation.

Efforts like these ensure that work on GHG emissions data is delivering value, both in terms of impact and encouraging corporate investment and corporate decisions to buy products with lower emission profiles.

Sustainability systems as convenors for good

To tackle climate change effectively, we need systems that define credible practices for designing, checking and improving the actions we take on climate and GHG emissions. 

We can use credible practices and credible sustainability systems to guide governments, NGOs and businesses towards ever more meaningful climate results. 

In addition, the unique power of sustainability systems within a GHG context is as a unifying force, where they address challenges and weaknesses with rigour, demanding continual improvements from every actor. 

In a climate context, sustainability systems are particularly effective at bringing actors together across supply chains, landscapes or commodities to build consensus on feasible actions to support businesses in implementing changes. 

Leaders in advanced thinking

Sustainability systems can lead the way in shaping good practice on emerging climate-related challenges. For example, equity issues around climate adaptation and resilience have often been overlooked. Sustainability systems are well placed to bring these issues to the forefront.

As one example, Bonsucro, Better Cotton, Socicana (Brazil), South African Cane Growers Association, SW Sugar Mills Limited (Pakistan), and Raízen (Brazil) are collaborating until April 2026 to develop tools and processes that support climate action and adaptation among sugarcane and cotton producers. 

A learning platform will be created to help partners to share experiences and adapt tools for future use. 

Sustainability systems are also advancing thinking on how climate action fits within broader sustainability strategies. Focusing narrowly on a single issue can lead to unintended consequences elsewhere. 

Most of our members, even those best known for their climate work, champion a holistic approach to sustainable development, reinforcing the understanding that climate challenges are deeply interconnected with all global systems.