Impact Institute receives prestigious UN Award
GENÈVA/Amsterdam – Impact Institute, a spin-off of True Price is awarded the ISAR Honours Award by UNCTAD (United Nations Conference on Trade and Development) working group on International Standards for Accounting and Reporting (ISAR).
ISAR acknowledged Impact Institute’s work for its improvement of reporting by companies on sustainability and the Sustainable Development Goals (SDG’s).
Executive Director of Impact Institute Adrian de Groot Ruiz: “We are honored with this recognition by this important UN body. Companies that measure and steer on positive social impact have huge potential to contribute to the eradication of poverty and containment of climate and biodiversity crisis.”
Impact Institute (a spin-off of True Price) developed a method and a guideline with which businesses can measure, report, and steer on all their societal impacts. This method (the Framework for Impact Statements) is applied by a number of companies across the globe to account for their societal impacts on all capitals and all stakeholders.
The Framework for Impact Statements, makes it possible to calculate and report on societal profits and losses. For example, the contribution to poverty in value chains through the absence of living wages, the contribution to tax income, and the loss of biodiversity. The framework helps businesses and institutions show the value created for their clients, their employees, and the community in which they operate, in addition to the financial value for their shareholders.
The listed Dutch based bank ABN AMRO was the first bank to apply the method. Tjeerd Krumpelman, Global Head of Advisory, Reporting & Engagement of ABN AMRO: “We aim to create long-term value for all our stakeholders, including clients, employees, investors, and society at large. We use the framework to measure and manage our impact.”
The method fits a trend where more and more businesses systematically account and report on more than just their financial profit, such as AkzoNobel, BASF, and Kering. In the United States, almost 200 CEO’s of the world’s largest businesses recently pledged to strive for stakeholder value as part of the Business Roundtable. This is part of a trend in which businesses are expected to create positive value for their clients, employees and society at large, while at the same time minimizing their negative impacts. However, current reporting mainly focuses on measuring profit for shareholders.
Impact Institute, based in Amsterdam, is a spin-off of True Price. Founded in 2012, True Price is a leading expert in methods and tools to measure and monetize societal impact. It calculates the true price of multiple products and saw a growing appetite for the idea among companies, governments, and consumers.
The goal of Impact Institute is to empower companies and individuals to realize the impact economy. The institute does this by creating a common language for impact through the publication of open source standards and by providing the tools, training, and services to implement those standards.
The methodology is open source and can be downloaded online.
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About the UNCTAD ISAR Honours Awards
The UNCTAD ISAR Honours Awards were announced during the thirty-sixth session of ISAR, which takes place from 30 October to 1 November 2019 in Geneva, Switzerland.
Out of 33 international nominees 7 were selected for the awards:
- Impact Institute, The Netherlands
- World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), Switzerland
- FSR – Danish Auditors, Denmark
- Securities and Exchange Commission, Philippines
- 5. Rat für Nachhaltige Entwicklung (German Council for Sustainable Development) (RNE), Germany
- SAMCODES Standards Committee (SSC), South Africa
- SynTao, China
Photo: Award Ceremony at the United Nations Venue in Geneva. Free to use.
Not for publication.
For more information or interview requests you can contact Michel Scholte by email michel@impactinstitute.com or mobile phone+31 (0)6 165 058 27.
