Who will encounter the IFRS S1 requirements?
Audiences for the IFRS disclosures include corporations, investors and financial institutions, regulators, stock exchanges, assurance and accounting firms, and data providers, credit rating agencies, and financial service providers.
Organisations
The demand for increased disclosures about sustainability-related risks and opportunities has precipitated this new era of sustainability regulations and standards designed to address this need. The formation of the ISSB and the development of global standards is a major step in reducing the fragmentation and uncertainty surrounding the sustainability reporting space. In addition to developing standards, the IFRS and ISSB are actively engaged in supporting the worldwide adoption of the IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards and integrated reporting, offering a variety of products and services to further implementation and best practices.24
Finance functions
As underscored by the requirements of these new IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards, we are seeing a shift in the locus of sustainability information, from primarily ‘stand-alone’ sustainability reports prepared by external relations, or other departments, to the financial statements and regulatory filings of the enterprise. This has thrust the finance function into these activities front and centre, which is a natural extension of the fundamental technical skills of the accounting profession.
Finance professionals
In addition to requiring fundamental accounting and reporting skills, the comprehensive nature of these new disclosure requirements — focusing on governance, strategy, risk, and metrics and targets — calls upon the broad range of skills of today’s management accounting professional.