10 August 2018 – The Makati Business Club recently co-hosted the fourth Global Report Initiative (GRI) Standards Certified Training Course for Sustainability Reporting in partnership with the Philippine Business for the Environment and BDO Unibank Inc. The GRI course ran from August 7 to 9 at the BDO North Tower in Makati City.

The GRI Certified Training Program is an intensive workshop that provides participants with basic knowledge on how to begin or improve their company’s sustainability reporting process using the GRI Standards. The three-day course offers tools to determine if a company is operating sustainably and delivering great value to society by assessing its economic, environmental, and social impacts.

“There is a growing sense of responsibility among businesses that we all have a big role to play in helping achieve the 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs),” said MBC Programs Director Roxanne Lu in her opening remarks. “More and more, companies around the world are understanding that they simply cannot afford to operate under business as usual, and are proactively engaging all their stakeholders to decrease their negative impacts and increase their positive impacts.”

In 2017, MBC committed to support the United Nations Development Programme in promoting business involvement in the achievement of the 17 SDGs. Endorsing sustainability reporting to its member companies directly supports SDG #12.6 which commits to “encourage companies, especially large and transnational companies, to adopt sustainable practices and to integrate sustainability information into their reporting cycle.”

The course marked the launch of MBC’s endorsement of sustainability reporting standards and its partnership with PBE, the certified training course partner of GRI in the Philippines, in this campaign.