Updating the Informational and Control Practices in the Sustainability Agenda
Authors: Odintsova Tatyana 
Published: June 2024

Research purpose.

The sustainability concept embraces a wide scope of linked practices: green thinking, sustainability informational and management assurance, ESG reporting and scoring, responsible and impact investment, stability measurements, and others. Significantly expanding beneficiary's and stakeholders' circle needs information to build and implement a policy providing ESG values creation and meeting their requirements in relevant sustainable agenda. This is why it is important to create a transparent information landscape and to shape new highlights in management and decision-making. The article is aimed at exploring specific ways to transform information and management practices, primarily accounting, ESG-reporting, analysis, and assurance to create a transparent information environment for sustainability.

Design / Methodology / Approach.

The study is designed as a qualitative analysis of existing information and related practices to identify gaps in the information needed by stakeholders for decision-making with that practically generated in the current environmental momentum. It involves summarising, categorizing, and interpreting open access sources data, such as unidirectional studies, non-financial reporting and ESG-rankings databases, program documents, frameworks and standards for sustainability and "responsible" reporting, professional audit analytics, and others. Logical and comparative analysis was used for data processing. The study’s theoretical framework is based on accounting theories, particularly the Interpretative paradigm.

Findings.

The possibilities were assessed following proposed approaches to upgrade the up-to-date system of informational-verifying appraisal practices by the requirements of a proper ESG environment. A holistic system layout was suggested, including information and control practices employed to provide sustainability. The main part of the recommendations refers to accounting and reporting for sustainability. New accounting ESG objects to display in this system were identified. It developed an integrated balance model of total capitals and their sources engaged and ESG -value-creating, taking for the basis traditional balance theory. Given the diversity of corporate non-financial reporting, classification characteristics for ESG reporting were suggested, and two key models of ESG reporting were defined. Recommendations were made in the field of design and methodology for information support of sustainability.

Originality / Value / Practical implications.

The article is the author's vision of the problems and ways of advancing traditional information practices in the context of global sustainability management requests. Recommendations for the holistic system of sustainability governance, informational support creation, transformation of accounting, ESG-reporting, other linked practices, streamlining, and methodological development of information activities that can be used in the practical field and employed in programmatic, advisory, and regulatory documents that structure the information field of socio-economic life.