Corporate sustainability, ESG, finance and digital transformation news

Insights & Resources

Global Climate Ambition Deepens, But Urgency Grows: UNFCCC’s 2025 NDC Synthesis Report signals

Ten years after the Paris Agreement, the UNFCCC’s 2025 NDC Synthesis Report (CMA/2025/8) sends a clear message: the world is finally bending the emissions curve—but not fast enough. Sixty-four Parties—representing roughly 30% of global emissions—submitted new or updated NDCs between January 2024 and September 2025. While the dataset is limited, the direction of travel is positive.

Unlocking Value through Green Procurement: Insights from World Economic Forum’s New Procurement Officers Playbook

This Playbook reiterates a clear message: the environmental footprint of companies begins in their supply chains. It highlights that decarbonizing purchased goods and services, materials, and logistics represents the most material opportunity for achieving corporate net-zero targets. This resonates with the growing wave of regulatory convergence — from the EU’s Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directive (CSDDD) to the Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM) — which increasingly shifts accountability for sustainability performance upstream into global supply chains.

New standard alert: ISO 17298:2025 — ISO 17298: Biodiversity for organizations – Guidelines and Requirements

Kigali, Rwanda, 7 October 2025 – The International Organization for Standardization (ISO) launched the first International Standard dedicated to supporting organizations globally to take action on biodiversity, during its Annual Meeting 2025 in Kigali, Rwanda. ISO 17298: Biodiversity for organizations – Guidelines and Requirements is a new standard providing, for the first time, a practical, scalable framework to help organizations assess their biodiversity impacts, dependencies, risks and opportunities.

Circular economy - Principles and strategies

Earlier this month on September 4, 2025, we hosted a 2-hour virtual primer on circular economy principles and strategy, engaging more than 250 corporate leaders from 23 countries. These included board members, CFOs, supply chain and procurement heads, operations leaders, and sustainability executives. This introductory session covered core principles, practices, and key policy and market signals to support ongoing growth.

Annual capacity-building 2025 sponsorship

Our TRANSFORMATIVEFIN HUB eLearning Centre is pleased to announce an annual capacity-building sponsorship for two flagship executive eLearning courses. This initiative is designed to empower mid-career professionals in Sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia to become leaders in corporate sustainability and carbon markets. If you are looking to elevate your skills and drive meaningful change, this opportunity may be yours.

How Inclusive Is Your Business? Let our DEI Checklist help you to find out.

Only 1 in 4 CEOs say they are confident in their organization’s DEI maturity—despite 87% agreeing that diverse teams drive better business outcomes. This checklist enables DEI leads, ESG officers, and HR strategists to rigorously assess how DEI is applied across Governance, Workforce & Culture, Products & Services, Supply Chains, Community Engagement, Data & Accountability.

Can Sovereign Sustainability Bonds Bridge the US$ 4 Trillion+ SDG Finance Gap?

This article provides insights on how sovereign green, social, sustainability, and sustainability-linked bonds can meaningfully help bridge the $4 trillion+ annual sustainable development financing gap. It explores critical questions such as: how do thematic bond work? Are they better than conventional sovereign bonds? and What are the limitations of thematic sovereign bonds? The article also addresses what the latest trends in sovereign sustainability bonds reveal, who invests in sovereign green and sustainability bonds, and what policy frameworks support green and social bond markets. Further, it assesses what thematic bonds deliver—and what they don’t—and whether there is credible evidence of impact or effectiveness from sovereign ESG bond-financed projects.

April Edition of The Bi-monthly Magazine - Navigating Trends & Opportunities

Welcome to the April Edition of The Bi-monthly Magazine! In this edition, we provide an executing briefing on the ambitious $200 billion biodiversity finance pact aimed at protecting nature by 2030, insights into the dominant global risks for 2025 such as extreme weather and disinformation, and an analysis of the major shifts in U.S. Diversity, Equity & Inclusion policies and corporate strategy. Additionally, we explore the EU's regulatory shift under the Omnibus Package, which simplifies sustainability rules, and highlight key outcomes from the 2025 Finance in Common Summit, where public development banks united to accelerate the SDGs.

Coming soon: The EU Omnibus Package – A critical turning point in EU’s sustainability reporting regulation

The European Commission's forthcoming Omnibus Package marks a pivotal moment in the evolution of the EU's sustainable finance regulatory framework. This initiative, expected to be unveiled in late February 2025, aims to streamline sustainability reporting obligations by consolidating key directives into a single, coherent regulatory mechanism. While the move is positioned as an effort to reduce the reporting burden on companies, its implications—ranging from regulatory certainty to potential dilution of sustainability standards—are fiercely debated among policymakers, investors, and industry stakeholders.

Amazon and Iberdrola sign new 476MW Solar and Wind energy Power Purchase Agreements

By 2023, Amazon completely offset its electricity consumption across operations with investments in renewable energy generation and was recognized as the largest corporate renewable energy buyer for four consecutive years – with over 600 renewable energy projects worldwide. The company continues to show its commitment to achieving its Net Zero target by 2040.