Six Sustainability Resolutions for 2023

Is your business prepared for the year ahead? Do you have any sustainability resolutions in place?

It’s officially 2023, and with a brand new year comes brand new opportunities to grow your organisation and achieve your goals. This includes those relating to sustainability commitments – but sometimes it can be difficult to know where to start.

To help kickstart your new year, we’ve put together a list of six sustainability resolutions to help you make real progress over the next 12 months.

1. Improving the Social Aspect of ESG

ESG isn’t just about the environment. Factors such as equality, diversity and inclusion are just a few of the things that make up the ‘S’– social in ESG (Environmental, Social and Governance).

Whilst it’s common to prioritise improving the Environmental aspect of your business, it’s important to ensure that the “S” of ESG is not overlooked in 2023.

As with all aspects of sustainability – improving on Social metrics starts with gathering the right data. This will reveal important insights on the social impact of your business, the wellbeing of your employees, and the state of your corporate culture.

Acting to actively improve the social side of your business within the context of ESG as part of your sustainability resolutions comes with a range of benefits. Reporting on this data can also positively distinguish your business from your competitors, present it as an appealing place to work and make it seem a more attractive candidate to investors.

2. Start Tracking with Axiom

You can’t drive real sustainable change without the right data!

Collating and reporting on sustainability data brings a range of benefits to your business, but gathering it manually can be a challenge. Using specialist software that does it automatically can add real value to your business and we have the technology that does this – including a supply chains emissions calculator and specially designed SECR reporting software.

If you want to know more about the role that technology can play in your sustainability journey, check out our Sustainability for Business FAQ blog here.

3. Make Individual Changes

Whilst engaging with formal sustainability initiatives and goals are a powerful way to reduce your businesses environmental impact, it’s also important to commit to making smaller, individual changes inside and outside your workplace.

This could include switching to sustainable materials in the office, going paperless or trying to use public transport more. It could also mean calculating your staff’s carbon footprint when they work from home, and thinking about ways you can encourage them to make more sustainable choices.

4. Set Goals for 2024 and Beyond

Sustainability is a journey! Setting long term goals and deadlines to achieve them is an effective way to ensure that your business continually improves and doesn’t stand still.

Whether this is outlining a plan of action to achieve net zero, or creating your own goals that are unique to you and your business – it’s helpful to think about where you want to be at the end of this year, next year and beyond. This will also give you some reference points to track and monitor your business’s progress.

5. Secure Sustainable Accreditations

It’s all well and good claiming to be sustainable – but they can ring redundant if you don’t have the evidence to back it up.

This is why securing sustainable accreditations from certified organisations can be so beneficial.

It shows that your business is being held accountable by an external body and validates elements of your organisation’s sustainability. This makes them additionally useful from a commercial perspective as they can be put on platforms such as your company website or announced on social media.

6. Reduce Scope 3 Emissions

COP27 took place last year – and there was a big focus on scope 1, 2 and 3 emissions and their importance in achieving net zero by the deadline.

Although scope 1 and 2 are fairly straightforward to measure, scope 3 encompass those emissions made by your supply chain. This makes them much more difficult to measure and control. As a result, many businesses are reluctant to tackle them, despite them making up a large proportion of overall emissions (80%+ for most organisations!).

This year, we would encourage all businesses to examine their supply chain and start monitoring their scope 3 emissions. Given their prevalence in the overall emissions output, it’s essential that businesses recognise their importance and take action to reduce them.

Measuring scope 3 emissions allows you to see which parts of your supply chain are the biggest emitters – equipping you with the knowledge to make more informed decisions going forwards.