"Rethink. Rebuild. Report. Towards a Sustainable Economy". The ambitious and timely goal of the Amsterdam Global Conference on Sustainability and Transparency is to craft a global agenda for building a sustainable economy over the next decade. The plenary and main hall sessions form the conference’s red ribbon pulling together the latest insights on sustainability disclosure’s role in this critical transition.

Opening plenary

How can we tackle the triple challenges of ‘finance, fuel and food’? How can the power of information help markets and societies find ways to become sustainable? How can claims regarding ‘green growth’ and ‘green industry’ best be assessed? Global Footprint Network’s Mathis Wackernagel, TEEB Study Leader Pavan Sukhdev, GRI’s Ernst Ligteringen and a recorded message by His Royal Highness the Prince of Wales will connect the dots between the challenges we see before us today and the means to finding the solutions we need.

In the same session, AkzoNobel’s Hans Wijers and Siemens’Barbara Kux will take the discussion forward and offer a vision of how businesses need to transform to make a sustainable economy in 2020 possible while explaining how their own companies are dealing with these challenges.

Governments Main Hall Session

On Thursday the floor falls to governments and their stakeholders. In the wake of a global financial crisis and economic recession that has given increased prominence to the role of government the central questions are: How can government harness the power of markets to serve the common good? Representatives from India, the Netherlands, Denmark, the United States and the European Union will review what measures they have implemented or refrained from implementing.

While a growing number of companies report and disclose environmental, social and governance (ESG) data, the majority of companies still limit disclosure to financial information. This uneven degree of transparency affects markets and society alike, with transparent organizations sometimes at risk of being shortchanged for their long term vision. Together with the stakeholders from the European Parliament, Save the Children, KLM and UNEP, government representatives will look at which measures they have or have not taken, and what approaches have worked for these organizations. The panel will explore the menu of policy options in this debate led by former ABN-AMRO Senior Executive Vice President Herman Mulder.

Financial Markets Main Hall Session

Revealing the hidden costs and benefits of our investment choices requires a great deal more information about the economic, social and environmental impacts of these choices than is currently available. How are market actors filling this information gap? What role does sustainability disclosure by organizations play in this development? In the Financial Markets plenary debate, moderated by former Calpers Board President Sean Harrigan, Sonia Favoretto of Brazilian stock exchange Bovespa, Robeco’s Hans Rademaker, Estelle Mironesco of Vigeo, Matt Kiernan of Inflection Point Capital Management and Bloomberg’s Curtis Ravenel will explain how they see the market for sustainability information taking shape and what role they see for their organizations. They will be entering a discussion with users of this information, namely General Electric’s Frank Montero, James Gifford of UN Principles for Responsible Investment, Yale Senior Fellow and U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission Investor Advisory Group member Stephen Davis, and Maria Luiza Pinto of Grupo Santander, in an effort to visualize when and how markets can make sustainable choices, given the right information and how they can best come to integrate these value drivers.

Business Main Hall Session

Zooming in on the largest group of reporters, the business debate moderated by Business for Social Responsibility’s (BSR) Aron Cramer revisits the central question: can reporting help companies become sustainable? Karin Ireton of South Africa’s Standard Bank, Y.C. Deveshwar of the ITC Limited, Mikael Hagström of US company SAS, and Brazil’s Petrobras offer their perspectives on the value of reporting as part of their corporate strategy. In a discussion with Deloitte’s Eric Hespenheide, Oliver Greenfield of WWF, Rachel Kyte of IFC, Frank Curtiss of Railpen and FT’s Pauline Skypala, the panel will examine the various strategies being developed in this diverse group of companies, analyzing the procession of steps towards tomorrow’s sustainable business model.

Readers’ Main Hall Session

From reporters to readers, the Readers’ debate will offer a glimpse of the outcomes of second Readers’ Choice Awards survey. Naturally this second sounding of reader opinion will invite comparison with the outcomes of the previous RCA survey. This year’s reader’s survey has also been complemented with a reporter’s survey making it possible to not just explore readers’ views on reporting, but also to match these with reporter’s intentions. The hosts of the RCA, Petrobras (Ana Paula Grether), KPMG the Netherlands and Spain (Wim Bartels and Etienne Butruille Martinez), SustainAbility (Jean-Philippe Renaut) and Futerra (Solitaire Townsend) will interpret reader’s views in a discussion with report readers led by Allen White, Vice President, Tellus Institute, and Former Chief Executive, GRI, also including: PWS’s Helle Bank Jørgensen, CSR Asia’s Erin Lyon, Celia Rosemblum of Valor Econômico, and Fortune Magazine’s Marc Gunther.

Integrated Reporting Main Hall Session

From the state of reporting today to the demands of reporting tomorrow, it is the “integrated reporting” debate that kicks off the final day of the conference. The session will look at the desirability and feasibility of completely erasing the already blurry line between annual reporting and sustainability reporting. As sustainability needs to become fully incorporated into business strategy, many companies believe it makes sense to link the information that is relevant to all the aspects of the organization’s strategy and its execution. Several of them have started to create a single report, emphasizing the change in their corporate practices. Reporting pioneers Natura (Rodolfo Guttilla), Novo Nordisk (Susanne Stormer) and Phillips, will explain their companies’ reason for using “integrated reporting”. Moderated by GRI Chairman Mervyn King and with the help of One Report:Integrated Reporting for a Sustainable Strategy co-author Robert Eccles of Harvard Business School, Alex Mally of CPA Australia, Paul Druckman of A4S, Ian Ball of IFAC and Ruth Picker of Ernst & Young they will debate the merit of integrating reporting and the obstacles on the road towards developing a framework for such reporting.

2020 Vision Main Hall Session

How should we see the conference debate and rate its conclusions? The final debate of the conference, led by Robert Massie, will draw on all the foregoing sessions and analyze how it all adds up. What are we doing now, in 2010, and what do we need to do to make a sustainable economy by 2020 possible? Dumi Nyoni of Earth Charter, Kevin McKinley from ISO, Roel Nieuwenkamp of the OECD Investment Committee, Oded Grajew of Instituto Ethos and Jerome Lavigne-Delvilleof UNGC, 2010’s leading normative frameworks, will debate the values and norms we need to adopt for this transition with a cross-section of stakeholder representatives including Barbara Dubach of Holcim, Pierre Habbard of the Trade union Advisory Committee to the OECD, Dante Pesce of Vincular, Heather White and Calvert’s Alya Kayal.

Closing Plenary

Even the longest journey must begin where you currently stand. The closing plenary will lay out the “where do we go from here?”: A representative from the City of Amsterdam, Civic Exchange’s Christine Loh, UNGC’s Georg Kell, and Kumi Naidoo of Greenpeace International offer the audience their perspectives on the road ahead and inspiration for the journey. Mervyn King, Chairman of the GRI will close the conference, drawing the key conclusions for the Global Reporting Intiative and its role in the transition. 

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