The European Financial Reporting Advisory Group (EFRAG) and the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) have announced a renewed cooperation agreement, aimed at further enhancing collaboration on sustainability reporting. The agreement outlines plans for joint efforts in areas such as the development of reporting standards and training initiatives.
This marks the second collaboration between EFRAG and GRI, following an initial agreement in 2021 focused on the development of EU sustainability reporting standards and aligning them with global standards.
As part of this renewed collaboration, the organizations have introduced a GRI-ESRS Interoperability Index. This tool delineates the correlation between disclosure requirements and data points in the European Sustainability Reporting Standards (ESRS) and the GRI standards, effectively eliminating the need for “double reporting” for entities disclosing under both frameworks.
Under the new agreement, EFRAG and GRI will collaborate on various fronts, including the development of standards and guidance for both existing and new sector standards, proportionate reporting for SMEs in the EU, and standards for non-EU companies subject to the CSRD. The organizations will also join forces on education and training for ESRS preparers and users, with steps toward accrediting GRI as an ESRS training organization. Additionally, they will focus on the interoperability of digital XBRL taxonomies, introducing a simplified tagging system and digital correspondence table between both standards.
The release of the interoperability index comes after the organizations confirmed in September that they had achieved a high level of interoperability between ESRS and GRI Standards. With the publication of the index, entities reporting under ESRS will be considered as reporting ‘with reference’ to the GRI standards, and existing GRI reporters can efficiently use their current reporting efforts for their ESRS ‘Sustainability statement.’