The Intergovernmental Working Group of Experts on International Standards of Accounting and Reporting,
Recalling the mandate of UNCTAD in the Nairobi Maafikiano requesting UNCTAD to promote best practices in corporate transparency and accounting, including by utilizing the Accounting Development Tool,
Acknowledging the relevance and effectiveness of the Accounting Development Tool as a key capacity-building initiative to assess national accounting infrastructures and strengthen the enterprise reporting environment at the country level, including with a focus on Sustainable Development Goal reporting,
Underscoring the relative lack of institutional and technical capacity to adapt corporate reporting environments to the new demands spurred by the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and effectively assess the private sector contribution towards attaining the Sustainable Development Goals in a consistent manner,
Recalling the agreed conclusions of its thirty-sixth session recognizing the UNCTAD guidance on core indicators for entity reporting on contribution towards implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals as a useful tool for organizations to provide comparable baseline data on their contribution to the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals and as a means to facilitate the comparability of companies’ reporting on sustainability issues in alignment with the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,
- Welcomes the feedback shared at the session by member States on the benefits and lessons learned in applying the Accounting Development Tool and the guidance on core indicators for entity reporting on contribution towards implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals for building their capacities for high-quality sustainability and Sustainable Development Goal reporting by companies;
- Requests the UNCTAD secretariat to continue its efforts relating to the implementation of the Accounting Development Tool and the guidance on core indicators for entity reporting on contribution towards implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals in interested countries with a view to assisting them in strengthening their regulatory, institutional and human capacity in an integrated and comprehensive manner and achieving high-quality financial reporting, as well as reporting on environmental, social and governance issues by enterprises;
- Calls upon the UNCTAD secretariat to continue monitoring developments in the standard-setting arena that have implications for the Accounting Development Tool and the guidance on core indicators for entity reporting on contribution towards implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals, with a view to updating these tools at an appropriate juncture in the coming years, as needed;
- Encourages the UNCTAD secretariat to conduct further work required for the implementation of metadata guidance and data collection mechanisms to support member States in reporting on Sustainable Development Goal indicator 12.6.1 (number of companies publishing sustainability reports), as well as to facilitate improved capacity for data availability and collection at the national level and their usefulness to the Global Sustainable Development Goals Indicators Database, the annual report of the Secretary-General on progress towards the Sustainable Development Goals, the yearly Sustainable Development Goals Progress Report and other thematic reviews of the implementation of the Sustainable Development Goals.
