Today companies like BP are faced with ever increasing pressures related to sustainable development, corporate responsibility, governance and transparency. The fall of Enron and other accounting scandals, international recognition of the "resource curse" and global climate change are just 3 examples of issues that inevitably focus spotlights on multi-nationals and our industry overall. This drives a "need-to-know" demand from stakeholders for disclosure on how we are managing our most significant risks and issues. One way to meet this demand is through voluntary publication of reports usually published under the generic banners of "sustainability", "corporate citizenship" or "social responsibility".
BP has been reporting environmental and social performance for many years, but transitioned to a broader Sustainability Report last year. This new report will be used annually to describe our company's progress on a wide range of non-financial issues, including climate change, worker health and safety, labour practices, business ethics, environmental management, human rights, security, economic benefits and community development.
Industry associations have recognised that this diverse array of interrelated issues, tackled by companies like BP, results in a complex choice of performance indicators. In itself this choice is a challenge for companies when deciding what to disclose in their public reports. For this reason, IPIECA and API have produced guidelines for companies on how to produce credible and successful reports. The guidelines may also provide other benefits for our industry, including improved transparency and consistency of information that associations could report on behalf of their members.
The approach taken by BP is to align with both industry and international guidelines. Using BP's reporting as a case study, this presentation demonstrates the benefits and flexibility of the IPIECA / API guidelines, and shows how reporting can also reflect a company's unique values while responding to the numerous challenges raised by stakeholders.
In 1991, when BP first reported on Health, Safety and Environment (HSE) performance, the company was responding to calls for our chemical business to disclose their emissions and discharges, following a period when chemical degradation of the environment was an emerging public concern. Encouraged by feedback on our first report - called New Horizons - our focus on HSE continued and in 1998 our reporting expanded to include social issues. We also transitioned from report oriented around indicator data to a more comprehensive report about performance against our business policies on ethical conduct, employees, relationships as well as HSE. The World Wide Web then offered a new vehicle for our report and we experimented with this new medium - deciding eventually that we needed both - print to tell a coherent and complete story - and web provide further information for those audience groups with specific interests or for detailed data.
Today our non-financial reporting has moved on again. Aiming for a step change, our latest publication is our "Sustainability Report". For BP, sustainability means the capacity to endure as a group, by renewing assets, creating and delivering better products and services that meet the evolving needs of society
