Article · 6 min read
Materiality: the question that shapes every ESG programme
Materiality decides where your ESG effort goes. Done well, it is the most commercially honest exercise in the sustainability toolkit.
Every ESG programme faces the same question: of the dozens of issues we could work on, which ones matter? Materiality is the discipline of answering that with evidence instead of instinct.
A good materiality assessment does three things. It maps the issues relevant to your sector and operations. It gathers the views of the people who matter — investors, regulators, customers, employees, communities. And it forces a ranking, because a list where everything is a priority is a list where nothing is.
Double materiality adds a second lens: not only how sustainability issues affect the business, but how the business affects people and the environment. Even where only one lens is required, considering both produces sturdier conclusions.
Materiality connects directly to strategy. Topics that rank high become programmes with owners, targets and KPIs. Topics that rank lower become monitoring items. Both decisions are legitimate; the failure is not choosing.
Revisit the assessment periodically. Stakeholder expectations move — what was peripheral five years ago, such as nature-related risk, can move quickly to the centre.
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SarvaRitam advises corporates, investors and institutions across ESG strategy, reporting and responsible investment.
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