Regulation and sustainability
When you are asked for sustainability data
A large client sends an environmental questionnaire. What you can answer with what you already have, and what not to invent.
Increasingly, a large client that buys from you asks for environmental data: consumption, waste, material origin, sometimes footprint. They are not asking out of conviction: it is being asked of them and they need the part that comes through you. And most of those questions are answerable with what you already have, if it is findable.
The three kinds of question, and where each answer comes from
| Kind | Example | Where the answer comes from |
|---|---|---|
| What you already measure by obligation | Waste handed to a contractor, invoiced consumption | Your own documents |
| What you know but have not gathered | Which materials you buy and from whom | Supplier documentation |
| What has to be calculated | Footprint attached to a product or a shipment | A calculation with criteria, not a document |
Important
The difference between the first two and the third is what keeps you out of trouble. The first two are **collection**: you have the data and need to assemble it. The third is a **calculation with assumptions**, and a figure calculated with no method behind it becomes a claim you will have to sustain every year and that a client may ask to have audited.
How to answer without over-committing
- 1
Separate measured from estimated, and say so
"Actual invoiced consumption" and "estimate based on X" are two different answers, and both are valid when labelled.
- 2
Answer with the period and the source
A figure with no period or origin is useless to the recipient and forces you to redo it.
- 3
Do not promise improvements you have not decided
A commitment in a questionnaire ends up in next year's contract.
- 4
And keep what you answered, dated
Next year they will ask the same and you will have to be consistent.
Watch out
Point four catches most companies in year two. A questionnaire answered from memory today and another answered from memory twelve months later almost always contradict each other — and to the client, that contradiction matters more than either figure. Keeping your answers is not bureaucracy: it is what makes the second answer defensible.
What you already have that helps
Those four cover most of a typical supplier questionnaire. What they do not cover is exactly what is worth reviewing with someone before answering.
Worth knowing
Sustainability reporting frameworks, who they bind and from when are moving, and what is voluntary for you today may arrive through your client before it arrives through the rules. **What applies to you and with what scope is a question for your adviser**; this only describes how to organise the answer with what already exists in your documents.
›Can I say we do not measure it?
Yes, and it beats inventing it. Add what you do measure and since when.
›Do we need certification?
To answer a questionnaire, hardly ever. Ask before investing.
›What if the client insists on data we do not have?
Then it is a business decision: calculate it with a method, or say it is not available.
A real case
The situation
A small firm receives an environmental questionnaire from its largest client and considers estimating figures.
What you do
- Answers with what is measured and labels what is estimated
- Keeps the answers with their period and source
What you get
The following year it answers in an afternoon without contradicting itself, which is what the client checks.
The situation
Figures nobody can back up are given.
What you do
- Answers with what is already measured, and says so
What you get
What is declared holds up.
The situation
What is not held is left blank.
What you do
- Explains what is not yet measured and from when it will be
What you get
An explained gap reads as a footnote.
The situation
The data sits in invoices and delivery notes, ungrouped.
What you do
- Gathers what already exists into a file
What you get
There turns out to be more than it seemed.
The situation
Every year it is rebuilt from scratch.
What you do
- Keeps what was answered with its evidence
What you get
The following year starts from there.
The situation
A figure depends on a supplier who does not reply.
What you do
- Records the request and the reply
What you get
The gap is documented rather than blank.
This article answers
- client environmental questionnaire
- they ask for our carbon footprint
- sustainability data for a supplier
- sme sustainability reporting