This summer, Kering, the parent company of the clothing and footwear manufacturer, Puma, not only published its EP&L, the environmental footprint of the company’s operations translated into monetary values, it published the entire methodology as an open-source tool for others to use.
The EP&L analyses the impact of Kering’s supply chain from raw materials to retail outlets and reports the impact in monetary terms.
In an article about Kering’s decision to open-source the methodology, the company’s CEO said, “Our EP&L has already served as an effective internal catalyst to drive us towards a more sustainable business model. I am convinced that an EP&L, and corporate natural capital accounting more broadly, are essential to enable companies to acknowledge the true cost on nature of doing business.”
From making the business case for sustainability to assessing carbon asset risk in monetary terms, and finally to reporting environmental results using natural capital accounting, more and more companies are moving toward currency as a way to plan, assess, and evaluate environmental performance.
This move makes sense, considering we live in the age of global capitalism.
Kering’s EP&L, along with World Bank’s WAVES initiative, the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s Valuation Guide, the Natural Capital Coalition, and others, provide strategies to implement natural capital accounting into the sustainability reporting process.
If your company is interested in producing a sustainability report using principles of natural capital accounting, let us know! And check out our analysis of how Puma stacks up to other athletic apparel companies.