Benchmark Gensuite and GIST Impact Partnership: Building Sustainability Intelligence

We have been serving our subscriber community for two decades now, offering sustainability management tools as part of our enterprise EHS suite to help them address sustainability management and reporting requirements. In the last few years, we have intensified our sustainability focus as these issues have become more urgent, and our Subscribers have been seeking advanced solutions, especially with the emergence of ESG disclosures and CSRD.  

We have now taken a great step forward through a partnership with the pre-eminent sustainability data and analytics provider, GIST Impact. By joining forces to create a comprehensive integrated solution, our Subscribers will have unprecedented insight into sustainability context, risks and opportunity in their operations, and the ability to execute management actions to guide their enterprise.  

How does this partnership benefit our Subscribers? Even companies experienced in collecting and reporting sustainability metrics are finding reporting requirements increasingly complex and challenging. Companies now need to go beyond reporting performance, and illustrate how they are identifying risk, managing impact on their communities and the environment, and taking steps that will make a difference. They need to provide intelligent context and meaning to their impacts and management actions. The integration of GIST Impact data will allow Subscribers to tell that story, going beyond metrics and providing intelligent insight.  

What does a partnership between Benchmark Gensuite and GIST Impact bring to the table to make a compelling offer? Why does 1+1 = 3? 

Benchmark Gensuite: Streamlining Sustainability Management 

Benchmark Gensuite offers Subscribers a unified digital platform that enables them to implement robust, cross-functional workflows for sustainability management. Guided by our subscribing community, we have developed best-practice-based functionality and flexible configurations to help companies manage their operations, complete their reporting obligations, and drive performance improvement. Following recent market and subscriber demand, we have developed further functionality around ESG data management and disclosure.  

GIST Impact: Quantifying Impact 

GIST Impact brings to the table extensive experience in measuring and quantifying corporate impacts. Their approach is rooted in the ‘Four Capitals’ framework and aligns with the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (UN SDGs). Key features of GIST Impact’s offerings include science-based approach to measure and value corporate impacts in monetary terms, high-level expertise in biodiversity and natural capital impact measurement and geographically precise, time-series data covering over 15,500 companies, and over 2.5 million individual businesses assets mapped globally. GIST Impact provide unprecedented insight into impact and consequence.  

The Value of Combined Services 

By integrating Benchmark Gensuite’s comprehensive ESG management platform with GIST Impact’s sophisticated impact measurement capabilities, companies can benefit from a holistic solution that addresses all aspects of sustainability management.  

Enhanced Insight 

For the first time, companies will have a single integrated platform to view their operational data directly in context of their sustainability constraints and opportunities. For example, they will be able to overlay their own sites, transport routes or suppliers with biodiversity risk or natural capital assessments, to identify vulnerabilities in their operations, and leverage Gensuite’s risk management frameworks. They will be able to convert this into economic impact on the bottom line, and compare this with peer and sector performance. They will have an unprecedented view of the sustainability context in which their operations are located and the risks and opportunities this represents.  This can be leveraged for both strategic and granular decision-making.  

Integrated Solution  

The partnership allows organizations to seamlessly access both Benchmark Gensuite’s powerful analysis and reporting capabilities with GIST Impact’s detailed impact data. This integration enables companies to easily produce insightful reports, providing a clear picture of the organization’s sustainability performance and impact. The data and platform integration allows companies to streamline their sustainability workflows, reducing the time and effort required to collect, analyze, and report on data, and extract insight. It allows teams to quickly move beyond data crunching and get to strategic assessment. 

Streamlined Framework Responses  

Both Benchmark Gensuite and GIST Impact include standard reporting and disclosure frameworks in their product, so subscribers can call upon pre-processed data to prepare and complete their responses. Major frameworks such as CSRD, CDP, IFRS and GRI are embedded in the platform and addressed by the data. From quantitative double materiality assessment (DMA) scores and science-based impact datasets, to reporting workflows and disclosure templates, the combined resources allows companies to quickly identify materiality, assess impacts, assemble and audit required data and generate regulatory and voluntary disclosures. Benchmark and GIST Impact automate and streamline, reducing the time burden, and allowing companies to benefit from existing workflows, templates and disclosure standards.  

Science Based Impact Assessment  

Benchmark Gensuite has traditionally enabled subscribers to collect their performance data and report it in terms of required or common reporting formats. The inclusion of GIST Impact data allows subscribers to add an up-to-date science-based element to their analysis, providing unprecedented confidence and insight into performance assessment. Teams are able to develop findings and recommendations based on scientific data, rigorous analysis and peer benchmarking. Sustainability reporting has never been so robust.  

CSRD 

As an immediate priority, the offer has a number of CSRD-specific solutions. Sustainability regulations and stakeholder expectations, along with very tangible biosphere impacts, are making sustainability management, more complex and more urgent that ever. The CSRD is the latest and most significant regulatory driver that is requiring companies to enhance their data and reporting capability. The Benchmark Gensuite GIST Impact partnership meets this challenge head-on, by providing quantitative and science-based DMA scoring that enhances objectivity and audit-readiness, climate risk assessment, risk modelling and EU Taxonomy disclosure.  

A Game-Changer for Sustainable Business 

The partnership between Benchmark Gensuite and GIST Impact represents a significant step forward in the field of Sustainability and ESG impact measurement and management. By combining Benchmark Gensuite’s comprehensive platform with GIST Impact’s advanced analytics and extensive datasets, companies now have access to an unprecedented combination of data and functionality to manage their sustainability program and support strategic decision making. 

This collaboration not only helps organizations meet their regulatory requirements, but to drive meaningful change and create long-term value for all stakeholders. As the sustainability landscape become more challenging and consequences more urgent, the Benchmark Gensuite-GIST Impact joint offer provides a solution to help navigate the complexities, and contribute to more profitable and more sustainable business operations.