Can the Sustainable Development Goals support nexus thinking in companies? The case of water

Many initiatives and targets have been developed to address the unsustainable consumption of resources that consider the interconnected impacts and trade-offs that exist between different resources that are critical for the functioning of human societies and economies. Despite efforts to engage with the business sector to achieve these aims, there lacks sufficient integration of globally agreed targets (such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals) into business operations, and even less is understood on how these goals translate into management processes. Using a case study of water, and a consideration of the Water-Energy-Food-Ecosystem (WEFE) nexus, this paper looks at the public communications made by FTSE 100 companies via their annual and CSR reports, identifying that where present, water management disclosures remain in silo and are not explicitly linked to global sustainable development goals.

Automated summary

Many initiatives and targets have been developed to address unsustainable resource consumption, but there is a lack of integration of globally agreed targets (such as the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals) into business operations. This paper examines water management disclosures of FTSE 100 companies and finds that they are not explicitly linked to global sustainable development goals.