Materiality in Sustainability Reporting

This chapters focuses on materiality in sustainability reporting. After an introduction to the concept of materiality in accounting, the chapter explores how materiality has become a fundamental concept in the context of sustainability reporting. Subsequently, the chapter synthesizes the academic debate on sustainability materiality and analyzes how materiality is defined and approached in the main sustainability reporting frameworks and standards. Finally, using a global sample of listed companies, an empirical analysis of the quality of materiality disclosure in sustainability reporting is presented.