GEMI Releases Quick Guide on Materiality

WASHINGTON, Sept. 10, 2015 /PRNewswire-USNewswire/ -- The Global Environmental Management Initiative (GEMI) today announced the availability of a new solution toolkit, the GEMI Quick Guide on Materiality.

The GEMI Quick Guide on Materiality is designed to help corporations: understand materiality and its relationship to sustainability; recognize the importance of materiality in defining an appropriate sustainability strategy; and learn what factors to consider when undertaking a materiality assessment.

"Materiality provides corporate sustainability leaders a valuable tool to enhance understanding of the social, environmental and governance issues of highest priority to a business and its stakeholders, and to help ensure strategic alignment with those most critical issues," said Stan Mierzejewski, senior manager, Sustainability, Tennant Company and tools chair for GEMI. "Businesses small and large can benefit from undertaking a materiality assessment that helps a company focus valuable resources where they matter most."

"GEMI's Quick Guide series provides a closer look into the methods leading corporations use to address sustainability topics," said Bill Gill, assistant vice president, Environmental Affairs, Smithfield Foods, and chair, GEMI. "The GEMI Quick Guides incorporate members' experiences and support GEMI's mission of collaborating for sustainable business solutions."

"It's critical that any organization undertaking a materiality assessment understand the different approaches, tools, definitions, and best practices," said Dan Daggett, executive director, Sustainability, Sealed Air, and vice-chair, GEMI. "This guide is designed to help companies at any level of implementation define an approach that is ideally suited for their business needs.  The strength of the latest GEMI Quick Guide is that it makes materiality assessments achievable for all organizations and ensures the results will be useful to guide sustainability strategy."

The GEMI Quick Guide on Materiality includes contributions from Ashland Inc., Carnival Corporation & plc, FedEx, Sealed Air, Smithfield Foods, Tennant Company and Union Pacific.

For more information about this GEMI Quick Guide, or opportunities to participate in the development of future GEMI Quick Guides addressing sustainability topics, please contact Kellen Mahoney.  All GEMI Quick Guides published to date may be downloaded for free at http://www.gemi.org/solutions/solutions-quick-guides/

About GEMI
GEMI is the global leader in developing insights, networking, and creating collaborative sustainability solutions for business. For 25 years, GEMI has captured the vision and experience of global corporate environmental, health and safety (EHS) and sustainability leaders from diverse business sectors through the development of a wide range of publicly-available, solutions-based tools designed to help companies improve the environment, their operations and add business value.

For More Information Contact:
Lyle E. Orwig: 262-563-5100

SOURCE GEMI