Northumbrian Water Group (NWG) has produced its first ‘Our Contribution’ report.
An innovative new approach to annual reporting using the five capitals that organisations depend on to look at the company’s influence and impact in the wider economy, environment and society.
NWG provides water and sewerage services to 2.7 million people in the north east of England under the brand name Northumbrian Water, and water services to 1.8 million people in the south east under the brand name Essex & Suffolk Water.
The organisation has significant resources - employing thousands of skilled people, owning assets worth billions of pounds, managing a multi-million pound annual investment programme, and working in partnership with thousands of suppliers.
The ‘Our Contribution’ report seeks to go further than simply monitoring the performance of the organisation based on its financial return, by encouraging a wider understanding of its impact on society, the natural world, the economy and its employees. By putting human, environmental and social indicators alongside financial indicators, NWG aims to provide a far more integrated picture of its performance.
Heidi Mottram, NWG’s Chief Executive Officer said: “I believe it has never been more important for businesses to look beyond their immediate performance, impacts and finances, and to recognise their total impact and contribution to the wider economy, environment and society.
“The nature of our business means that we have a massive influence and dependency on the natural environment, the economy and the communities we serve. We embrace this responsibility and recognise that sustainable growth is critical to our business resilience and continued success. This is reflected in our vision to be the national leader in the provision of sustainable water and waste water services.”
Central to the Our Contribution report are five capitals that NWG relies on as a business for its goods and services – financial capital, manufactured capital, natural capital, human & intellectual capital and social capital.
The report recognises that understanding and managing the organisation’s interactions with these five key capitals is critical to its future business success, and sets out how each area of the organisation depends on them.
“We need to understand and make business decisions based on the impacts of all our capitals, so that we can continue to provide a first class service to our customers, protect and enhance the environment, make a positive contribution to society and be a thriving and successful business,” Heidi added.
“Our work in this area is ambitious and ground-breaking, and we are excited to see this developing and contributing to achieving our vision of sustainably leading our sector.”
In order to measure performance in the most comprehensive and credible way possible NWG has used PwC’s Total Impact Measurement and Management (TIMM) framework. It has also taken expert advice from the professional services firm and consulted both inside and outside the business. To support the analysis included in the report a number of case studies have been included which showcase the work that the organisation does.
This first ‘Our Contribution’ report outlines the impacts from NWG’s business activities. Over the next year NWG will be working on more detailed metrics that it can use to measure these impacts and their value for society.
The Our Contribution report can be viewed by clicking here.
For more information contact Michael Page on 01268 664862.
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