Two years ago The Economist reported on the launch of the results of SustainAbility’s latest benchmark of corporate sustainability reporting with a headline suggesting that nonfi nancial reporting is “too serious to be left to amateurs”

TWO YEARS LATER, AND AFTER A RAFT OF HIGH PROFILE corporate announcements on corporate sustainability, our 2006 analysis – Tomorrow’s Value: The Global Reporters 2006 Survey of Corporate Sustainability Reporting – concludes that sustainability reporting has turned another important corner. For the first time leading companies are talking less about managing sustainability risks and giving more weight to the disclosure of how the sustainability agenda is creating value for their stakeholders. One of the first companies to break ranks was General Electric (GE).