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Sustainability of Corporations, Industries and Nations
venkataramanan, Financial Consultant, United States
Meaning of Sustainability: an entity's ability to grow and maintain accelerated growth.
• Growing means one step at a time. Accelerated growth means growing at an accelerated pace.
• Growth can be vertical OR horizontal:
- Vertical growth is achieved by increasing profitability, by reducing cost OR by increasing sales &volume
- Horizontal growth means growing with the help of amalgamation, absorption and takeovers etc.
• Sustainability of organizations, industry and nations requires consideration of various aspects like swot analysis, trends, betas, alphas, market trends, techno-economic factors, environmental changes, cultural changes, nations socio-economic factors and policies of governments.
The metrics used for the measurement of sustainability (involving the sustainability of environmental, social and economic domains, both individually and in various combinations) are evolving: they include indicators, benchmarks, audits, sustainability standards and certification systems like Fairtrade and Organic, indexes and accounting, as well as assessment, appraisal and other reporting systems. They are applied over a wide range of spatial and temporal scales.
Some of the best known and most widely used sustainability measures include corporate sustainability reporting, Triple Bottom Line accounting, World Sustainability Society, Circles of Sustainability, and estimates of the quality of sustainability governance for individual countries using the Environmental Sustainability Index and Environmental Performance Index.
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