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Research in sustainability measurement has been growing at a very high pace over the past years, and it has explored a variety of issues, from sustainability disclosure to measurement in green supply chains, from the diffusion of environmental standards to the political use of sustainability metrics. This study is the first to report and discuss the results of a comprehensive review of the sustainability measurement literature. In particular, the authors adopt a wide conceptualization of the measurement process, and analyze data through a bibliometric method–bibliographic coupling. The results show that the literature is divided into eight distinct areas of inquiry and 12 sub-fields, some of which have expanded significantly over recent years, and others appear to be waning. Furthermore, the lack of a comprehensive view of sustainability measurement has led to the development of many separate communities, resulting in duplications of effort, incomplete framing of the problem, and the proposal of partial solutions. However, findings drawn in sustainability measurement research could inform current debates in performance measurement and management in three main ways: by emphasizing stakeholders’ roles in the design, implementation and use of measures; by indicating ways to establish common measures and sharing data between organizations; and by adopting novel theoretical perspectives. Equally, future sustainability measurement studies could benefit from consideration of extant research on strategic performance measurement and on the behavioral effects of measurement practices.

Over the years sustainability practices have become extremely important for companies as well as for the society. Although most companies have developed sustainability programs, as they are reducing waste, cutting carbon emissions, and otherwise enhancing operational efficiency, we are witnessing a mishmash of sustainability tactics that does not add up to a sustainable strategy. To endure, a sustainable strategy has to cope with the competing – and apparently divergent – interests of all stakeholders: investors, employees, customers, governments, NGOs, and society (Eccles and Serafein, 2013; Epstein et al., 2015). In this context Performance Measurement Systems play a key role as they help companies to formalize and implement their sustainable strategies as well as to proactively identify new trajectories that help companies to appropriately reconcile the trade-offs between different stakeholders’ wants and needs (Franco-Santos et al., 2007; Epstein and Roy, 2001). As a matter of fact, in the last fifteen years, various streams of research within the performance measurement and the management accounting domain, have examined the measurement and management of sustainability from various perspectives. An extensive body of research has examined environmental disclosure and reporting - see Berthelot, Cormier, and Magnan (2003) for a review. Other research has defined the concept of environmental management accounting (e.g., Bartolomeo et al., 2000; Burritt, 2004), other studies have examined the role of accounting/accountants in environmental management (e.g., Wilmshurst and Frost, 2001) and issues related to environmental cost accounting (e.g., Antheaume, 2004; Herbohn, 2005) or eco-control (Henry and Journeault, 2009, 2010). Despite the growing number of studies that have discussed these issues, a consistent framework that explores and details this growing body of research is yet to be identified. For this reason the purpose of this paper is to develop a systematic literature review of the practices and methods that managers can adopt to plan and execute a proper measurement and management of sustainability. Specifically, this paper aims to analyse the literature on sustainability measurement and management, to identify its subfields, and to suggest avenues for future research on this topic.

FORMIT-M is a widely applicable, open-access, simple and flexible, climate-sensitive forest management simulator requiring only standard forest inventory data as input. It combines a process-based carbon balance approach with a strong inventory-based empirical component. The model has been linked to the global forest sector model EFI-GTM to secure consistency between timber cutting and demand, although prescribed harvest scenarios can also be used. Here we introduce the structure of the model and demonstrate its use with example simulations until the end of the 21st century in Europe, comparing different management scenarios in different regions under climate change. The model was consistent with country-level statistics of growing stock volumes (R2 = 0.938) and its projections of climate impact on growth agreed with other studies. The management changes had a greater impact on growing stocks, harvest potential and carbon balance than projected climate change, at least in the absence of increased disturbance rates., Environmental Modelling & Software, 115, ISSN:1364-8152, ISSN:1873-6726

Sustainability Transitions (ST) is a complex phenomenon, encompassing environmental, societal and economic aspects. Its study requires a proper investigation, with the identification of a robust indicator and the definition of a suitable method of analysis. To identify the most informative geographical boundaries for analysing ST pathways, we consider the Carbon Emission Intensity (CEI) and estimate a four-level growth model to study its pattern over time for all the EU regions. We apply this model to a novel longitudinal dataset that covers CEI data of European regions at four different geographical scales (state, areas, regions, and provinces) over a nine-year timespan. This approach aims at supporting the decision-makers in developing more effective sustainability transitions policies across Europe, especially focusing on regions and overcoming the well-known “one-size fits all” approach.•The unconditional growth model has been applied to a multi-level structure considering four levels, defined by three geographical scales and time.•The ideal structure of the model would have required five levels, but the sample size of the dataset made the application computationally unfeasible;•The application of the model allowed to identify patterns of stability and change over time of the variable amongst different geographical units., Graphical abstract Image, graphical abstract

Sustainability measurement represents a key element if companies aim to translate sustainability from compliance with standards to core organizational asset. This paper presents the development of a structured dataset of European companies – named as Sustainability Measurement and Management (SuMM) Lab– that aims to assess company’s performance accordingly to sustainability metrics. Data have been collected on a pilot sample of 400 Italian companies and the results provide insights on how SuMM Lab could be exploited to assess the diffusion of sustainability practices in organizations.

Organisations have been disclosing environmental and social information through different tools, including their websites. However, the type of environmental and social information that organisations disclose online, and what are the characteristics of those organisations is still not fully understood. This research aims to (a) identify which environmental and social information organisations disclose online, and (ii) explore drivers of the specific information disclosed. We collected data on sustainability disclosures from 2008 Italian organisations. Results show that overall the amount of environmental and social information disclosed online is low. However, organisational characteristics explain different contents of disclosure. Bigger organisations (in terms of revenues and number of employees), and with environmental and social certifications in place tend to disclose more environmental and social information. Also, consumer goods&rsquo, organisations disclose mostly information related to the supply chain, whilst resource-intensive industries disclose mostly information on corporate social responsibility. This research shows that overall there is still a reserved attitude towards disclosing environmental and social information in Italian organisations, providing little information to stakeholders about environmental and social policies, strategies and practices. This study provides researchers and practitioners information on the content of sustainability information disclosed and possible drivers for their disclosure, this supports their understanding of the conditions where voluntary sustainability disclosure is more expected.