Strong support for IOSCO’s vision for an International Sustainability Standards Board under the IFRS Foundation

The Sustainable Finance Taskforce (STF) of the International Organization of Securities Commissions (IOSCO) held two roundtables on 26 April and 7 May 2021 with an objective to engage in a constructive dialogue with global stakeholders on IOSCO’s priorities to enhance the reliability, comparability and consistency of sustainability-related disclosures and collect views on the practical implementation of a global system architecture for these disclosures.

Participants in the roundtable included representatives from international and multilateral organizations, sustainability reporting organizations; global asset managers and other capital markets participants; corporate issuers; accounting firms and the accountancy profession; the IFRS Foundation; and IOSCO member authorities.

Across the two sessions, there was strong support for the key elements of IOSCO’s vision for an International Sustainability Standards Board (ISSB) under the IFRS Foundation. The participants were united in their support for globally aligned reporting standards to promote comparability of sustainability-related disclosures across jurisdictions and to avoid market fragmentation. The discussions emphasised the need for a building blocks approach. The IFRS Foundation was encouraged to leverage existing advisory groups within its architecture that provide input to the standard setting process.

The press release by IOSCO on the roundtable discussions may be accessed here.