Global Carbon Exchange partners CarbonSystems

South African legislation will soon require companies to account for their carbon emissions as well as other non-traditional data such as energy, sustainability efforts, environmental performance and corporate social investment. This is in accordance with The South African Climate Change White Paper, released in October 2011, which announced that carbon budgets would become the norm within the next two years, as well as specific reporting formats which will be phased in over a similar period.

"Companies face major challenges in terms of data integrity and transparency, particularly regarding data required to measure organisational and supply chain footprints, which have not traditionally been measured and monitored by most organisations," says Kevin James, CEO of GCX.

Platform integrates into current management systems

The enterprise sustainability platform supports organisations by reducing the time and cost associated with the management of sustainability data. The system also delivers up to date financial grade voluntary reporting and accounts for compliance reporting. It fully integrates into an organisation's current enterprise management systems whilst driving operational efficiency and cost savings, and verifying ROI on all sustainability initiatives.

"The adoption in South Africa is still relatively low, largely because companies are still learning about the new technology. There have however been a few early adopters whom are already bearing the fruit of adopting the CarbonSystems platform," says James.

This new partnership therefore marks a new era in sustainability monitoring and reporting in South Africa. In a move away from inaccurate spreadsheets and unreliable data, this software is likely to provide more transparency and data integrity to ensure impacts are appropriately accounted for.