The Impact Investors Foundation in collaboration with the Global Steering Group for Impact Investment and the Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria has boosted the capacity of over 100 MSMEs, financial and sustainability professionals in the public and private sectors in the adoption of the new International Sustainability Standards Board’s IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards.
The training was held in Lagos and Abuja to prepare companies in the country for the implementation of the IFRS Sustainability Disclosure Standards, which will help to create a global baseline of consistent, financial reporting, which would be useful for the investors’ decision-making, the organisations noted.
The workshops had representatives of listed and large corporates, SMEs, enterprise support organisations, investors, chambers of commerce, policymakers, financial regulators, professionals of the accounting profession, and academia in attendance.
In her opening remarks, the Chairperson for Nigeria’s National Advisory Board for Impact Investing Foundation, Mrs Ibukun Awosika, said conversations on impact transparency and measurement were important to position Nigeria for the benefits of impact investment and increase the flow of capital to the nation.
She said, “Having the right partners, working with the right organisations like FRC so that there is winning, to give value for companies who are willing to support what is a global vision. No matter what we say, if those who are regulators and operators do not have an understanding, we are missing the point.
“If there are nations of the world who should be at the edge of impact investing and benefit from it, then definitely we should be number one. We have so much to do, to contend with and it affords us the opportunity to have our problems looked at from a different view and to consider the flow of capital into our country from different lenses.”
- Continued on www.punchng.com
The CEO of Impact Investors Foundation, Ms Etemore Glover, said that increased transparency meant more opportunities for FDIs, impact capital, partnerships and long-term value creation and sustainability of businesses.
She charged participants to be the champions of the ISSB by adopting and implementing it for their businesses, while commending MTN Nigeria for getting its leaders onboard as early adopters of the standards.
The Chief Policy Officer of GSG, Mr Sebastian Welisiejko, explained that impact transparency was at the core of GSG’s mission as it would accelerate the advancement of impact-led economies.
He continued that private capital flows to emerging economies, including Nigeria, were estimated to have declined by 22 per cent from 2019 to 2022, increasing the annual financing gap to meet the SDGs.
“However, impact transparency can reverse the trend because providing adequate information on the social and environmental impact of businesses would encourage investment flow and bridge the SDG financing gap.
“Impact transparency will transform information available to investors and other stakeholders. If delivered inclusively, it will help to reduce information and knowledge barriers that prevent the flow of investment from reaching the emerging and developing economies,” he added.
The Director/Head of the Directorate of Public Sector Accounting Standards, Financial Reporting Council of Nigeria, Dr Iheanyi Anyahara, encouraged organisations in Nigeria to embrace early adoption of the standards to benefit from the opportunities.
He explained that the Federal Executive Council passed a resolution in 2010 that Nigeria should adopt global standards on accounting and auditing-related matters.
He remarked that having a single set of high-quality global sustainability reporting standards being issued by the ISSB had immense benefits.
In Abuja, a representative from UNDP, Ms Fatima Umar, spoke extensively on the importance of measuring and managing the direct and indirect, positive and negative, impact of an organisation’s decisions on the well-being of people and the planet.
