They may already be under increasing pressure to develop a standard mechanism for measuring the carbon footprint of a company or product, but that has not stopped the global body for accountants, the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA), calling on the profession to also start working on methodologies for measuring water footprints.  ACCA has today released a new report entitled Water: the next carbon? calling on firms and their accountancy departments to better track water use and water risks. 

The report follows a recent conference hosted by ACCA and WWF-UK, which saw the global professional body sign a memorandum of understanding with the environmental group to work together on assessment of current UK water accounting and reporting processes.  The partnership could result in the development of water-reporting standards, similar to the global IFRS financial reporting standards that ACCA supports.

Vicky McAllister, sustainability advisor at ACCA, welcomed the new report and urged more firms to embrace water-reporting methodologies. “UK businesses should be addressing and reporting on the importance of water resources and management in their operations as well as upstream and downstream activities, one element of which is calculating the water footprint,” she said. “WWF UK is considered an expert in this field and the resulting research should yield some interesting results for UK organisations to take on board.”

Her comments were echoed by Dave Tickner, head of freshwater programmes at WWF UK, who warned that a failure to address water security issues could undermine firms’ long-term competitiveness.

“The sustainable supply of water to all users, including businesses, underpins economic growth, poverty reduction, food and energy security and adaptation to the effects of climate change,” he said. “Wise management of this critical natural resource is therefore in all our interests.”

For a free water audit click here

Related posts...

• June 22, 2010 -- UK Business Energy Prices: (3)
  A new survey carried out by the Economist Intelligence Unit has revealed that over 80% of British firms expect energy and fuel prices to rise sharply and almost 50% have great concern that the UK coul...
• February 21, 2010 -- Identifying a Half Hour Meter: (0)
  How to find out if you have a half hourly meter – So how do you know if you have a half hour meter?  It’s actually quite straight forward, and all you will need to find this out is a recent copy o...
• February 10, 2010 -- UK Business Gas Prices: (0)
  Business Gas Prices can be difficult to understand, as there are many different types of pricing structures available.  You could simply ring around and obtain gas prices direct from suppliers, but it...
• February 7, 2010 -- Oil Prices Back To $70 Range: (0)
  Oil prices plunged in a busy trading session on Friday, triggering big losses across the commodities markets, as investors went back to buying into the US dollar.  Crude oil prices did have a partial ...
• February 5, 2010 -- CRC Business Lights: (1)
  The era of the 'on-all-night' illuminated high street could end, the Environment Agency is predicting. The agency says new rules will force businesses to switch off lights and displays at night to mee...
• February 3, 2010 -- Bglobal Smart Meter Deal: (3)
  Bglobal Plc said it has signed a new agreement to supply and install smart meters for British Gas Business during 2010. The contract value is anticipated at more than £12 million. In addition, the com...

RSS feed for comments on this post. TrackBack URI

Name (required)

Mail (will not be published) (required)

Website

CAPTCHA Code *