ESG Research and Resource Center

The sustainable finance market has seen rapid growth in the last two years, with sustainable debt issuance surpassing US$1.6 trillion in 2021. This blog explores the market trends and future of sustainability-linked loans and sustainability-linked bonds.

Learn about the key components of sustainability-linked finance instruments and how they can help corporations achieve their sustainability goals.

The telecom industry is exposed to several Material ESG Issues, including Data Privacy and Security, Business Ethics, Human Capital and Product Governance. Product Governance issues in the telecom industry include service quality, maintaining reliable, high-speed networks, and responding to customer billing concerns.

A self-proclaimed “free speech absolutist”, Musk has criticized what he views as excessive moderation on online platforms, indicating his desire to ease Twitter’s content moderation policies and only remove content deemed illegal by governments.

Learn about how tying executive compensation to ESG performance can enhance a company’s accountability and transparency, the challenges organizations are facing, the types of metrics firms use for ESG-linked compensation programs, industries and regions with high pay-link adoption, steps to make your company’s program credible and transparent, and more.

In this infographic, we examine the state of ESG pay-links, including their adoption in long-term incentives and short-term incentives, in five regions: Europe, the United States and Canada, Asia-Pacific, the Middle East and Africa, and Latin America and the Caribbean.

Explaining the relationship between leadership compensation and corporate strategy, whether it makes sense for incentives to be tied to ESG-related goals, and why more companies are adopting this practice.

Morningstar Sustainalytics Corporate Solutions shares the material ESG issues high risk and low risk industries have in common as well as some key actions companies can take to better manage these issues.

Learn how an ESG-based incentive plan can help companies respond to stakeholder pressure and align strategy with action.

With growing scrutiny from stakeholders—international regulators and regional governments, NGOs, the general public, investors, and financial institutions—companies accused of human rights violations and environmental damage in their supply chains face substantial risks.

The invasion of Ukraine highlights the fragility of the global food system. The destruction caused by the war and subsequent trade restrictions on Russia, endangers a significant percentage of the global food supply coming from two of world’s leading agricultural commodity exporters, consequently prompting food prices to surpass the 30-year high.

Financial institutions funding the supply chains affected by biodiversity loss stand to lose right alongside farmers, producers and retailers—and so, in turn, do investors. ESG stewardship continues to be a powerful investor instrument to mitigate risks on a changing planet. With growing expectations of double materiality, it is an opportunity for investors to have a greater societal impact and support the transition towards a nature-positive economy.

All companies are affected by material ESG issues. Poor management of these issues can negatively impact a company’s operations, employee retention, community relations, and ultimately its share price. Learn which ESG issues cut across industries and how companies can address the most impactful MEIs affecting them.

We discuss setting up your corporate ESG program for success and avoiding early ESG obstacles in this interview with Sustainalytics Corporate Solutions Director, Shilpi Singh. You’ll discover the importance of four ESG focus areas: leadership buy-in, planning and resourcing, ESG strategy, and reporting and communication.

Discover the five industries facing the highest ESG risk, the issues impacting the risk profiles of companies in those industries, and how all companies can best manage these issues.

In this infographic, we outline essential action-oriented steps to get you started on your ESG journey, including obtaining high-level executive buy-in, resourcing your efforts, strategic planning, and reporting the results of your program.

This report sheds light on the growing effects of water scarcity on companies and countries. To address these challenges, investors can use water reporting metrics to identify companies and countries with severe water risk. We further relate water metrics to firm and country characteristics and highlight substantial cross-sectional differences.

Discover some of the obstacles ESG leaders face in the early stages of their journey toward sustainability — and what you can about them—in this checklist. Is your company dealing with limited human resources, overwhelming ESG information, inconsistent communication with stakeholders, understanding the competitive landscape, or funding your ESG program?

In this FAQ, we’ve answered several key questions to help companies like yours understand what ESG means for you in practice.

This blog post explains what is ESG, including basic ESG concepts, ESG scores and ratings, and why companies of all sizes need ESG risk management.