Over the past two decades, sustainability has evolved from a feel-good emotion to a heavily institutionalized and acronym-laden discipline. With every passing year, a new abbreviation emerged — often in response to a global event, regulatory shift, or a declaration.
The party arguably began with the MDGs (Millennium Development Goals) in 2000, which laid the groundwork for their more famous successor, the SDGs (Sustainable Development Goals) launched in 2015 by the United Nations — 17 goals, 169 targets, and a few million PowerPoint slides!
Then came CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility), popularized in the early 2000s, formalized in countries like India by 2014, and soon mandatory in spirit, if not always in action. Perhaps the ancient Kings in India knew CSR better. Kings like Ashoka the Great (268–232 BCE) seemed to have practiced CSR centuries before it was coined.
As the climate conversation heated up, GHG (Greenhouse Gas) protocols entered the scene — with Scope 1, 2, and 3 emissions making analysts bury their heads into spreadsheets. Around the same time, the CDP (Carbon Disclosure Project), started in 2002, began asking companies: ‘So, how bad is your carbon karma? And tell the world about it’
By 2006, the term ESG was coined in a landmark UN report — and quickly became a darling of investors who wanted to feel righteous while staying rich. PRI (Principles for Responsible Investment) followed soon after, setting up an entire ecosystem of ‘doing well by doing good (of course with disclaimers)’.
In the 2010s, GRI (Global Reporting Initiative) became the default global reporting lens, SASB (Sustainability Accounting Standards Board) added a U.S. flavour, and TCFD (Task Force on Climate-related Financial Disclosures), launched in 2015, made CEOs sweat over climate scenarios instead of just balance sheets. This led to emergence of data pooling platforms who promised reports in just few hours delivering flavors you asked for.
Lately, we’ve welcomed SBTi (Science-Based Targets initiative), TNFD (Taskforce on Nature-related Financial Disclosures), BRSR (India’s Business Responsibility and Sustainability Report, 2021), ISSB (International Sustainability Standards Board) , IFRS (International Financial Reporting Standards S1/S2), and CSRD (Europe’s Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive). You see everyday people flashing on LinkedIn the certificates. All good business.
If that feels like a lot, it’s because how it is. We’ve gone from handshakes and mission statements to taxonomies and XBRL (eXtensible Business Reporting Language) filings.
According to my Professor Friend everything in the sustainability world seems to need an acronym, preferably with three letters and utmost four.
“You can’t just say ‘we care about the environment’ anymore,” he laments.
“Now, it must be ‘aligned with our net-zero, nature-positive, gender-inclusive, donut-economy strategy.’”
He flips open a document. “Look here — One of the IITs just renamed the canteen menu as ‘Low-carbon nourishment portfolio.’ And the menu contains idli-sambhar!”
The Professor leaned forward, eyes narrowed.
“Have you noticed, my dear,” he said, “that sustainability conversations today sound less like dialogues and more like encrypted messages from MI6?” I thought the sustainability dialogues could be best had through sustainability Mojis on the Whats App.
(BTW, MI6 stands for the Secret Intelligence Service (SIS) of the United Kingdom — the British government’s foreign intelligence agency. It’s famously associated with James Bond (Agent 007) in literature and film)
I thought of butting in. I presented my theories about why people speak in abbreviations:
- To Sound Important: People love acronyms because they create an illusion of expertise. If you say ESG five times in a sentence and throw in an SDG or two, people assume you know what you’re talking about — even if you don’t.
- To Blend In: Then there are the parrots — people who don’t know what these acronyms mean but use them anyway because everyone else is saying them.
- To Gatekeep: Some folks deliberately use jargon to keep conversations exclusive — a kind of ESG elitism.
Professor nodded agreeing to my theories.
We were attending a sustainability conference organized by the Big 4. We were overstressed with abbreviations used in every speech and so we decided to leave the conference room and reached the corridor where coffee was served. We thought of picking some ginger cookies to go along with our coffee. So we went to the counter. There were two sharply dressed professionals already there and they were having a soup.
We couldn’t resist listening to the conversation. Here was the gist…
Priya:
“Hey Raj, did you get that RfP from the client?” They want ESG alignment with GRI, SASB, and now CSRD too!”
Raj:
“Tell me about it! And they’ve thrown in TCFD and SBTi as mandatory. We’ll need a solid double materiality matrix, else the BRSR will flop!”
Priya:
“Exactly. We did a PCAF-based Scope 3 estimate for another client last week — their financed emissions were way off the GFANZ trajectory.”
Raj:
“Oh. Did you cross-check with PACTA or just use CRREM pathways?”
Priya:
“CRREM. But the client also wants taxonomy alignment — both EU and India! I told them, ‘Pick one; I’m not doing EUGBS and RBI-GBP in one report!’”
Raj:
(Laughs) “IKR. And then someone threw in TNFD for biodiversity. I said, ‘Boss, we’re still figuring out TNFD v0.4!’”
Priya:
“I know! They’ve signed up for PRI and CDP, and now want B-Corp certification before COP30.”
Raj:
“Classic. Oh, and did you hear SEBI might adopt ISSB’s IFRS S2 over BRSR Core?”
Priya:
“Ugh. My XBRL parser is already crying.”
At this point, the Professor muttered as we walked away “Think all they wanted was a sustainability report.”
I thought that the duo was having an alphabet soup.
Well, we got back to our table.
Sure, sustainability is not a branding exercise — it’s a behavioural transformation. We may dress it up with acronyms, embellish it with logos, and rename old wine in new jargonized bottles, but unless it translates into real impact, it’s all theatre.
So the next time someone proudly declares they’re ‘ESG-aligned, SDG-compliant, and BRSR-ready,’ just smile and ask: ‘But what have you actually done?’
Because as Shakespeare almost said — a compost by any other name still smells as… well, earthy.
It doesn’t matter if we call it “Soil Regeneration Biomass,” “Decomposition-Derived Input,” or “Circular Organic Feedstock.” At the end of the day, it’s still compost — simply humble, smelly, and yet invaluable to the planet. Let’s not forget the soil. The smell. The substance.
And that’s the point. Sustainability doesn’t become more effective just because we throw more elegant names at it. Impact doesn’t grow proportionally with the number of acronyms we can squeeze into a report.
As we walked away from that acronym-soaked conference, we noticed a child in the garden, crouched over a small patch of soil.
“What are you doing?” I asked.
“I’m planting a seed,” the child said. “So there’ll be a tree when I grow up.”
“No impact report?” Professor asked. I saw him wink.
I smiled.
The child looked confused. “No. I don’t understand what you are saying but I just want a tree. And maybe some birds that will perch.”
Professor and I stood silently for a moment, watching the soil pressed gently by tiny fingers.
No KPI. No framework. No buzzwords. Just intent, care, and empathy.
Perhaps that, we thought, is the original sustainability.