To say small businesses in Canada have had a rough few years would be an understatement. NearlyIf regulators tack on extra costs from ESG reporting criteria, it may be the final nail in the coffin for many.to making some additional reporting mandatory, and the Canadian Securities Administrators – an umbrella group of provincial and territorial regulators – are looking at imposing such requirements as we speak.
These new requirements for Canadian companies will likely be based on what the International Sustainability Standards Board has developed. These disclosure standards would, among other things, make it mandatory for publicly listed Canadian companies to report all upstream and downstream greenhouse gas emissions, referred to as Scope 1, Scope 2, and Scope 3 emissions.
For instance, take a canola oil processor in Saskatchewan. First, it would need to tally emissions that result from manufacturing. In this case, this means any emissions from that canola oil processor’s manufacturing process, as well as emissions from the fleet of vehicles it owns to make deliveries. That’sNext, it would need to report emissions from the operation of its facilities.