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Materiality: From Accounting to Sustainability and the SDGs

  • Living reference work entry
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Responsible Consumption and Production

Part of the book series: Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals ((ENUNSDG))

Synonyms

Importance; Relevance; Significance

Definitions

Materiality is the concept that defines why and how certain matters or issues are of importance for a specific company or within a business sector. When an issue is material, it has major impacts on the financial, economic, reputational, and legal dimensions of a company, as well as on the system of internal and external stakeholders of that company.

What Is Materiality?

Introduction to Materiality

The concept of materiality applies to a wide variety of fields: accounting, auditing, reporting, business, financial, legal, risk management, and, more recently, nonfinancial issues (Corporate Reporting Dialogue 2017). This entry analyzes how materiality is defined across these domains with the purpose of providing a comprehensive picture of the concept and proposing a definition in the context of the Sustainable Development Goals.

Before presenting how the entry is organized, it is thus important to highlight the role that materiality...

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Author information

Authors and Affiliations

  1. Director of Innovation, Datamaran, London, UK

    Donato Calace

Authors
  1. Donato Calace
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Correspondence to Donato Calace .

Editor information

Editors and Affiliations

  1. Faculty of Life Science, HAW Hamburg, Hamburg, Hamburg, Germany

    Walter Leal Filho

  2. Ctr Neurosci & Cell Biology, 1 Floor, Univ Coimbra, Edf Fac Medicina, Coimbra, Portugal

    Anabela Marisa Azul

  3. Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo University Faculty of Engineering and Architecture, Passo Fundo, Brazil

    Luciana Brandli

  4. Istinye University, Istanbul, Turkey

    Pinar Gökcin Özuyar

  5. International Centre for Thriving, University of Chester, Chester, UK

    Tony Wall

Section Editor information

  1. University of Passo Fundo, Passo Fundo, Brazil

    Luciana Brandli

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Calace, D. (2019). Materiality: From Accounting to Sustainability and the SDGs. In: Leal Filho, W., Azul, A., Brandli, L., Özuyar, P., Wall, T. (eds) Responsible Consumption and Production. Encyclopedia of the UN Sustainable Development Goals. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_43-1

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-319-71062-4_43-1

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  • Publisher Name: Springer, Cham

  • Print ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

  • Online ISBN: 978-3-319-71062-4

  • eBook Packages: Springer Reference Earth and Environm. ScienceReference Module Physical and Materials ScienceReference Module Earth and Environmental Sciences

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