Ceres and the Association of Chartered Certified Accountants (ACCA) today announced the shortlist of candidate reports for the Ceres-ACCA North American Sustainability Reporting Awards for 2006. Of the 102 sustainability reports received, 19 were selected for further consideration by the judges’ panel that meets next month. The final winners will be announced at an awards ceremony in Toronto on April 12, 2007 and also at the Ceres Annual Conference at the Seaport Hotel in Boston on April 25, 2007.

Now in its sixth year, the purpose of the awards program is to acknowledge and publicize best practices in reporting on sustainability, environmental and social performance by corporations and organizations and to provide leadership to those companies that are publishing or intend to publish sustainability reports.

The awards are not intended to endorse or reward corporate sustainability performance, but rather to acknowledge exemplary disclosure that places performance in the broader context of sustainability challenges, risks and opportunities. The judging criteria address completeness, credibility and quality of communication. The panel of 14 judges includes North American leaders and experts representing a broad spectrum of backgrounds.

Short-Listed Reports

Alcan

Baxter International

Bristol-Meyers Squibb

Citigroup

General Electric

Green Mountain Coffee (1st time reporter)

Harwood Products (SME)

Hewlett-Packard

Mountain Equipment Cooperative (1st time reporter)

Nexen

PotashCorp

Shell Canada

Starbucks

Telus

Timberland (corporate report)

Timberland (Dominican Republic facility report)

TransAlta

Vancity Group

Weyerhaeuser

For 15 years, ACCA has held annual awards — first in the UK and now in more than 20 countries to promote transparency in reporting the impact of business activities on sustainable development. Ceres launched the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI), which has become the internationally established standard for corporate reporting on the “triple bottom line” of economic, social and environmental performance. The Ceres-ACCA Awards Program was launched in 2001.

"The Ceres-ACCA Awards reward transparency by giving recognition to those organizations that report sustainability information in the most complete and credible way. We do not reward rhetoric,” said Mindy S. Lubber, president of Ceres. “We are looking for organizations which document their key impacts and clearly explain changes in performance, positive or negative, and set a vision and targets for future progress. The Ceres-ACCA judging panel now has the difficult task of selecting the 2006 winners from this high quality shortlist.”

"ACCA is encouraged to see a wide range of sectors make the shortlist this year, including mining, telecommunications, banking and retailing,” said Rachel Jackson, Head of Social and Environmental Issues at ACCA. “These organizations have made the sensible business decision to be more accountable to their stakeholders by reporting publicly.”