Sustainability reporting & knowledge transfer
Initiative description: Reporting progress achieved against the Sustainability Strategy and any changes or additions to the strategic objectives, initiatives and targets, annually from 2019 to 2023, including publication of a post-tournament sustainability report in alignment with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Sustainability Reporting Standards and following guidance from the United Nations Guiding Principles Reporting Framework. In addition, fulfilling internal knowledge transfer obligations to FIFA for the enhancement of the sustainability of future tournaments.
Sustainability Reporting
This Sustainability Report provides an update to all stakeholders on how tournament organisers delivered on the commitments made in the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ sustainability strategy.
It is hoped that through this online report, its accessibility is increased to reach a wider global readership. The report covers all pillars and objectives defined in the sustainability framework and describes how the initiatives implemented to achieve these objectives were executed, and, where relevant, if pre-defined sustainability targets were achieved.
The first sustainability progress report was published in 2020 and covered progress during 2019. It then transitioned to an online report which covered progress achieved in 2020 and 2021 with the aim of providing more current updates on progress and performance.
Since January 2022, continued progress updates were provided periodically through this online report. During the same year, a stakeholder survey was carried out, asking for feedback in order to enhance the report.
While initiative leads provided information and/or drafted the web pages of the Sustainability Report with the support of a central report development team, the Sustainability Steering Group was responsible for reviewing and approving the reported information, including the organisation’s material topics. The Steering Group identified which members of the group would be responsible for reviewing and approving each web page of the report covering all identified material topics. This allocation depended on expertise and organisational role linking to the initiative information being reported. In some cases, the review and approval of report pages was shared by more than one member of the Group. Group members had the opportunity to provide written comments or to meet with the central report development team to discuss the sections and provide verbal feedback. After comments were addressed and the sections approved, the central report development team was able to upload them to the reporting site.
This online report now represents the final FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™ Sustainability Report. It was created and externally audited in accordance with the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) Standards (GRI Content Index and assurance statement).
The report was prepared by FIFA, Q22 and the SC with the support of Sustainability Excellence, a local sustainability advisory company.
For enquires regarding this report, please contact: sustainability@fifa.org.
Knowledge transfer – external
To facilitate knowledge transfer to organisers of other mega sporting events, a document describing the process behind the development of the FIFA World Cup 2022™ Sustainability Strategy was published. The document sets out in detail the approach taken to identify and merge material sustainability topics and salient human rights issues, the process of developing objectives and initiatives to address them, and ways to maximise the sustainability of the FIFA World Cup Qatar 2022™.
To facilitate knowledge transfer and awareness raising within the country and internationally, the following documents and reports have also been published:
The Supreme Committee for Delivery & Legacy (SC) started reporting on its performance in 2014 and published 19 reports in total, including many of the reports listed above as well as annual Workers’ Welfare progress reports, reviews in partnership with Building and Wood Workers’ International (BWI) and compliance reports authored by Impactt Ltd. It has also produced other useful materials such as the Workers’ Welfare Standards and knowhow on ethical recruitment and heat stress mitigation. All materials can be found on the Workers’ Welfare website.
Tournament organisers have also delivered and carried out associated webinars in collaboration with:
The Qatar Green Building Council (QGBC) – now erthna – on Green Hospitality
The Josoor Institute on Circular Economy and Environmental Sustainability
In addition, the capacity building and awareness-raising web page of this report includes links to training and awareness raising materials created for workforce, fans and partner hotels covering topics such as accessibility, recycling and human rights.
Knowledge transfer – internal
Internally, the Sustainability functional area has also prepared a Post-tournament Report covering the most important achievements and challenges faced during tournament delivery. Members of the Sustainability team have also prepared de-brief reports per site and ‘Knowledge Sharing Reports’ to support FIFA with enhancing sustainability management at future events. Internal reports covered the most important areas of sustainability operations:
Sustainable building
Minimising waste to landfill
Air quality monitoring
Accessibility infrastructure and services
Anti-discrimination
Human rights grievance mechanism
Tobacco control
Capacity building
Sustainable Procurement
Sustainability Management Systems
Knowledge Sharing Reports were followed by debrief meetings covering most topics mentioned above aiming to:
Clarify what was written or address knowledge gaps
Share and compare views if there were very different perspectives on the same topics
Discuss what could be future aims for FIFA tournaments and transferability of lessons to other contexts