At IEMA, environmental, social and governance (ESG) performance is practical: understand the risks, act on opportunities and make sustainability part of everyday work. This approach guides IEMA’s employee-led ESG Committee, which turns good intentions into measurable action across our business, our people, and our community.
For a small business, the Committee demonstrates practical ESG leadership. It provides a dedicated forum to identify, prioritise, and progress initiatives that support IEMA’s values. In doing so, it helps embed sustainability into business decisions and workplace culture.
What is IEMA’s ESG Committee and How Does It Drive Sustainable Business Practices?
The Committee provides a structured forum for reviewing ESG priorities, tracking progress against objectives and reporting outcomes to company leadership, ensuring accountability and continuous improvement. It provides oversight, coordination and momentum for initiatives that reduce IEMA’s environmental footprint, strengthen employee wellbeing and safety, support the community, and integrate sustainability into day-to-day operations.
The Committee comprises four competitively selected roles: Chair, Wellness, Environment & Community, and Health & Safety. This structure provides dedicated oversight and clear leadership for each focus area, supporting a mature and well-governed approach to ESG.
Why Practical ESG Action Matters for Business Performance and Sustainability Outcomes
As sustainability advisors, IEMA believes it is important to demonstrate the behaviours and practices we recommend to clients. The ESG Committee helps ensure IEMA can lead by example, continuously improving our own environmental, social and governance performance while supporting better outcomes for our clients.
Effective ESG is about more than disclosure. It requires action, accountability and continuous improvement. The Committee helps ensure IEMA’s sustainability initiatives are prioritised, tracked and embedded into the way the business works, rather than treated as a tick-the-box exercise.
By bringing together employees from across the business, the Committee creates a practical link between IEMA’s sustainability strategy and everyday operations. It also helps identify ESG risks and opportunities across employee engagement, health and safety, carbon emissions, sustainable procurement, waste management, governance and community impact.
FY2026 ESG Initiatives: Delivering Measurable Sustainability and Community Impact
Reducing Food Waste and Supporting Communities Through Practical ESG Action
In FY2026, the Committee helped coordinate an OzHarvest Cooking for a Cause team event. IEMA team members prepared nutritious meals for local charities and diverted 35 kilograms of food from landfill, avoiding the equivalent of 35 kilograms of carbon dioxide emissions. This hands-on initiative combined food waste reduction, community contribution and team connection in a practical and memorable way.
Embedding Employee Wellbeing into Everyday Work Practices
The Committee champions initiatives that put people first. IEMA introduced Wellness Hours in May 2026, giving every employee two hours each month to recharge in a way that works for them, whether through exercise, time with family, an appointment or simply taking time to reset. Since the Wellness Hours initiative was launched, IEMA team members have logged 63 hours across activities supporting their physical, mental and social wellbeing, from exercise and healthcare appointments to family events, hobbies and community connection. The message is simple: employee wellbeing should be part of how we work, not something squeezed in after hours.
Strengthening Workplace Health and Safety Governance
Health and safety governance remain central to IEMA’s ESG approach. Throughout FY2026, the Committee has contributed to reviews of IEMA’s HSEC policy and business risk assessment, as well as updates to safety resources, training and certification registers, and safety notices. These improvements help keep IEMA’s systems current, practical and aligned with office, field and client-based work.
Improving Carbon Accounting, Emissions Data and Decarbonisation Performance
The Committee supports IEMA’s commitment to business decarbonisation through annual greenhouse gas emissions calculations, the identification of emissions hotspots and reduction opportunities, and process improvements that provide clearer visibility of the company’s carbon footprint. This includes strengthening year-on-year carbon accounting methodologies and moving from spend-based estimates towards more accurate activity-based data where possible.
Through improved carbon accounting and targeted emissions reduction efforts, IEMA reduced its FY2026 greenhouse gas emissions to 168 tCO₂e; an 18% reduction from FY2025, while achieving our lowest emissions intensity on record. For IEMA, measuring emissions is not the finish line. It is the foundation for better decisions, stronger governance and more targeted emissions reduction.
The same principles that IEMA helps clients to apply to their carbon accounting and decarbonisation initiatives are also applied internally to IEMA, ensuring our business continually improves the quality, accuracy and usefulness of our emissions data.
Looking Ahead: Building IEMA’s ESG Framework for Long-Term Sustainability Success
IEMA’s ESG Committee continues to evolve as the business grows. A key focus for FY2027 is developing a formal ESG Framework that establishes clear objectives, responsibilities and performance measures, providing a roadmap for continuous improvement and supporting transparent reporting on IEMA’s ESG performance.
For IEMA, ESG is not a standalone program. It is part of how we operate, make decisions and contribute to positive outcomes for our people, clients, communities and the environment. The ESG Committee helps turn that commitment into action.