CA Sri Lanka launches landmark Non-Financial Reporting Guideline

Sanjaya Bandara, President of CA Sri Lanka, presenting the first copy of the NFR guideline to Viraj Dayaratne, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission in the presence of Heshana Kuruppu, Vice President of CA Sri Lanka and Nuwan Withanage, Chairman of the Task Force to Develop Non-Financial Reporting Practices in Sri Lanka 

In its standing as the sole authority to promulgate accounting and auditing standards in the country, the Institute of Chartered Accountants of Sri Lanka (CA Sri Lanka) recently launched the Non-Financial Reporting Guideline to strengthen and ensure fair and balanced corporate reporting among companies, while also promoting non-financial reporting practices amidst growing demands from diverse stakeholders for enhanced corporate social responsibility.

The Non-Financial Reporting (NFR) Guideline was launched in the presence of Viraj Dayaratne, Chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, Sanjaya Bandara, President of CA Sri Lanka, Heshana Kuruppu, Vice President of CA Sri Lanka, Nuwan Withanage, Chairman of the Task Force to Develop Non-Financial Reporting Practices in Sri Lanka and Dulani Fernando, Chief Executive Officer of CA Sri Lanka.

This NFR Guideline has been developed for all entities, including listed and unlisted, as well as large to small and medium-sized enterprises in Sri Lanka, which produce annual reports and follow the EESG framework concept, which stands for Economic, Environmental, Social and Governance, instead of limiting it to the ESG (Environmental, Social, and Governance) framework.

This framework has also introduced several novel concepts such as the “Core and More Approach” to simplify non-financial reporting practices. Further, to improve the comparability of non-financial information the framework included the ‘KPI based approach’ for both quantitative as well as qualitative. However, having understood that reporting is a journey, CA Sri Lanka further simplified the KPIs to basic level KPIs as well as advance level KPIs so that it is easier for local companies to adopt. 

A key benefit of this newly developed guideline which is in line with the international frameworks for non-financial reporting, is that it provides balanced and flexible guidance on reporting non-financial information in a way that helps companies to disclose material information consistently and coherently whilst establishing a common language for non-financial reporting. The framework also ensures comparability across companies and sectors.