How SDG alignment is calculated
How IdealRatings evaluates corporate alignment across all 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals, via direct disclosure and activity-based estimation.
SDG alignment results are sourced from our data provider, IdealRatings. The SDG evaluation framework assesses corporate alignment across all 17 UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). To ensure coverage regardless of a company's reporting maturity, alignment is evaluated through two distinct pathways: direct corporate reporting, and activity-based estimation.
Direct corporate reporting (reported alignment)
Captures explicit contributions a company discloses itself, within its own primary reporting channels.
- Data sources — official annual reports, corporate sustainability reports, and regulatory filings.
- Criteria — applied when a company explicitly references operational contributions, strategic goals, or metrics as directly aligned with a specific SDG.
Activity-based methodology (estimated alignment)
Where a company hasn't directly disclosed its SDG contribution, alignment is instead estimated from its business activities, through a three-step process:
- Financial revenue breakdown — reported financial statements are analysed to map income streams across distinct business operations.
- Industry classification — those business operations are categorised using the North American Industry Classification System (NAICS).
- Impact mapping matrix — a predefined mapping framework links specific NAICS codes to positive or negative impacts across the 17 SDGs.
Where SDG alignment is expressed on a revenue basis, this methodology is revenue-weighted — the proportion of revenue linked to each mapped activity determines the strength of alignment (or misalignment). Where SDG involvement is instead captured as a binary yes/no indicator, no revenue weighting applies; the mapping simply flags whether the company's activities touch that SDG.