Last week, Wal-Mart issued its first Sustainability Progress Update, a comprehensive review of the company's sustainability initiatives and performance.

While the progress report does not directly reference the GRI guidelines, it clearly incorporates many of the standard disclosures, performance indicators, and management approach narratives outlined by the GRI framework. Lacking is a GRI Index that allows analysts and the industry to quickly find and cross reference performance data in key categories such as environment, product responsibilty, society, human rights, labor and economic indicators. Such an index might easily be incorporated on the corporate website.

The degree of thoroughness in reporting on metrics is characteristic of Wal-Mart's reputation for efficiency and measurement. Few reports, if any, have come close to the volume of quantitative statistics presented in this progress report.

You can download the Sustainability Progress Update in PDF format at:
http://walmartstores.com/GlobalWMStoresWeb/navigate.do?catg=772