Insights from the analysis of sustainability reporting across UK real estate companies

Organisational sustainability reporting can act as a mechanism for the United Nations to track the progress of the Sustainability Development Goals (SDGs) and concomitantly provide clarity of business activities and performance to a range of stakeholders. This study aims to assess the reporting of sustainability-related matters, and notably the incorporation and prioritisation of the SDGs, across the real estate market of the UK by interrogating both sustainability and annual reports. Content analysis was utilised to consider the qualitative aspects of the text itself, subsequently a scoring process was employed to uncover a quantitative view. Results demonstrate that, although there is acknowledgement of the sustainability agenda among these companies, there is a focal cluster of SDGs that explicitly apply to the property sector (namely SDGs 11,12,13) and a least-important group of goals (namely SDGs 1,2,6,9,10,14,15,16), which do not relate-well with real estate activities. Based upon the calculated average quality scoring (2.19 out of 5), findings reveal firms generally convey their sustainability activities in a qualitative manner with minimal incorporation of quantitative key performance indicators. Moreover, SDG 13 achieves one of the highest scores (2.99) and this suggests the greatest focus of company intentions are directed towards climate action. However, it is important to also note that very few companies discuss specific SDG targets in their reports. Based on this evidence, it is proposed that if the companies employed goal-specific targets it would allow for a greater overview of sector performance on the goals, year-on-year, and also counterbalance concerns that firms are green-washing (or rainbow-washing) their communications and the emergence of a disconnect between proclaimed intentions and genuine measurable actions

A morphometric analysis of the infant calvarium and dura

Literature addressing the anatomic development of the dura and calvarium during childhood is limited. Nevertheless, histological features of a subdural neomembrane (NM), including its thickness and vascularity, developing in response to an acute subdural hematoma (SDH) have been compared to the dura of adults to estimate when an injury occurred. Therefore, we measured the morphometric growth of the calvarium and dura and the vascular density within the dura during infancy. The mean thicknesses of the calvarium and dura as a function of occipitofrontal circumference (OFC), as well as the mean number of vessels per 25× field, were determined from the right parasagittal midparietal bone lateral to the sagittal suture of 128 infants without a history of head trauma. Our results showed that as OFC increased, the mean thicknesses of the calvarium and dura increased while the vascular density within the dura decreased. Our morphometric data may assist in the interpretation of subdural NM occurring during infancy. We recommend future investigations to confirm and extend our present data, especially by evaluating cases during later infancy and beyond as well as by sampling other anatomic sites from the calvarium. We also recommend morphometric evaluation of subdural NM associated with SDH in infancy and childhood