Developing an authentic reporting identity: an accounting approach to biodiversity and species preservation

Purpose This paper answers calls for research on organizations pursuing biodiversity preservation from an ecocentric management perspective. We explore an approach to biodiversity accounting in the Chilean wine industry, which is characterized by complex ecosystems and environmental threats. This is of particular interest because it is not clear how biodiversity accounting and reporting approaches reflect strategic biodiversity preservation choices. Design/methodology/approach We narrate a wine producer's approach to developing its authentic reporting identity, including how its biodynamic certification process influenced its production process, and sustainability accounting and reporting. To achieve this, we conduct an analysis using multi-sited ethnographic design, which involves several time deepening strategies, multiple observation points and data collectors. Findings Over time, the wine producer refined their biodiversity counting and reporting approach, exposing several limitations of traditional accounting reporting systems for sustainable outcomes. These findings address concerns that our contemporary understanding of the entity is problematic, and what is material for sustainable outcomes, such as biodiversity and species preservation, cannot be made transparent within the current approaches to materiality in sustainability reports. Practical implications Authentically ecocentric enterprises play a pivotal role in teaching us about our connection to ecosystems. This case study shows how organizations can develop an authentic reporting identity that is built on biodiversity first when contemplating biodiversity reporting. Originality/value Our study offers a way to develop and apply biodiversity accounting that is consistent with organizations' reporting identity. What we learn, through their efforts to produce sustainable outcomes, is an alternative approach that places nature at the center of accounts, for which quantification is a secondary priority to the relationships therein. These findings have value to the growing domain of nature-focused reporting, biodiversity accounting globally and the conservation of ecosystems across multiple organizations.