| Summary: | Materiality has been heavily emphasized in different sustainability reporting guidelines
to increase the quality of the sustainability reports and report issues that are most
aligned with the company’s most significant economic, environmental and social issues.
In this thesis materiality analysis in sustainability reporting is analyzed. Firstly, in the
theoretical part, the concept of sustainability reporting and materiality is explained
along with the provision of materiality in different reporting guidelines. In this research
section, fifteen different airlines’ sustainability reports are analyzed to find out how the
materiality analysis is carried out in the airlines. The study is focused on airlines
because; air transportation is one of the most energy intensive forms of transportation
that has major impacts on noise, local air pollution and GHG emission.
The thesis concludes that materiality assessment is carried out improperly by most of the
airlines and the process is not transparent as very less information is given regarding the
assessment process. Similarly, there is need for more inclusive stakeholder involvement
in the materiality assessment process. The research findings also showed differences in
the number, theme and presentation of identified material issues by the airlines in their
sustainability reports. The thesis contributes to the understanding of materiality in nonfinancial
reporting and suggests appropriate method to carry out the materiality
analysis in sustainability reporting. Further, research on this topic could be conducted
by focusing the materiality analysis on single company or taking the stakeholders’ views
on the identified material issues.
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