Editorial

The first joint meeting of the IASB and ISSB took place in London in January 2024. The subject under consideration was the feedback received in response to the ISSB's recent agenda consultation and, in particular, whether the new board should undertake a project on integration in reporting. While most respondents did not see the project as a priority for the ISSB at this stage, many of them commented on the importance of connectivity between the sustainability standards and the accounting standards. In order to achieve improved connectivity, many respondents stressed the need for the two boards to work closely together. These comments may have come as a surprise as the consultation had not included any questions on this topic. Perhaps as a result, some board members seemed a little perplexed by the feedback and commented that behind the scenes, much joint work is already taking place. This raised the question of whether the boards should communicate more about the way they are working. ISSB chair Emmanuel Faber noted, however, that it was to be expected that stakeholders should raise this issue, since the ability of the two boards to work together to create a set of standards addressing sustainability and accounting issues, which would result in fully interconnected reports, was one of the key reasons for establishing the ISSB within the IFRS Foundation. He noted that the responsibility for achieving this vision rested exclusively on the two boards. Nevertheless, despite the need for the boards to collaborate, another member commented that the boards are independent, which was exemplified by the fact that they did not take any decisions during the joint meeting, as the process of actual decision making would be undertaken subsequently, in separate meetings.