Article by Nathan Dukes, journalist at InsideSAP:

As Kevin Rudd said in his speech to the high level plenary at the Copenhagen conference:

"History will record it as a time when either the peoples of the world... turned the tide of history. Or else history will record this conference as a time when once again, we became so consumed with the petty nationalisms of the past, that we turned instead against each other and failed to act on this great common challenge of the future."

Unfortunately, Ajilon said it may be the latter.

Ajilon says that despite the lack of clarity from a legislative perspective now is the time for companies to act. By putting processes into place now, companies can prepare for the introduction of further environmental legislation in Australia.

Michael Yandell, Manager of Sustainability Solutions at Ajilon, says this is an inevitability.

"In order to understand from a business perspective where you're placed, you have to have a very good handle on your current carbon position. If you don't, you'll be at a disadvantage when they do put a price on carbon," he said.

"It's going to appear on your balance sheet. Your auditors are going to want to see traceability, accuracy and completeness around your data. You need to get that baseline in place now."

SAP recently expanded their solution set with Carbon Impact and Sustainability Performance Management.

Michael believes Sustainability Performance Management (SUPM), is highly relevant in the Australian market with it pre-defined content for GRI and other reporting requirements.

While several SAP solutions in this market address specific areas, SUPM can be used as a data collection centre, so information can be aggregated from different data sources.

Equally, SUPM has the ability to build data sources where few are available with built in surveys and data sheets for both numerical data and text based commentary.

"If you look at sustainability in its broadest context it covers employee satisfaction, diversity, health and safety and environmental issues, amongst others. For a lot of these areas, there isn't any formal system to collect the data. It might exist in a spread sheet if you're lucky," Yandell said.

"That's where SUPM really fits in because it provides both the capability to extract data from other systems and SAP."

Michael says Ajilon are well placed to help companies find the right solution for their business.

"There aren't many IT companies that understand much about the sustainability space from the legislative and business perspective."

Michael said where other companies focus on the technology, Ajilon focus on the business and in providing solutions to their problems.

"Most of the managers who are look after sustainability are not familiar with formal corporate IT systems or dealing with corporate IT departments, and SUPM is very much a business driven solution," he said. Thus it needs a business driven approach to the solution.