Is Your Industry Covered by a GRI Sector Standard? (2026 Update)

This article gives reporting teams a current-state view of GRI's Sector Program, plus a summary of the 2025-2026 Topic Standard revisions that affect nearly every reporting organization regardless of sector.

Why Does GRI Publish Sector Standards at All?

Sector Standards exist to make materiality assessments more consistent and more rigorous within a given industry. Rather than every company in, say, mining independently deciding which impacts are likely material, GRI 14 identifies the impacts most commonly material for that sector based on extensive research and multi-stakeholder input, giving companies a documented starting point their own assessment must engage with. This is covered in more detail in How Are the GRI Standards Structured? and How to Conduct a GRI Materiality Assessment.

Which Sectors Are Covered Today?

• GRI 11: Oil and Gas — covering upstream and downstream impacts specific to the sector, including emissions, biodiversity, and community relations tied to extraction and processing activity.
• GRI 12: Coal — covering impacts specific to coal extraction and processing.
• GRI 13: Agriculture, Aquaculture and Fishing — covering impacts across land use, water, labor, and food security topics specific to these sectors.
• GRI 14: Mining — covering impacts specific to mineral extraction, including biodiversity, community relations, and worker safety.

These four were prioritized first because GRI's Sector Program targets the highest-impact sectors before moving to the rest of its roadmap.

Which Sectors Are in Development, and When Will They Publish?

Exposure drafts for banking, capital markets, and insurance Sector Standards were open for public comment through May 2025, with the final standards expected to be approved in the second or third quarter of 2026. A separate standard for textiles, apparel, and footwear is expected to be finalized in the fourth quarter of 2026 (some sources point to an earlier second-quarter timeline — the exact date should be confirmed against GRI's current published Standards development schedule). This matters particularly for financial-sector organizations: once the banking and insurance standard is published, Sector Standard application will be expected for companies in scope.

What Is the Long-Term Scope of the Sector Program?

GRI's stated ambition for its Sector Program is to eventually cover roughly 40 sectors, prioritizing those with the greatest economic, environmental, and social impact first. This means the current four published standards, plus those in development, represent an early stage of a longer rollout rather than a near-complete library.

What Should Organizations Without a Published Sector Standard Do?

An organization in a sector without a published Standard is not exempt from rigorous materiality assessment — it simply conducts that assessment using the Universal Standards' general requirements and the Topic Standards relevant to its identified material topics, without a sector-specific reference document to draw on. In practice, this often means drawing more heavily on peer benchmarking, industry-specific research, and stakeholder engagement to compensate for the absence of a GRI-published sector reference.

The 2025-2026 Topic Standard Revisions Everyone Should Know About

Independent of the Sector Program, GRI has revised several widely-used Topic Standards, and these changes affect reporting organizations across every sector:

• GRI 101: Biodiversity (2024 revision) supersedes the legacy GRI 304 Biodiversity standard.
• GRI 102: Climate Change (2025) is a new standard superseding the legacy GRI 305 Emissions standard.
• GRI 103: Energy (2025 revision) supersedes the legacy GRI 302 Energy standard.

Any organization currently preparing a content index (see How to Build a GRI Content Index: A Step-by-Step Guide) should confirm it is citing these current numbers and versions rather than the superseded legacy standards, since the renumbering is a genuine, substantive change rather than a cosmetic one.

Semtrio Note: As a GRI Community Member since 2020, Semtrio tracks Sector Program developments and Topic Standard revisions directly, and applies current versions in client materiality assessments and content index preparation.

If you are unsure whether a GRI Sector Standard applies to your industry, or which Topic Standard version your next report should cite, our sustainability reporting team can confirm current applicability before your reporting cycle begins.

Frequently Asked Questions

My industry doesn't have a GRI Sector Standard yet — can I still report "in accordance with" GRI?

Yes. You apply the Universal Standards and the Topic Standards relevant to your material topics; a Sector Standard is only required where one has been published for your industry.

When will the banking, insurance, and textiles Sector Standards be published?

Exposure drafts for banking, capital markets, and insurance were open for public comment through May 2025, with final standards expected in Q2 or Q3 2026. The textiles, apparel, and footwear standard is expected around Q4 2026, though timelines should be confirmed directly with GRI.

Do I need to redo my content index because of the biodiversity, climate, and energy Topic Standard revisions?

If your prior content index cites the legacy GRI 304, 305, or 302 numbers, you should confirm whether the current version (GRI 101, 102, or 103 respectively) now applies to your next reporting cycle.

How many sectors will GRI eventually cover?

GRI's Sector Program targets roughly 40 sectors over time, prioritized by impact, with four standards published to date and several more in active development.