Area of land directly controlled by the organization during the reporting period.
Organizations should footnote details about the nature of the direct control relationship and all assumptions used, including source of data. See usage guidance for further information.
The IRIS catalog differentiates between land that the organization directly controls and land that the organization indirectly controls. This metric is intended to capture the area of land that is under the organization's direct control.
Direct control refers to land for which the organization controls land use through direct operation or management, including situations in which the organization's employees cultivate the land directly. Note that land ownership is not always equivalent to control. For example, where land is leased to another entity or individual to cultivate (e.g., a third-party manager), land is only directly controlled if the lease is accompanied by exhaustive criteria for land use.
Such land-use criteria are often included in management plans and legal agreements that also incorporate sustainability principles and typically include termination provisions in the event of poor performance. To the extent that the third-party manager must make minimal, ad-hoc, and discretionary land-use decisions that fall outside the scope of the land-use criteria, the land may still be considered directly controlled by the organization.
This metric has 4 related submetrics.
Land Directly Controlled: Total (OI5408) is required for Joint Impact Indicator: Land Use.
JII definition: Hectares of land used during the reporting period. May be used to assess land use efficiency (e.g. MW/ha for reservoirs, i.e. megawatts of power produced per hectare of land used for water storage).
JII unit of measurement: ha (land)
June 2022 - IRIS v5.3 Released (current version)
Immaterial change. Minor revision to usage guidance for clarity.
January 2020 - IRIS v5.1 Released
No change.
May 2019 - IRIS v5.0 Released
No change.
March 2016 - IRIS v4.0 Released
Material change. Glossary and corresponding text in metric's usage guidance modified to clarify the issue of direct control in the case of third-party management of the land.
March 2014 - IRIS v3.0 Released
Immaterial change. Minor revision to definition language for clarity.
November 2011 - IRIS v2.2 Released
New metric. Land Area Directly Controlled (OI5408) was developed via the IRIS Taxonomy Development Group.
IRIS Metrics Work Better in Sets
To use IRIS metrics—and the resulting data—to understand impact performance, IRIS metrics should be used and analyzed in generally accepted sets and according to well-defined objectives. IRIS+ gives you access to generally accepted Core Metrics Sets aligned to common Impact Themes and Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).