About Paul Hohnen

Paul Hohnen has worked intensively since 1975 on a range of global economic, development and environmental issues as a diplomat, international civil servant, Director of Greenpeace International, and Strategic Director of the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI). Now an independent consultant, his clients include governments, intergovernmental agencies, business and non-profit organisations.

Trained as an international lawyer, Hohnen worked from 1975 to 1989 as an Australian diplomat at the OECD in Paris, to the EU institutions in Brussels, and in Fiji and Sri Lanka. He was closely involved in the 1992, 2002 and 2012 Earth Summit processes, and has participated in the negotiation of a wide range environmental conventions, including on climate change. He has also been involved in the development and promotion of the GRI Sustainability Reporting Guidelines, the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises and the ISO 26000 Social responsibility guidance.

Hohnen conducts executive level workshops on embedding sustainability in business strategies and is an expert on materiality and sustainability reporting. Frequently invited to act as a conference facilitator, Hohnen has been a keynote speaker at a variety of high-level global business, government and NGO forums. His work has been featured in mainstream and speciality press and he is a regular contributor to Ethical Corporation magazine and The Guardian Sustainability Blog.

Hohnen is an Associate Fellow of the Royal Institute for International Affairs (Chatham House) in London, which published his paper 'The Future of Sustainability Reporting' in 2012, and is a member of the Dutch Worldconnector group.

Photo: Kien Seebregts 2012