Environmental and social responsibility report
2021-2024

The IOC holds a unique position as leader of the Olympic Movement and guardian of the Olympic Games. The IOC’s responsibility in environmental and social matters is integral to the organisation’s vision of building a better world through sport.

This Environmental and Social Responsibility Report Overview highlights how, between 2021 and 2024, the IOC has implemented its environmental and social commitments across its three spheres of responsibility: as an organisation, as owner of the Olympic Games, and as leader of the Olympic Movement.

This page introduces four thematic reports, developed in accordance with the latest Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) standards, and subject to independent assurance by ERM CVS, that detail the IOC’s commitments, achievements and ongoing challenges:

Refer, also, to the related GRI Supplement: Environmental and Social Responsibility

Together, these reports illustrate the IOC’s holistic approach to addressing environmental and social imperatives as part of Olympic Agenda (Olympic Agenda 2020 and Olympic Agenda 2020+5), the strategic roadmap for the Olympic Movement. By combining these interlinked strategies in one place, this overview underscores how the IOC continually evolves to meet global expectations, leverage the unifying power of sport, and foster positive change worldwide.

Background

The Olympic Movement and the IOC

To understand the focus on these environmental and social imperatives, it is important to know what the IOC is and how its role in the Olympic Movement creates wide-ranging impacts and opportunities.

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Our ambition

Driven by its vision to build a better world through sport, the IOC sees both a responsibility and an opportunity to contribute tangibly to global sustainable development efforts. The organisation’s aim is to minimise its footprint while maximising positive impacts across social, environmental and economic spheres.

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Our Environmental and Social Responsibility

Sustainability

The IOC has adopted a holistic approach to sustainability, working across its three spheres of responsibility. Following a materiality assessment and extensive consultations with stakeholders, the IOC Sustainability Strategy, approved in 2016 and published in 2017, focused on five focus areas:

Infrastructure and natural sites
Sourcing and resource management
Mobility
Workforce
Climate

Since then, these focus areas have evolved to better address the three key interlinked issues that humanity currently faces:

Climate change
Biodiversity loss
Waste and pollution

Olympic Games Impact and Legacy

With Olympic Agenda, the IOC has shifted its approach to organising the Olympic Games. Today, the Games adapt to the hosts and to their long-term needs, not the other way around.

In line with this approach, the IOC Legacy Strategic Approach, approved in 2017 and published in 2018, sets the strategic direction for the Olympic Games in creating long-term benefits for host cities and their communities, extending the impact beyond the event itself.

The 2021–2024 objectives related to the Olympic Games impact and legacy brought an increased focus on assisting OCOGs and Games hosts to deliver social, economic and sporting benefits for local communities both before and after the Games, ensuring effective governance and funding for legacy, and promoting the legacies of past and future Olympic Games.

Gender equality and inclusion

The IOC has long recognised the powerful contribution it can make to advancing gender equality both in and through sport.

The IOC’s role “to encourage and support the promotion of women in sport at all levels and in all structures, with a view to implementing the principle of equality of men and women” is enshrined in Rule 2.8 of the Olympic Charter and informs all aspects of its work. Olympic Agenda reiterated this commitment with concrete actions – including the aim to achieve 50 per cent female participation at the Olympic Games, and to mainstream gender equality across the Olympic Movement.

Human Rights

The IOC’s commitment to improving the promotion and respect of human rights within its remit has been long-standing.

The foundations of this commitment can be found in the Olympic Charter, which states that “the practice of sport is a human right. Every individual must have access to the practice of sport, without discrimination of any kind in respect of internationally recognised human rights within the remit of the Olympic Movement”.

Sport is a powerful vehicle for fulfilling numerous human rights, such as the right to physical and mental health, and the right to engage in leisure and recreational activities. These rights can only be truly realised when the principles of inclusion, non-discrimination, safety, respect for basic needs and a healthy environment are respected.

Explore the reports by spheres of responsibility

IOC as an organisation

Sustainability
Gender equality and inclusion
Human rights

IOC as owner of the Olympic Games

Sustainability
Olympic Games impact and legacy
Gender equality and inclusion
Human rights

IOC as leader of the Olympic Movement