Key Takeaways
- Asia-Pacific is the clearest growth story. Nearly two-thirds of respondents expect its influence on sustainability to increase, making it the region with the strongest positive momentum.
- The EU and China are expected to remain influential agenda setters. Both are seen as playing an increasingly important role in shaping sustainability priorities, standards, and expectations in the years ahead.
- Influence is becoming more geographically distributed. While respondents are more likely to expect the United States’ influence to decline than increase, they also see signs of growing influence in regions such as Latin America and the Middle East and North Africa, pointing to a more diverse global sustainability landscape.
Where Is the Future of Sustainability Being Shaped?
Across this series based on new research from GlobeScan and BSR, sustainability professionals at large companies have described an environment in which sustainability efforts are becoming more focused, with greater emphasis on compliance, tighter resources, and a narrower set of priorities. As companies adapt to these changing conditions, an important question emerges: where will the future sustainability agenda be shaped?
When asked how regional influences on sustainability are likely to evolve over the next three years, respondents point to a changing global landscape of influence. Asia-Pacific stands out as the region most widely expected to gain influence, with nearly two-thirds (62%) of sustainability professionals anticipating its role will grow. The European Union and China are also expected to play increasingly important roles in shaping sustainability priorities, standards, and expectations in the years ahead. There are also signs of growing influence in regions such as Latin America and the Middle East and North Africa.
At the same time, respondents are more likely to expect the influence of the United States on the sustainability agenda to decrease (43%) rather than increase (23%). Together, these findings suggest a rebalancing of influence across regions, with sustainability increasingly shaped by a broader range of actors, markets, and policy environments rather than becoming concentrated in any single geography.
WHAT DOES THIS MEAN?
The future sustainability agenda is likely to be influenced by a broader mix of regions than it is today. These findings suggest a balancing of influence across regions rather than the emergence of a single new center of gravity. For companies, success will increasingly depend on understanding how sustainability priorities evolve across multiple markets and translating those signals into strategies that are globally coherent while remaining relevant to local contexts.
To find out more about how large companies are shifting from ambition to implementation, the GlobeScan BSR State of Sustainable Business 2026 report provides a snapshot of how corporate sustainability is evolving today based on insights from 124 senior sustainability professionals at large global companies.
How This Insight Was Generated: This analysis draws on an online survey conducted by GlobeScan and BSR in April and May 2026 among 124 sustainability professionals working at companies with annual revenue of $1 billion or more, the majority of whom are based in North America and Europe.
Survey Question: How much, if at all, do you think regional influences on sustainability will change over the next three years? For each of the regions or countries below, please use the scale to best describe whether you feel its influence on sustainability will decrease, say the same, or increase.
Headquarters represented: North America, Europe, and Other regions.
