CDP Reporting

CDP is the global disclosure system that collects companies' environmental data on climate, forests and water on behalf of investors and large buyers. For many suppliers, the first contact with CDP is an email from a customer asking them to respond to its questionnaire as part of the customer's CDP supply chain programme. That request often means setting out the company's carbon inventory, targets and climate governance in writing, in a comparable format, for the first time. Alalëa prepares CDP responses together with the inventory and targets behind them, based on evidence and consistent with your other reports. Whether you are a Turkish exporter responding to European buyers, a subsidiary in Türkiye contributing to a group submission or a company disclosing voluntarily, the approach is the same.

What CDP is and on whose behalf it collects data

According to CDP's 2026 questionnaire overview, CDP has collected environmental data since it was founded in 2002, on behalf of more than 640 institutional investor signatories representing USD 127 trillion in assets and more than 270 major buyers with USD 6.4 trillion in purchasing power. The same document states that more than 22,100 companies disclosed through CDP in 2025.

This structure means there are two routes into CDP:

• Investor request: Large and listed companies may receive requests directly from CDP on behalf of investor signatories.
• Supply chain request: Buyers that are members of the CDP supply chain programme ask selected suppliers to disclose. According to CDP, more than 45,000 suppliers were asked to disclose through CDP in 2025.

Companies that receive no request can also disclose voluntarily.

How the questionnaire is structured

Since 2024 the climate change, forests and water security questionnaires have been combined into a single corporate questionnaire. According to the 2026 overview, the full corporate questionnaire has 13 modules: modules 1 to 6 and module 13 are integrated modules covering more than one environmental issue, modules 7 to 11 are issue-specific environmental performance modules, and module 12 is specific to the financial sector.

Forest questions focus on seven commodities: timber products, cattle products, soy, palm oil, coffee, cocoa and rubber. Companies in high-impact sectors receive additional sector-specific questions; according to CDP, an organisation can be assigned up to four questionnaire sectors, but scoring is based only on the primary questionnaire sector.

Why suppliers in Türkiye receive CDP requests

For a company that is not publicly listed, the typical source of a CDP request is a customer's supply chain programme. European and global brands need supplier data to calculate their own Scope 3 inventories, track supplier targets and support their own disclosures. According to CDP's supply chain page, members use this data for their own reporting, Scope 3 accounting and supplier engagement programmes, and suppliers can answer customer-specific supply chain questions alongside the main questionnaire. CDP sums this up as "write once, read many": a single response reaches several customers and investors.

In practice, a supplier in an export-oriented sector such as textiles, automotive components, food, chemicals or packaging may receive CDP requests from several customers in the same cycle. Response quality can play a role in supplier assessments and, over time, in purchasing decisions. For EU buyers, a well-founded response from a Turkish supplier also means more reliable data in their own Scope 3 inventory.

How your inventory and SBTi targets feed the CDP response

The heaviest part of a CDP response is quantitative data, and that data comes directly from the carbon inventory. CDP states that its climate reporting requirements are aligned with the GHG Protocol Corporate Standard and its Scope 2 and Scope 3 guidance. The 2026 overview also asks respondents to follow the GHG Protocol principles of relevance, completeness, consistency, transparency and accuracy.

The link between CDP and SBTi is also strong: according to the SBTi's own description, CDP is one of the partner organisations behind its growth. An approved science-based target lets you fill the target questions in your CDP response with concrete, measurable and externally validated content. A similar development is under way for land-related emissions: CDP has announced plans to align its questionnaire with the GHG Protocol Land Sector and Removals Standard in 2027.

A company without an inventory will find it hard to give a good CDP response. In the first year, the most efficient route is often to build the inventory with CDP questions in mind and base the response on it. Common pitfalls on the data side are covered in 5 common mistakes in Scope 3 data collection and market-based and location-based Scope 2.

How CDP scoring works

CDP publishes its scoring methodology each year in detailed documents. Here we summarise only the basic logic CDP states publicly.

A few rules to keep in mind when reading this table:

• Essential criteria: According to CDP, essential criteria are absolute requirements that must be met to reach a scoring level. Even if the points threshold for a level is exceeded, the score can be capped if the essential criteria are not met. These criteria apply to the full questionnaire.
• Not disclosing: Companies that do not respond, or do not provide enough information to be scored, are marked "Did not disclose".
• Blank fields: A blank answer counts as not disclosed. In numerical fields, zero means the value was measured and the result was zero.
• Unscored fields: "Comment" columns and the "Further information" field at the end of the questionnaire are not scored.
• Language: Only responses in English, Latin American Spanish, Brazilian Portuguese, Japanese and Chinese are scored. Responses in Turkish are not.
• Organisation-specific information: For questions asking for rationale, examples and case studies, CDP expects company-specific detail on activities, locations and methods rather than generic statements.

The 2026 timeline

According to CDP's help centre, the submission deadline for scoring in the 2026 cycle was 16 September 2026; scores will be released to disclosers through the CDP Portal in the week of 30 November 2026 and published the same week for companies with public scores. According to CDP's 2026 page, the final response deadline is 28 October 2026. The calendar follows a similar rhythm each year: request lists are compiled in spring, the response window opens in early summer and the scoring deadline falls in September. Starting preparation before the response window opens keeps data collection from colliding with the scoring deadline.

Alignment with ISSB and TSRS

CDP describes itself as the ISSB's global climate disclosure partner. According to CDP, its questionnaire has been aligned with IFRS S2 Climate-related Disclosures since 2024, and its climate data points have been aligned with the TCFD recommendations since 2018. In the same document, however, CDP makes an important caveat: alignment with IFRS S2 does not mean the questionnaire fully meets IFRS S2 requirements.

In Türkiye, the counterpart is TSRS, the Turkish Sustainability Reporting Standards. By the decision of the Public Oversight Authority (KGK) published on 16 January 2026, the thresholds for TSRS were set at TRY 1 billion in total assets, TRY 2 billion in net sales revenue and 500 employees; entities exceeding at least two of the three in two consecutive reporting periods are in scope. In July 2026, KGK brought TSRS 2 into line with the greenhouse gas disclosure amendments the ISSB made to IFRS S2; the changes are mandatory for periods beginning on or after 1 January 2027.

For a company in scope of TSRS, the CDP response and the TSRS 2 report should therefore draw on the same dataset: the same inventory, the same boundary, the same risk and opportunity analysis, the same governance structure. Different figures in the two documents are the first inconsistency a verifier or data user will notice. CDP itself explicitly asks for no contradictory information within a response or between questions. The same principle applies to a multinational group: the Turkish entity's figures in a customer's CDP request should match what it reports to its parent.

Our process

1. Request and scope analysis: Which customer or investor sent the request, which themes (climate, forests, water) does it cover, and is the full or the SME questionnaire appropriate? Are there customer-specific supply chain questions?
2. Gap analysis: If you have responded before, we map your previous response and score feedback against the questionnaire; if not, we map your existing inventory, policies and targets. The result is a table showing which questions can be answered with evidence today and where gaps remain.
3. Data and evidence collection: We identify data owners and gather evidence for emissions, energy use, targets, governance (board oversight, responsibilities), risk and opportunity assessment and reduction initiatives.
4. Inventory update: If there is no inventory, or it is incomplete, we complete Scope 1, 2 and the relevant Scope 3 categories through our carbon footprint work.
5. Draft response: We answer the questions in English, specific to your company and based on evidence, planning which information goes where with the scoring methodology and essential criteria in view question by question.
6. Internal review and approval: We submit the response to the relevant departments and management for approval and check its consistency with your TSRS report and sustainability report.
7. Portal entry and final check: We support entry of the response into the CDP Portal and carry out the final pre-submission check with you, verifying one by one that content carried over with "copy forward" from previous responses is still current.
8. Next year's plan: When score feedback arrives, we prepare a plan prioritising data, target and governance improvements for the next cycle.

Gaps we see most often

• Inconsistency between inventory and response: The figure in the sustainability report differs from the one in CDP, or the boundary or base year is undocumented.
• Scope 2 given as a single number: Location-based and market-based results are not separated, and certificate use is not explained.
• Zero entered in unmeasured fields: For CDP, zero is a measured zero.
• Generic statements: Sentences such as "we value energy efficiency"; CDP expects company-specific examples, figures and cases.
• No target: Without a concrete, time-bound target with defined coverage, management and leadership level questions stay empty. See why SBTi targets are withdrawn.
• Governance gap: No record of who handles climate issues at board level and how often.
• Response in Turkish: Not scored, and it can be a disadvantage in customer assessments.
• Copied response not updated: Last year's response carried over without being matched to the new year's data.

What determines the scope of the work

Every company's situation is different. The decisive factors are whether an inventory and an SBTi target already exist, the number of themes to answer (climate only, or forests and water too), the company's questionnaire sector and the sector-specific questions that come with it, whether the company has responded to CDP before, and internal approval processes. The first year is the most intensive, because it is when the data and evidence infrastructure is built.

Why Alalëa

The quality of a CDP response is determined not by questionnaire technique but by the quality of the inventory and targets behind it. Alalëa's founder, Göker Avcı, is an SBTi Certified Expert; we build the inventory, the targets and the CDP response with the same method and the same dataset, so the same figures appear in CDP, TSRS and customer questionnaires. We share our approach openly in our GHG Protocol sector boundary guide, Scope 3 categories 1 to 15 and current points in the SBTi process.

If you have a CDP request in hand or want to prepare for the next cycle now, get in touch with us.