After the failure to reach a climate change accord at the 2009 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) COP15 summit in Copenhagen, last year’s climate conference in Cancùn faced the need to re-establish the legitimacy of multilateral negotiations under the UNFCCCC.  It wasn’t until the last few hours of the negotiations, that ‘a consensus without Bolivia’ was finally reached.

Following the damp outcome at Copenhagen, COP16 needed to establish a stronger agreement.  Unfortunately, the outcome of Cancùn was pre-determined, and proved to be modest. Countries pledged to meet non-legally binding emissions targets and according to analysts at Climate Action Tracker, even with these targets, the world would be heading towards a 3.2 degree Celsius increase in global temperature, with devastating environmental consequences.  Nevertheless, there were some positive outcomes, such as the creation of a new Green Fund, initially $30 billion and potentially rising to $100 billion by 2020, to help poor countries decarbonise their economies and adapt to climate change.  Moreover, the REDD (Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation) element of the deal holds promise for immediate impact on curbing carbon emissions.

Reactions towards the agreement were mixed, with many commentators regarding the Cancùn accord as only “a step in the right direction.” UK Ministers said: “We’ve worked hard to bring countries together and the expectations have been exceeded.  A global deal on climate change is now back on track.” Mexico President Felipe Calderòn, acknowledged, “It is less than what is needed, but it represents a significant step in the right direction.” On the other hand, Bolivia stood alone in rejecting the deal altogether, where Bolivian Ambassador Pablo Solon commented, “For us, this is not a step forward.  It is a step back, because what is being done here is postponing without limit the discussion on the Kyoto Protocol.” While the scope of the COP16 accord may not have been monumental, one can say that it helped restore some faith in multilateral UNFCCC processes with the hope of a stronger resolution at the COP17 in Durban, South Africa this year.

This week saw the organisation of the first of two climate conferences ahead of COP17, held in Bangkok, Thailand. Delegates from 175 countries sought to provide an update on progress of the Cancùn agreements and come up with an agenda for this year’s COP17 negotiations.  UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres said that governments have two main tasks before COP17.  Firstly, there is the need to chart the future of the Kyoto Protocol allowing sufficient emissions reduction targets that will keep the world from going over a 2 degree Celsius temperature rise. Secondly, governments need to rapidly advance work to complete the institutions which were agreed in Cancùn and deliver the funding and technology to help developing countries deal with the reality of climate change.

Aside from further developing the agreements reached at Cancùn, last week’s talks in Bangkok aimed to provide an opportunity for countries to clarify their commitments and increase their ambition levels.  General commentators had hoped that Bangkok, and the subsequent conference in Bonn, Germany this June will pave the road for a new deal on emission reduction targets so that a legally-binding international commitment can be reached at the COP17 this year before the Kyoto deal expires at the end of 2012.  As World Wide Fund delegate leader Tasneem Essop said prior to the start of the talks, “The fragile compromise achieved in Cancùn helped put the UN negotiations back on track. Bangkok needs to build on this progress and boost the overall ambition levels of the talks if we are to avert the worst consequences of climate change.”

Whilst the agreement reached in Cancùn saved the fraught UN Climate Process from collapsing, differences in Bangkok re-emerged on how to move forward and tackle tougher issues such as advancing the fate of Kyoto.   Developing countries pressed for a discussion focusing on issues Cancùn didn’t fully address such as rich nations’ emissions targets and the financial aid that is to be given to poorer countries.  On the other hand, the US and other developed nations wanted to focus on the less contentious topics of the Cancùn agreement.

According to Climate Action Tracker, “Bangkok climate talks have not changed the gap between emission reduction pledges and what is needed to get the world on track for limiting global warming to 2 and 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels?” None of the developed countries made the effort to increase their reduction target, as was requested as part of the mandate for the workshop in Bangkok and of the Cancùn agreement.

Following a weeklong of workshops and negotiations, an agenda was nonetheless set.  After struggling to set negotiating priorities for 2011, the agenda outlined the issues that would be addressed in subsequent meetings leading up to the high level conference in Durban at the end of the year.  Governments agreed that the outcome of COP17 will have addressed both, the implementation of the Cancùn agreements and issues that were not resolved at COP16 but which form part of the Bali Action Plan that was agreed in 2007.

For the EU, climate talks are not advancing quickly enough. Connie Hedegaard, the EU Climate Commissioner, avowed that “too often, too much, time is spent on how to proceed.  What we need it to come down to the content side of this and that is urgent.”  Indeed, many nations were unhappy that most of the time was taken up trying to agree on an agenda. As Pablo Solon stated that “to spend five days discussing an agenda seems insane but what is behind the discussion of the agenda is what kind of outcome we will have in South Africa.” Furthermore, Senior US negotiator Jonathan Pershing told reporters that “it’s less rosy today than when we came in (at the start of the meeting)” and was not impressed by the fact some countries wanted to renegotiate the outcome reached at Cancùn.

It is thus fair to conclude that stalled disagreements over the agenda to guide negotiations through the year and the lack of progress over emissions targets bode ill for upcoming discussions in Bonn and Durban later this year.

By Jessica Wettstein

It was 2008, and Julius Brinkworth had a problem. As Head of Energy and Environment at Sainsbury’s, he had created an investment programme which could make the retail giant’s stores massively more energy efficient. It would save large amounts of carbon – and money, too. There was just one snag. The upfront costs, which ran to hundreds of millions of pounds, had to be signed off by the Capital Investment Committee. Would it get the green light? It seemed touch and go. But then Julius discovered something surprising.

He looked into how the committee calculated the net present value (one way of measuring whether an investment is worthwhile). He discovered that this completely ignored the Carbon Reduction Commitment and Enhanced Capital Allowances – two UK government schemes which reward companies for becoming more energy efficient. This may not sound that exciting – but for Julius, it was a real breakthrough moment. He realised that, by failing to take these rewards into account, the committee was in danger of turning down what would otherwise be a demonstrably sound investment. Once the monies available from those schemes were added into the pot, the decision was straightforward. Sainsbury’s made the investment.

The principle that sustainability saves money is nothing new, of course. There are plenty of examples out there. Take BT. What’s interesting, though, is how often the financial upside comes as a surprise. When Marks and Spencer launched ‘Plan A’ in 2007, its budgeted cost was £200 million. Within a couple of years, it was breaking even; and by 2009-10, the various initiatives which made up Plan A had actually added £50 million worth of net benefit to the company.

With rich pickings like these on offer, you would imagine that finance departments would have become adept at identifying savings from sustainable development. In practice, this is often far from the case. Instead, many SD specialists have similar problems to Julius Brinkworth. They want their companies to succeed through sustainability, but they struggle to express the business case for the particular product, programme or strategy. And that means they struggle to convince their colleagues that there is one.

Why is this? In essence, it’s because sustainability is both complex and uncertain. And that puts it outside the comfort zone of most corporate financial decision makers. For the most part, the tools they use to calculate costs, risks and benefits assume that tomorrow will be more or less like today (’today plus 2%’, as the phrase goes). That is fine for many of the decisions the tools are used to make. But these are often either blind to the wide array of potential financial dividends from sustainability initiatives – as with the Sainsbury’s example above – or they simply cannot cope with its inherent uncertainty.

A new, more sustainable product, for example, might be hugely successful in the coming years, as energy and resource prices spiral, as tighter regulation kicks in along with generous incentives for green innovations, and as consumer preferences shift and markets realign. But when it comes to capturing the value of those advantages, there is inevitably an element of conjecture. The numbers are much ’softer’ than financial decision-makers are used to. As a result, the sustainable innovation looks less well developed, less mature – essentially, less of a good bet – than an unsustainable alternative.

So when faced with a choice between the familiar and the fuzzy, decision-makers often play safe – as they see it. But in so doing, they take what may well be a bigger risk of missing out on future opportunities. As a result, companies get stuck in a vicious cycle: they want a cast iron business case before they will act, but they can only get the data they need by going ahead and taking a punt on innovation, which many will understandably be reluctant to do. Changing this pattern means finding ways to make what looks ‘fuzzy’ solid and important: making it show up on the spreadsheets, as it were. Often, this means expressing it in terms of shareholder value. At Forum for the Future, we’ve developed a toolkit to help do just that [see 'Making it count', below]. It is clear that specific sustainability challenges are already hitting value drivers. Any company with an agricultural supply chain is worried about security, quality and cost of supply. The Climate Act in the UK and the EU Emissions Trading Scheme are affecting the cost of energy use. Customer expectations and purchasing behaviour are shifting – just look at the rapid mainstreaming of fair trade. And as the Carbon Disclosure Project demonstrates, investors, too, are already asking tough questions of management. These and other factors are all shifting the future landscape in which companies will operate. Sustainability professionals are well placed to map out its contours, identifying opportunities to create real value for their business.

By David Bent, Head of Business Strategies at Forum for the Future

Many question the environmental credentials of celebrities.  It is indeed fair to ask whether or not they actually help or hinder environmental causes as all the glitter and glam of Hollywood results in a massive environmental footprint.  Celebrities’ eco-unfriendly lifestyles are often reflected through their opulent/extravagant consumption: from numerous homes and cars to large private jets and globetrotting.

On the other hand, we have seen an increasing number of celebrities getting involved and joining the so-called “green movement” in reducing pollution, conserving resources, protecting biodiversity, and encouraging the use and development of renewable sources of energy.  Some of the most respected celebrities; most notably Leonardo DiCaprio and Edward Norton have been involved in everything from lobbying government legislatures, to fund-raising events, to forming partnerships with other organisations, to adopting greener lifestyles.  A wide array of stars have made it an avocation to champion the environmental causes they feel most strongly about, including  Brad Pitt, Natalie Portman, and Livia Firth – just to name a few.  The contemporary celebrities can receive such great public deference as a result of the admiration or morbid curiosity vested in them.  They possess an influence of a kind that politicians spend so long and so much money attempting to gain.  The fact that celebrities have the eye and ear of the masses, they are able to use their fame and star power to raise awareness, mobilise support and influence outcomes not only for environmental  but also humanitarian causes.

As a result of all the noise made on environmental issues, the trend in the world of celebrities has been to become green.  That is, they are increasingly designing greener homes and adopting more eco-friendly lifestyles.  So what kind of eco-conscious drift have celebrities been undergoing?  Well… The use of the hybrid car, in particular the luxury SUVs Toyota Pruis have caused a furore across the streets of Hollywood.  Stylish in its own right, the Prius’ most notable feature is its exceptional gas mileage of over 45mpg.  In addition, in their luxurious homes, many have installed solar panels which generate renewable energy as well as water recycling systems.

Going beyond eco-friendly homes and cars, celebrities are making a green impact in more influential ways.  For example, Leonardo DiCaprio, often considered a leader in the celebrity green movement, has been a vocal environmental activist for quite some time.  He wrote and directed a feature length documentary film titled “The 11th Hour,” which raised awareness on global warming.   He also set up the Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation in 1998 to promote environmental issues and is involved in “Save Tigers Now” – a global campaign between Leonardo DiCaprio and the WWF.

Brazilian supermodel Gisele Bündchen has also been recognised for her active commitment to the environment.   With a truly global reach, Gisele uses her fame to raise awareness about protecting the planet to people across the world.    She began her own flip-flop line, Ipanema Gisele Bündchen, to call attention to environmental causes and raise funds for forest and water-related projects in the Brazilian Atlantic Forest and the Amazon Rainforest.   Going beyond this, Gisele has embarked into the digital realm to educate and inspire people to take action.  She launched her own Blog da Gisele which aims to inform the public about environmental matters and share pictures and videos.  Acknowledging her efforts towards the environment, she was designated Goodwill Ambassador for the United Nations Environment Programme on 20 September 2009.

Hollywood, as an industry, has also been stepping up efforts to improve its environmental record.  A place of extravagance with bright lights, special effects, and splendour, also becomes a place with a large environmental impact.  Studios are increasingly improving their green credentials by using energy from renewable sources such as solar panels, recycling wastes and using eco-friendly construction materials.  The 2005 movie “Syriana,” starring George Clooney became one of the first “carbon neutral” Hollywood productions.  In addition, the Producers Guild of America Foundation and PGAGreen.org, with support and seed funding from Disney, Fox, NBC Universal, Sony Pictures Entertainment and Warner Bros., developed the Green Production Guide for film and television professionals looking to turn their productions green.

This year, in response to this growing trend and the efforts made by celebrities, as well as the important role and influence they exercise, we decided to launch a new category in the Green Awards 2011, recognising the Best Green Celebrity.   This Award will honour a celebrity, in any field, who has championed the cause of the environment.  The Award will be open to public voting, and the winner will be honoured at the Green Awards ceremony on 24th November 2011.  If you would like to nominate a global celebrity, send us a tweet @GreenAwards with the celebrity’s name and #GreenAwardsCelebrity11 or alternatively, become a fan of our Green Awards 2011 Facebook page.

By Jessica Wettstein

The United Nations designated the year 2011 as the International Year of Forests not only to highlight the importance of forests, but also to remind us that we are at the precipice for change.  This year’s theme is a continuation of the 2010 International Year of Biodiversity, seeking the protection of the habitat of some of the most important and diverse ecosystems.  Launched under the banner ‘Celebrating Forests for People,’ the UN is giving us the opportunity to reflect on the intrinsic relationship between healthy forests and our own prosperity.

During the launch ceremony at the UN Forum on Forests (UNFF), Secretary–General Ban Ki-Moon stated that “By declaring 2011 as the International Year of Forests, the United Nations General Assembly has created an important platform to educate the global community about the great value of forests – and the extreme social, economic and environmental costs of losing them.” The UNFF, which is made up of all 192 members of the UN, has the mandate to promote the sustainable development of all types of forests.

One of the objectives of this UN initiative is to unite everyone to recognise the vital roles that forests play in every aspect of our lives and emphasise how dependent we are on them for our well-being and survival.  As Jan McAlpine, the Director of the UNFF said in a statement, “every one of us, all seven billion people on earth, has our physical, economic and spiritual health tied to the health of our forest ecosystems.”

Some statistics are shocking!  For instance, according to the WWF, 5,000 trees are destroyed every hour in the Amazon.  Moreover, forests are home to over 80 percent of the world’s terrestrial biodiversity and deforestation is responsible for 15 percent of global CO2 emissions – more than the entire transport industry.   Forests provide shelter to people, food, medicine, clean water and they are vital in maintaining a stable climate and environment.  Unfortunately, they are being destroyed at an unprecedented rate for commonly known reasons such as logging, conversion to agricultural and cattle-grazing land, and urbanisation.  According to the Global Forest Resources Assessment, 13,000 hectares of forests are lost each year globally.

This UN-sponsored celebration therefore calls on governments, civil society and the private sector to use this global platform to commemorate actions that have been taken to sustainably manage and conserve the world’s forests.  It is a unique opportunity to celebrate forests through a year-long series of events that showcase success stories, highlight innovative solutions and stirs up public awareness and participation at all levels.

To celebrate the International year of Forests, various activities will be organised.  Member states, international organisations and civil society are expected to create national committees and choose focal points for the purpose of facilitating organising activities supporting forests.   The UN created a website serving as a forum for discussion and interaction as well as to promote events organised throughout the year.  In addition, the UNFF Secretariat is collaborating with the Jackson Hole Wildlife Film Festival to organise the International Forest Film Festival (IFFF).

At Green Awards, we are very exciting to be supporting the International Year of Forests.  We appreciate the real value they hold and call for the international community to focus necessary attention to forest protection and conservation.  In this year’s awards, with forests as the highlighted theme, we are moving beyond recognising ‘communication’ focused initiatives towards ‘best-in-class’ examples of sustainability outcomes, with one of our new categories honouring the ‘Best Conservation and Biodiversity’ efforts.  We believe it is an important celebration as 2011 could be the year which will determine whether or not the world is successful in our fight against deforestation.

Video Source: http://unep.org/forests/

By Jessica Wettstein

Companies are increasingly using ‘green claims’ – or communicating on the environmental attributes of their products, services or organisation.   Green claims or labels play an important role in educating and helping consumers make informed decisions about the products or services they purchase, and are also essential in driving businesses to develop products that have a reduced negative impact.

Unfortunately, green claims made by companies aiming to label their environmental credentials are sometimes false or misleading and have the potential to undermine consumer confidence in green marketing or lead to unfair competition between businesses who dishonestly assert to be environmentally conscious.

It is in this context that Defra (the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs) published an updated Green Claims Guidance earlier this month.  The revised guide advises companies to use clear language when communicating on the environmental impact of their products or services, and encourages the following three steps to be followed:

•    ensure the content of the claim is relevant and reflects a genuine benefit to the environment;

•    present the claim clearly and accurately; and

•    ensure the claim can be substantiated

According to many, making environmental claims is not any different from making any other kinds of claims.  However, the language and terminology used in green claims is still relatively new to people and many terms lack an ‘official’ definition. Among others, Maureen Nowak, the policy advisor in the Green Economy Programme at Defra, holds that it is important to be clear and accurate when communicating environmental credentials because it is key in guaranteeing that claims are reliable and are not misleading consumers.

Defra’s guide goes beyond advertising, covering all forms of communication from marketing, to mission statements, symbols and images.  It aims to facilitate businesses in making clear, accurate, relevant and substantiated environmental claims on products, services or in marketing and advertising and help restore public faith in those claims.

Some would argue that consumers are increasingly choosing to buy products that are more sustainable, providing an opportunity for companies to increase marketing efforts in this domain.  If this is the case, misrepresentation and incorrect claims are essentially taking advantage of consumer’s belief in such claims and ‘green’ products in general.  In fact, a research carried out by Consumer Focus revealed that people find it difficult to determine products that are better for the environment and many think companies use ‘green’ as an excuse to charge higher prices.  Also, two-thirds of the respondents express doubts regarding the truth in ‘green’ product claims.    This has important implications for the green market because consumers’ lack of confidence in green claims will ultimately make them disinclined to exercise their green purchasing power.

The launch of this amended guide has stirred a lot of discussion on the contribution it will make in turning sustainability communication more credible and opinions on this subject are mixed.   For instance, Rowland Hill, Corporate sustainability manager for Marks & Spencer, stated: “we welcome the new Green Claims Guidance, which will help companies to market products and services that are more sustainable.”  Ramon Arratia, Sustainability Director EMEAI of InterfaceFLOR, described the guide as “very well crafted, structured and addressing the most common mistakes in green claims.”  On the other hand, Melissa Sterry, Green Awards 2010 Judge and Founding Director of Societas and New Frontiers, sums it up as being a “plain speaking layman’s guide to sustainability communications.”  She opines that the guide is limited in its approach as it tells people how to comply or ‘tick boxes’ rather than craft effective environmental messages. With this scope, she views the guide to be a useful tool for SMEs, rather than larger enterprises.

The guide can therefore be seen as an initial first step, but not a sufficient one to promote the trust and clarity in environmental claims the public is after.

By Jessica Wettstein

The conventional understanding of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) as being merely a philanthropic contribution by corporations is being criticised and regarded as inadequate by key opinion leaders.   I have come across a great number of articles and blog posts that look at how the idea of CSR has changed over the years and is deemed irrelevant today.  For instance, in The Wall Street Journal, Professor Aneel Karnani posits that “the idea that companies have a duty to address social problems is not just flawed but it also makes it more likely that we’ll ignore the real solutions to these problems.” Similarly in The Guardian, Michael Edwards points out that “corporate philanthropy deflects attention away from the need to change core business practices.”

A few months ago, Wayne Visser, Founder and Director of the think-tank CSR International has blogged about the failure of Corporate Social Responsibility to have a positive impact on society and the planet, and the need for a new approach – CSR 2.0, where CSR stands for Corporate Sustainability and Responsibility.  This time, I would like to bring forward Michael Porter, one of the most influential business thinkers, and co-author Mark Kramer’s big idea of ‘Creating Shared Value.’

Porter himself suggests that CSR is the product of escalating tensions between business and society, and has served as a logical intermediate step to create a truce between the two, but not as the ultimate solution.  He condemns businesses for creating profit at the expense of the community and as a result, political leaders have been unable to pursue business-friendly policies.  Indeed, the impulse has been to regulate, control and impose taxes on businesses.   He therefore calls for a rethink of the relationship between business and society and the benefits that the capitalist system has on meeting societal needs and improving people’s lives.

Convinced that on a deep level, business and society are mutually dependent on each other, he argues for profit and societal needs to be reconciled by creating shared value (CSV).  This involves creating economic value in a way that simultaneously creates value for society by focusing on its needs and addressing its challenges.  Whilst CSR programmes are often externally determined and focus merely on reputational issues, they are hardly connected to the business.  On the other hand, CSV forms an integral part of a company’s profitability and competitive advantage, and should therefore guide the investments decisions of companies.  CSV is a powerful way of creating economic value for the firm and requires a company to identify core areas in which shareholders and society’s interests coincide, and invest their resources in those areas to maximise value creation.  There is also the need for governments to learn to regulate businesses in ways that stimulate shared value rather than impede it.

The concept of CSV recognises that businesses depend on a healthy and vibrant society to flourish and that society needs successful businesses to prosper.  It also acknowledges that failing to address social and environmental issues can incur additional costs for firms and that on the contrary; tackling these can reduce some of their costs through innovations in technology, operating methods and management systems.  As a result, by moving from CSR to CSV, businesses will be generating profit that comes from meeting societal needs, and regain legitimacy whilst restructuring capitalism and its impact on society.

Porter talks more about creating shared value in his interviews with the BBC and the Harvard Business Review.

By Jessica Wettstein

During the infancy of the Internet Age, several years before the launch of iTunes, a young British entrepreneur had the idea to create an online music download store. The concept was simple; create a virtual store, hosted on the web that enabled music lovers worldwide to order the latest releases at the click of a mouse. Today we’re all very familiar with this concept, but back in the early Nineties the idea was revolutionary. Having bought together a team of developers to build the platform and set-up shop in a small studio down a backstreet in Brixton, the music entrepreneur quickly realised the value of his concept. Within weeks of launching the Beta phase of the start-up, interest had been expressed worldwide and orders were coming in from as far a field as Russia and the United States. Meetings to pitch the concept to executives in the London offices of some of the world’s biggest music groups followed. Despite giving some lip service to the idea, not one of the music majors came aboard; indeed they attached so little value to the online music store concept that they wouldn’t even proceed with a trial of the technology. Under-pinning their lack of foresight was an assumption that business could and would carry on as usual and do so indefinitely; to imagine that the music majors could fall from grace and see their profits nose-dive any time soon was simply unimaginable for many music executives. However, nose-dive they did, as the Internet’s popularity spread like wildfire, enabling disruptive models to displace traditional music formats.

The saying goes ‘history repeats itself’. When Radio Caroline took the to seas in 1964 the music industry bosses of the day did everything within their power to shut the station down. Their attitude to pirate radio was only marginally less scornful than that of their counter-parts attitude towards the Internet in the early Nineties. Such poor foresight and judgment is not reserved to the music industry, nor even to the private sector. Consider for a moment Royal Mail. Surely upon the launch of email at least one bright spark suggested to the Royal Mail executive board the potential benefits of investing in the new technology; after all it would make sense for the leading British postal service to at least take a crack at becoming the leading British electronic mail service. How different Royal Mail’s profit and loss sheet could look today if such an opportunity had not been overlooked in the past.

There are two types of fear of loss: fear of losing what you have and fear of losing what you could have. Decision-makers in the public and private sector embrace the former at their peril, yet do so surprisingly often, as illustrated in the examples given above. The psychology isn’t complex; when we put our hearts, minds and souls into creating something the last thing we feel like to doing is dismantling, disrupting or destroying it. Our natural urge is to protect that which we have built, be it a career, a business or industry.

The scale of change required to build a sustainable society makes the impacts of the Internet look like piecemeal. The Internet enabled the creation of a faster-moving, better-connected and more democratic world. The way we work and the way we communicate has been revolutionized. However, on the whole the Internet has not challenged the way we source commodities, manufacture goods, build towns and cities, travel from A to B, produce energy, treat waste, grow food and keep livestock. Sustainability challenges all of these things and more and yet, many organisations are taking a reactive, not a pro-active approach. Certainly there are exceptions to this rule, with standout examples including IBM, Nike and Marks and Spencer – each of which has made an ambitious commitment to building a truly sustainable business, to which they pay a great deal more than just lip service. However, the majority of private and public sector organisations are best described as laggards where sustainability is concerned.

While developing a model for a sustainable city able to withstand extreme weather and geological events, I’ve been researching how the Earth’s ecosystems build resilience to natural disasters. I’ve found that in the natural world destruction goes hand in hand with renewal, wherein there is symbiotic relationship in constant motion between the two, neither able to exist without the other. Take for example forests in fire-prone regions. When we see images of flames ripping through these forests on our television screens the picture can look very bleak. However, some tree species are reliant on these fires, for it’s only when forest scrub is cleared by fire that their saplings have the space, light and soil nutrients to grow. Forests and businesses aren’t so different. Businesses can only make space for the new if they are prepared to clear out the old every now and then. Just as you need to plant several acorns to grow an oak tree, a business needs to plant and nurture many new ideas to keep their metaphorical forest in good health.

It’s time for decision makers across both the private and public sector to feel a fear of loss; a fear of loss of what their organisations could miss out on.  Some of the sustainability ideas they will be presented with in coming months and years will feel maverick, perhaps even wacky. Most will have little, if any traditional infrastructure supporting them. The odds stacked against their success will be huge. The majority will fall over at the first or second hurdle. When being presented with such ideas keep Radio Caroline in mind  (if you don’t know story hire the film ‘The Boat That Rocked’, as it will give you the general picture) and as they say in the States “Face the Fear”.

Melissa Sterry, Founder of Societás and NEW FRONTIERS

Over the past few days, the global GREEN AWARDS confirmed the participation of some of the most influential personalities from the sustainability field , ensuring  the Awards move forward with the best possible advice and expertise available.

read the rest of this entry

BREAKING NEWS - Chris Huhne, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate Change will be a keynote speaker at the Global GREEN Awards 2010 ceremony!

The Green Awards 2010 Ceremony will take place on Thursday 2nd December 2010 at the Natural History Museum.

The Awards are now open for entry from all over the world, until 30th September 2010 (12am) - to enter please visit: http://www.greenawards.co.uk/

For sponsorship opportunities, please contact Iain Patton at iain@greenawards.co.uk

Good luck!

When looking for best examples of communications about Biodiversity, I came across this visual created by Julia Diel, a student of The Offenbach Academy of Art and Design (Germany). I think this striking image summarises well the risk we are facing with regards of biodiversity losses!

This visual was created in 2007 for a German campaign Schuetzt biologische vielfalt ( Protect biological diversity ) no longer available online….

“Biodiversity is considered a prerequisite for a functioning ecosystem, and human beings are only capable of surviving in such an ecosystem. The widespread extinction of species is thus a threat to our own existence. In general, however, people have yet to realize this. This campaign is designed to change that. In order to speak especially to people with little interest in environmental protection, the threat is discussed in terms of society. Politics, sports, music, and entertainment all work—just as nature does—only thanks to the uniqueness and the diversity of their protagonists and the interplay between them. When these groups are stripped of their diversity, this demonstrates the fatal consequences such one-sidedness can have and how important it should be for the future to protect biodiversity.”

Source: http://www.hfg-offenbach.de/w3.php?nodeId=3927&pVId=99392232

Caroline Martinot