ORGANIZATIONAL CHANGE -
Business is increasingly aligning its activities with the United Nation’s Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). A recent report shows that 43 percent of the world’s largest 250 companies are now linking their sustainability reporting to the SDGs.
MARKETING AND COMMS -
Confronted with an ever-growing demand for transparency and materiality, companies need to find an adequate format to publish both financial and pre-financial information to their stakeholders in an effective way. While traditional reporting reaches its limits, online integrated reporting features a number of key advantages that enable them to get the job done.
It is fair to say that 2017 was an important year for corporate reporting. A number of events established the disclosure of relevant ecological, social and governance (ESG) specific data as the “new normal”:
PRESS RELEASE -
Today, Nestlé® Pure Life® Purified Water, the world's leading bottled water brand, is announcing the introduction of a 700-mL bottle made from 100 percent food grade recycled plastic*, known as rPET. The new package is available starting this month on retail store shelves in North America.
“Nestlé Waters North America is the original bottled water company in the U.S., and environmental sustainability is an integral part of our company’s purpose and heritage,” said Antonio Sciuto, Executive Vice President and Chief Marketing Officer for Nestlé Waters North America. “This new bottle made from 100 percent recycled plastic for our namesake brand is the latest way we’re satisfying consumer demand for healthy hydration on-the-go and inspiring consumers to recycle.”
PRESS RELEASE -
Sustainable Brands ensures that global flagship events are climate neutral and contribute to Sustainable Development Goals
Zurich, Switzerland and San Francisco, United States, 14 February 2018 - Sustainable Brands®, the premier global community of brand innovators, kicks off the second year of its action-oriented Good Life initiative by renewing its partnership with So
FINANCE & INVESTMENT -
While sustainable finance has largely focused on providing financial products and tools to investors and businesses, we’re beginning to see more opportunities arise for consumers to support and shape the development of a more sustainable economy. One example of this is the emergence of the so-called “green” mortgage, a loan product that allows borrowers to reduce their utility bill costs by allowing them to finance the cost of incorporating energy-efficient features into a new housing purchase or the refinancing of existing housing.
CLEANTECH -
Nissan is driving the future of mobility forward with a vehicle-to-grid (VG2) demonstrator project that could prove instrumental in helping the UK transition to low-carbon transportation and a smart energy system. The £9.8 million e4Futures project will allow drivers to feed energy back into the electricity grid during peak times.
FINANCE & INVESTMENT -
A new report has found that money actually does grow on trees. Businesses are making money from planting trees and growing sales as rapidly as 10 times per year.
SUPPLY CHAIN -
The number of companies committed to tackling emissions in the supply chain has doubled over the last year, according to new research from CDP and McKinsey & Company.
CLEANTECH -
Back in 2015, we first learned about + POOL, a wildly ambitious idea by four enterprising New Yorkers to make the City’s notoriously polluted Hudson River swimmable with the help of a floating, water-filtering pool.
PRESS RELEASE -
GRID Alternatives, a national leader in making clean, affordable solar power and solar jobs accessible to low-income communities, announced today a $500,000 grant from Bank of America Charitable Foundation to support its SolarCorps Fellowship Program. This national grant builds on the bank’s past support for GRID in locations in California and Colorado.
PRESS RELEASE -
We live in a digitally connected world where anyone can be a global problem solver, addressing critical issues like unemployment, hunger, poverty, climate change, and income inequality. By combining the power of technology with innovative, entrepreneurial, and passionate people, we can accelerate solutions that create positive and lasting change.
Last year, Cisco set an ambitious new goal: harnessing the power of global problem solvers to positively impact the lives of one billion people by 2025.
We set out to achieve this goal and make this impact in three ways:
PRESS RELEASE -
Braskem's sugarcane based bioplastic to be used to package over 500,000 bags of Leafgro®, a soil conditioner for sale in lawn and garden retail locations along the U.S. East Coast.
SUPPLY CHAIN -
An estimated 150 million metric tons of plastic waste are in the ocean today and every year around eight million metric tons more are being added. Earlier this year, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation warned that by 2050 there will be more plastic than fish in the world’s oceans if a more effective system for global plastics is not put into place.
PRESS RELEASE -
Crédit Agricole, Danone, Firmenich, Hermès, Michelin, SAP, Schneider Electric & Voyageurs du Monde accelerate their actions for climate & the most vulnerable populations
This new impact investment fund, with a target of 100 million euros, aims at improving the lives of 2 million people and avoiding the emissions of up to 25 million tons of CO2 over a 20-year span.
SUPPLY CHAIN -
Electric vehicles and alternative fuels are key components of the auto industry’s vision for the future, but technology isn’t the only thing driving sustainable mobility.
PRESS RELEASE -
Everyone needs to do their part to conserve water. But what if entire communities could work together to eliminate the unnecessary waste of this valuable resource?
That’s the idea behind Green Plant Framework/Aquifer Systems, founded by Joshua Parde. The system allows users to compare the total volume of water delivered from a municipal source to the amount actually used in a home or other building. With this data, homeowners and property managers can identify water leaks and make critical repairs.
PRESS RELEASE -
University of Phoenix® and PepsiCo today announced cooperation on a mentorship program designed to encourage more women to enter the science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) and finance workforces to help women bridge the gender gap and fill the growing number of open positions in STEM fields.
COLLABORATION -
As part of its ongoing regionalization strategy, The Consumer Goods Forum (CGF) has created a Japan Sustainability Local Group. Chaired by Koji Inoue of Ajinomoto Co., Inc., the Local Group will help local and multinational CGF members in Japan share knowledge and best practices on sustainability challenges facing the consumer goods industry and strategies for working towards the CFG’s global Environmental and Social Sustainability Resolutions.
CHEMISTRY, MATERIALS & PACKAGING -
Packaging remains a considerable challenge for businesses looking to reduce their impacts, but innovators such as food-service supplier Eco-Products and Finnish startup Sulapac are helping to accelerate the transition to lower-impact models through cross-industry partnerships and sustainable packaging solutions.
CLEANTECH -
While discussion around the future of urban mobility largely focuses on electric vehicles and public transportation, buzz is growing around the role of bikes in driving down emissions in cities.
Congested city streets pose considerable challenges for delivery trucks, a problem that French startup FlexiModal endeavors to solve with its BicyLift bicycle trailer. The emissions-free logistics solution allows the operator to move Euro pallets (120 x 80 cm) by bicycle and by hand in areas where circulation of traditional delivery vehicles is limited. The trailer weighs 55 lbs. and has a carrying capacity of around 400 lbs.