WALKING THE TALK -
Interface has become the first global flooring manufacturer to declare that all of its products — including all carpet tile and luxury vinyl tile (LVT) – are carbon neutral across the entire product lifecycle. The company is now offering its Carbon Neutral Floors™ program as standard to every customer, at no extra cost, to help them meet their own sustainability goals while also allowing them to reduce the emissions impact of their projects or spaces.
WALKING THE TALK -
This morning, from the main stage at SB’18 Vancouver, Max Burgers’ Chief Sustainability Officer, Kaj Török, announced that the Swedish burger chain is set to offer the world’s first climate-positive burgers. Török said that customers will soon be able to “take a bite that’s good for the planet as well as their taste-buds” when eating at the quick-serve burger chain, and urged other companies to join Max in going climate positive.
PRODUCT, SERVICE & DESIGN INNOVATION -
Reimagining global agriculture will require numerous efforts of various size and focus, such as those in the news this week from a global agribusiness firm trying to meet targets across complex supply chains, a startup developing ways for bees to deliver natural pesticides, and teens looking to utilize unused space for agriculture or al
PRESS RELEASE -
At its Annual General Meeting of Shareholders, Danone today introduced a set of nine long-term goals for the company and its brands. Aligned with the United Nations 2030 Sustainable Development agenda, the Danone 2030 Goals embed the business, brand and trust models of the company to drive long-term sustainable value creation and deliver the company's 'One Planet. One Heath' vision.
As a founding act for its goals, Danone is launching 'One Person, One Voice, One Share', an innovative employee engagement program and governance model for all of its 100,000 employees to co-own the company agenda, actively participate in defining roadmaps to bring the goals to life, and deepen their ownership mindset.
'Danone 2030 Goals' for the food revolution
BEHAVIOR CHANGE -
Imagine buying a pair of shoes and being able to address the carbon emissions from those shoes’ production and transportation right when you buy them. To date, this hasn’t been possible: We didn’t have blockchain to immutably and transparently track the carbon; point-of-sale integrations were cumbersome, and the carbon market has only worked in tonnes while a pair of shoes is around 12kg of carbon.
SUPPLY CHAIN -
Crop diversity and water conservation are critical aspects of sustainable agriculture, but to truly future-fit our food system, ensuring soil health is imperative. To do this, DanoneWave has launched a new soil health initiative to build best-in-class programs to support sustainable agriculture in its farming communities.
PRESS RELEASE -
Kohler Co. today announced a 15-year agreement to purchase 100 megawatts of wind power per year from the Diamond Vista wind farm located near Salina, Kansas.
Enel Green Power North America will construct the project this year and will be the long-term owner and operator of the nearly 300 MW wind project. Enel acquired Diamond Vista from Kansas-based renewable energy developer Tradewind Energy.
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.
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.
MARKETING AND COMMS -
The Outdoor Industry Association (OIA), whose members include REI, Iron Mountain, Patagonia, The North Face and Timberland, is producing a new film series that shares the stories of outdo
COLLABORATION -
The circular economy continues to gain steam as key players in the sustainability sphere join forces to unlock new opportunities to create positive impacts.
First, the Ellen MacArthur Foundation and Cradle to Cradle Products Innovation Institute (C2CPII) have partnered to drive momentum towards a circular economy.
THE NEXT ECONOMY -
2017 was a big year for the circular economy, with innovative new products, initiatives and tech tools popping up almost daily, and making it easier than every for corporates and consumers alike to engage in circularity.
An initiative of the World Economic Forum and the Forum of Young Global Leaders, The Circulars are awarded to individuals, companies (from startups to multinationals) and public and social organizations in recognition for their contributions to the circular economy. This year, 43 innovators have been nominated for pushing the circular agenda forward and paving the way for others in their field.
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.
COLLABORATION -
It may seem odd to hear about thousands of brook, brown and rainbow trout living in a paper mill, but it is certainly no fish tale in the traditional sense.
Located near Pennsylvania’s Allegheny forest on the headwaters of the scenic Clarion River, Domtar’s Johnsonburg mill boasts a long and rich history of papermaking — and more recently — of raising fish to help support local rivers.
COLLABORATION -
In an unprecedented move, Clarins Fragrance Group is blazing new transparency trails, with brands MUGLER and AZZARO committing to produce perfume alcohol in a way that meets rigorous environmental and social requirements under a groundbreaking “made in France” program.
The key aim of the “responsible alcohol” project is to promote biodiversity in agricultural practices. Other benefits of the program include local production, which will create a short circuit between harvest and transformation sites.
WASTE NOT -
Want to subvert the traditional apparel supply chain? You must possess a “little bit of craziness,” according to Giulio Bonazzi, CEO and president of Aquafil, an Italian company that transforms abandoned fishing nets and castoff bits of carpet into good-as-new nylon fibers. Speaking on a panel at the Textile Sustainability Conference in Washington, D.C., last week, Bonazzi noted that his propensity for seeing goldmines in landfills hasn’t always drawn plaudits. In fact, he was often ridiculed.
LEADERSHIP -
Customer experience design is the forgotten dimension of sustainability. We need to transcend what have now become well-defined approaches and definitions of customer experience, to help companies understand why their offerings are no longer resonating with people, and how to develop a profound understanding of the lived experience of every single person whose lives our organisations touch. This understanding is just as applicable to those businesses and organisations developing sustainable products, services, technologies and initiatives.
NEW METRICS -
Part Four in a 10-Part Series by Reporting 3.0. See previous parts below.
NEW METRICS -
“There is no sustainable business in an unsustainable world.”
This saying — a kind of Reporting 3.0 “motto” — is simultaneously contrarian and common sense: contrarian in the sense that it counters the prevailing tendency in the corporate sustainability field to focus on incremental progress toward sustainability at the company (“micro”) level. Common sense in that sustainability applies holistically (not just atomistically), such that company-level impacts “roll up” to the systemic (“macro”) level.