The latest products, services, design approaches and business models that are helping organizations of all sizes deliver on their sustainability ambitions and establish a new business as usual
Since the introduction of the first ecolabels and standards for organic products in the late 1980s and '90s, sustainability standards and certifications have proliferated across myriad industries. From food to manufactured goods, standards and certifications are helping consumers and businesses alike make better purchasing decisions to ensure they respect the triple bottom line.
You’ve probably heard plenty of startups claim they can “revolutionize” their industry, but in the case of Bolt Threads, they may actually be right. The California-based biotechnology startup is already manufacturing its Engineered Silk™ protein at scale and made two big announcements this week at TechCrunch Disrupt NY: the conclusion of a $50 million Series C financing round, and a new partnership with apparel brand Patagonia.
The UPS Foundation has partnered with drone manufacturer Zipline and leading vaccine alliance Gavi., to deliver blood, medicines, and vaccines to clinics across Rwanda via a fleet of Zipline drones. Drones can provide a faster, more reliable method of medicine delivery in areas where roads are often impassable, or where products cannot be kept for long without spoiling. The venture is planned as a one-year initiative, with hopes to expand in the future.
The Arandas, Mexico-based Tequila Cazadores distillery has become a shining example of Bacardi’s “Good Spirited” corporate responsibility program. The facility is now 100 percent biomass-fueled thanks to a recently-installed biomass boiler, and about 60 percent of its biofuel comes from spent agave fibers from the distillation process.
Robots farmers; intelligent crop monitoring; vertical city farms; algae- or lupine-based ingredients; and sustainable methods for growing, nutrient extraction and waste valorization – if the latest crop of F&A Next finalists is any indication, all of these could be revolutionary new components of our food and agriculture systems in the near future.
Brussels-based association Zero Waste Europe is developing a project to empower community groups across Europe to challenge wasteful products and facilitate stakeholder collaboration on their redesign. ‘The People’s Design Lab’ is expected to launch in June, but with only one week left in its campaign, Zero Waste Europe has raised just over €4,500 of its €8,000 goal.
Danish utility company DONG Energy is offering renewable electricity to business customers in the United Kingdom for “no additional premium” compared to “brown energy” sources. In an announcement late last week, the energy supplier pledged to “cover additional costs associated with 'going green,'” so that UK businesses can access renewable electricity and achieve their sustainability ambitions without commercial disadvantage.”
The local food movement has thrived in recent years, bolstered by consumers’ growing concerns over what is in their food and where it came from – and startups are jumping at the opportunities it presents. From California to New York, a host of apps and business models are connecting growers, buyers, sellers and eaters. At the same time, many small farmers are still struggling.
In 2010, I wrote a piece on sustainability. At the time, my point of view was that it’s a challenge too big and too complex for governments alone; particularly with the financial growth of nations such as China, Brazil and India, where consumers were beginning to get a taste of their newly acquired buying power. Back then I thought it would take a change in human behavior to have a real impact on business practices … people seeing the threats to their environment the way they once saw the threat of smoking to their health. So, it’s 2016, where do we stand?
For all the talk about the importance of corporate social responsibility (CSR), the truth of the matter is most executives don’t believe it drives direct bottom line business benefit, or that it effectively addresses societal problems. The authors of Connect: How Companies Succeed by Engaging Radically with Society interviewed 70 CEOs and found that they view CSR as commercially irrelevant, believing it focuses more on boosting employee morale than addressing the way a company engages with society’s concerns.
The Unilever Sustainable Living Young Entrepreneurs Awards, now in its third year, has attracted the highest number of entries to date. The Cambridge Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL), which runs the competition with Unilever and Ashoka, says it received over 900 entries from over 99 countries from young entrepreneurs creating a safer, healthier and brighter future.
Global outdoor lifestyle brand Timberland prides itself on its commitment to innovate and operate in an accountable and responsible manner — in terms of its products, the communities in which it operates, and the outdoors. As part of this commitment, the company today announced the implementation of its rigorous environmental standard — the Timberland Environmental Product Standard (TEPS) — across all of its product categories, beginning with its Spring 2016 collection.
Food dominates our lives; it influences our health and has becomes a defining theme of 21st-century popular culture. No wonder then that the sustainability issues that influence the things we eat and drink have taken on such importance with the public worldwide.
Late last year, devastating fires engulfed 2 million hectares of land in Indonesia, impacting the health of 43 million people around Southeast Asia, and emitting as much greenhouse gases into the atmosphere as Brazil does in a year. They were driven by years of rampant, unregulated deforestation, chiefly for the expansion of paper pulp and oil palm plantations.
2016 is the centennial of the National Park Service (NPS), and in February the agency got a present from the biggest tech company in the world – or, more accurately, the world got a present from Google and the NPS: On February 11th, Secretary of the Interior Sally Jewell hosted an event at the Tuskegee Airmen National Historic Site to announce a Public-Private Partnership between Google and the NPS.
SustainU, a West Virginia-based leading producer of apparel using fabrics from 100 percent recycled, domestically manufactured materials, this week announced a partnership with Major League Baseball (MLB) to produce licensed apparel for the 2016 season.
Label Insight - leading provider of SaaS data solutions providing insights and strengthening the connections between CPG brands, retailers and consumers - announces the launch of its Sustainability SmartSPEC™ solution. The Sustainability SmartSPEC is customizable based on a retailer's unique sustainability initiatives in categories such as environmental impact, animal welfare and farming techniques.
A minimum of 10 billion apparel and footwear products are expected to be produced with unique digital identities and data profiles in the cloud over the next three years through a partnership between packaging materials leader Avery Dennison and Internet of Things (IoT) company Evrythng. The companies believe this to be the largest number of IoT-connected products in a single deal, to date.
This Friday, world leaders will convene to sign the Paris Climate Agreement. The international regulatory environment and national policies to curb emissions are reshaping global markets. Decarbonization could define the 21st century economy. But what do these changes mean for businesses?
This week, both the World Resources Institute (WRI) and MorningStar Farms — producer of veggie burgers, sausages and other faux meat items beloved by vegetarians across the U.S. — have unveiled research asserting that the average American could cut their diet-related environmental impacts by nearly half just by eating less meat and dairy.