Category Archives: Uncategorized
When the Kat has your tongue
Earlier this year, Greenpeace went after Nestle to stop using palm oil from Sinar Mas, a company in Indonesia. They made a revolting take-off on the Kitkat advertisement in which you see a guy taking a Kitkat, breaking off a row and starting to eat it. Except that it’s an orangutan’s finger, and blood spurts [...]
Does your brand have a soft underbelly?
In 1999 Ben & Jerry’s, the eco-groovy, socially active, in-your-face, counter-culture ice cream company was booming. They had expanded internationally from Japan to Holland, and had a reputation as being one of the most reputable companies in the US. One of the most reputable companies in the US?!?* This was a tiny Vermont-based ice cream [...]
Unilever delists supplier on environmental grounds
Unilever has delisted Indonesia’s largest palm oil company, Sinar Mas, after being shown evidence by Greenpeace that Sinar Mas was illegally destroying rainforests. While they were first presented the evidence two years ago, Unilever had sought to work with Sinar Mas to improve its performance. “Constructive engagement” having failed, Unilever took action to delist. Unilever [...]
Women’s International Input for COP15 Meeting in Copenhagen
The indigenous Peruvians have a saying that if you want nature to provide for you, you need to provide for nature.
We seem to have lost that feeling: We have set up society to focus on efficiency above everything: our society seeks to produce more using less- less labour, fewer materials, less energy… BUT while we [...]
Is your company about to lose the platform it’s built on?
In the beginning, tribes of people would supply themselves by following their food. Either fully or partially nomadic, they still went to the supplies, hunting and gathering and forming tools as they went along. Then they started to organise food through farming and animal husbandry, and over time established craftsmen to produce tools and goods, [...]
This company made their customers raving (green) fans
When I was little my grandmother insisted on buying her groceries at a small shop. We had to stand in line and wait to be served. And when it was finally our turn the old man whose store it was, would shuffle around gathering my grandmother’s order. The process was slow, and [...]
Bags and bottles – tapped out.
A sign of the times?
The other evening, I was in a Toronto restaurant (Cava, on Yonge street) – a hip tapas-type restaurant with an awesome wine list. The waiter came to take our order. He listened attentively, committed it to memory, helped us choose a suitable wine, and then said “can I suggest tap water [...]
Is CSR a fad?
Corporations are increasingly needing to focus on sustainability because, as Achim Steiner Head of UNEP recently said, we are “not just at Peak Oil, we’re at Peak Everything”. Which means that reycling materials at a product’s end of life, becomes a strategic form of materials sourcing, not just a “do gooder” activity. Furthermore, many businesses [...]
Is Wal-Mart saving the planet?
Wal-Mart is getting suppliers to compete on environmental/sustainability criteria – and the bar is already quite high. Now business must know how to excel in sustainability if they want to grow. As well as the business payoff, there is likely to be a great environmental payoff – the Toxics Release Inventory serves as a good analogy – and suggests that pollution will reduce significantly as a consequence.
Lessons from . . . Pond Scum?!
Humans are wired to understand and respond to threats like a lion chasing us down. Climate change, population growth, and other stressors happen too slowly for our minds to get around. Furthermore, doubling rates always seem extremely slow – until it’s too late: pond scum with a doubling rate of one day, would starve the life out of a pond just one day after the pond was only 1/2 covered…