Financial markets play a pivotal role in our economy in that the allocation of resources through these markets determines, to a significant degree, the development of our society. The way we invest today has an effect on the way society will function and produce in the future. Even a small shift in the behaviour of the actors on the financial markets can have significant consequences on other ...
A growing number of businesses are dealing with sustainability issues. One way to approach corporate sustainability is by implementing radical innovations with a high ambition level in terms of profit as well as people and planet. However, keeping the ambition high by realising value synergy within new business models is challenging. During the process of realisation, often trade-offs in ...
The adoption of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in 2015 has made a U-turn in how organizations and companies perceive a business model that has been used for almost three decades. The industrial business model, that is based on a linear approach and the depletion of scarce natural resources and all-for-profit attitude, has become outdated due to its inability to address the environmental ...
The emergence of computer-mediated communities rises from people's needs to gather and participate in informal public spaces in everyday life and their primordial wish to look for a sense of 'community'. Internet service providers set up privately owned platforms in the internet and people join in voluntarily for sharing information about the specific topics of their common interest. Using a case ...
While Governments Fail to Deliver, Cities Lead in the Mission to Address the Climate Crisis There were just a couple of days between the UN summit on climate change and the C40 World Mayors Summit but the disparity in the promises and visions was immense! The third C40 Summit was held in Copenhagen this year with lots of different side events and AVF was present as the organizer of “The ...
Through sustainability reporting, your organization is empowered to make responsible, data-driven decisions in order to reduce its carbon emissions on the environment. Managing your company's sustainability progress means keeping up with compliance requirements and improving its social and environmental record. Ultimately, you want to reduce potential hazards and risk, create efficient ...
In February of 2019, CEOs and senior executives from seven major pharmaceutical companies met with the Senate Finance Committee about drug pricing. During that meeting, AstraZeneca CEO Pascal Soriot discussed how value-based agreements have the potential to transform how medicines are priced and reimbursed in the U.S., and in doing so, triggered a host of discussions across the industry on the ...
The 'clean economy' has become something of a catch all phrase being used in a variety of contexts to describe the desired end state of a transition to a lower carbon future. Like the often overused phrase 'green economy' it carries many meanings, not all of which are grounded in reality. The GLOBE Group has been engaged in some groundbreaking research on the clean economy and it would seem ...
This paper examines the respective roles of business and government if we are to achieve sustainability. The model of Stewart Brand is discussed with reference to the sustainability governance issues in the People's Republic of China (PRC). At a time when many governments seem reluctant to regulate on sustainability issues, the paper recommends a more strongly enacted role for government while ...
The Johannesburg Stock Exchange announced on 3 June of this year that a new collaboration with global index provider FTSE Russell will see its environmental, social and governance (ESG) disclosure indicators align with FTSE Russell’s evolved ESG approach. “The new approach will replace our Socially Responsible Investment (SRI) Index. It will give JSE-listed companies the opportunity ...
We are confident that sustainable sanitation solutions will have a positive domino effect on the environment, health, water, energy, women, agriculture, food security, quality society, well being and stability through the engagement of social business partners, CSR companies, non profit organizations, United Nation, development programs and banks, plus many others, in the process. A long-term ...
How innovation in products, processes and business models can help organisations become more sustainable. By Richard Waters, Principal, Carbon Trust Advisory. Regulation, cost, reputation, revenue and risk management are driving many organisations to cut their carbon emissions, and become more sustainable. More businesses are looking at how they can put environmental sustainability at the heart ...
A considerable body of literature deals with the creation of economic value while increasing corporate environmental and social performance. Some publications even focus on the business case for sustainability which aims at increasing corporate economic value through environmental or social measures. The existence of a business case for sustainability is, however, mostly seen as an ad hoc ...
Customers want it, regulations are moving toward it and investors are seeking it out. Strong crosswinds are in the global economy. The Fourth Industrial Revolution is here, with pervasive transparency, unlimited information access and accelerating disruptive technology and change. Rapid adaptation never has been more important as corporations spread globally, facing new regulatory and ...
Emission reductions equivalent to 551 million metric tonnes of carbon dioxide were recorded across global supply chains in 2017, up from the 434 million registered the previous year. This signifies greater reductions than the total amount of emissions produced by Brazil in 2016, with businesses reporting cost savings of approximately $14bn (£10bn) as a result. The research, ...
Where is the Steve Jobs of sustainability? The business leader with the big, disruptive ideas—and the force of will—to achieve for sustainable production and consumption what Apple’s visionary chief did for global technology and information? This question springs strongly to mind after attending the Rio+20 conference. Unlike the original Earth Summit 20 years earlier, business ...
Availability of phosphorus underpins global food security and, with rapidly declining resources of mineral phosphate deposits, there is a critical need to identify alternative sources of phosphorus for global food production. Urine is a potential source of phosphorus, yet to capture, value, and reuse urine requires a transformation in how we think about sewage in multiple dimensions - the ...
This is the fifth installment of a five-part blog series on scaling environmental entrepreneurship in emerging markets. In this series, experts in the field provide insights on how business accelerators, technical assistance providers, investors, and the philanthropic community can work with developing market entrepreneurs to increase their economic, environmental, and social impacts. Read the ...
This paper joins concepts from sustainable development, business excellence, and quality function deployment to develop a vehicle that deploys a unified concept of BEST Business Excellence. Four sustainability cornerstones comprise BEST: Biophysical/Environmental Sustainability; Economic Sustainability; Social Sustainability and Technical/Technological Sustainability. European Foundation for ...
Krebs (2008) suggests that an ecological worldview should displace the economic worldview. This means business could increasingly be analysed from an ecological perspective. Some moves in this direction have been made, but one area so far left unexplored is the question of whether the ecosystem metaphor allows a comparison between the way ecosystems change over time and the way human economic ...