Design Sustainability into:

1. Products or Services
2. Processes
3. Business Model
4. Company Focus
5. Brand Identity of Company
6. Supplier Web & Value Chain
7. Industry Leadership & Advocacy Role 
   

   Products and Services—The first area an enterprise should focus on is its products and services. Are they sustainable? Are products made from nontoxic, renewable materials, manufactured under socially responsible conditions? 

   Processes—How sustainable are a company’s processes? Do the design and production processes promote the re-use of materials and minimal use of energy, water, and materials? “You want to make sure the process, as well as the product, is green,” says Friedman. Companies might also review their overall design processes, targeting “cradle-to-cradle” (as opposed to “cradle-to-grave”) product lifecycles (as written about by Bill McDonough and Michael Braungart). 

   Business Model—Companies can align their financial incentives with their sustainability goals. For example, leasing as opposed to selling is a new concept that some businesses are now exploring. This shift could help balance profitability with waste reduction.   (E.g., as long as Interface Carpet made more profit the more carpet it sold, there was little financial incentive to use less material by selling less carpet. However, once Interface changed to a business model of leasing carpet, of collecting an annual fee for “carpet services,” then the company would make more profit the longer the carpet lasted and the more fibers they could reuse). 

   Company Focus—“When you move your efforts to a company focus,” says Friedman, “you get everyone on board at all levels. By doing this, you let loose innovation throughout the company.” Given the early stages of the sustainability movement, Friedman notes that contributions are needed almost everywhere. Everyone has something to add to make sustainability a reality.  

   Brand Identity—Making sustainability a part of an enterprise’s public identity turns out to be a great branding and marketing tool, as shown by companies such as The Body Shop and Ben and Jerry’s—or, locally, Shaklee Corp. The latter became the country’s first climate-neutral company in 2000. By actively seeking out such companies, conscientious consumers, investors, and job candidates promote TBL success and profitability. 

   Supply Chain and Value Network—As part of the “big picture,” a company’s commitment to TBL goals can move beyond the boundaries of its own organization to include to its entire value chain or network, including suppliers, partners, and even customers. All materials, resources, and processes that contribute to the making or use of a company’s product or service be viewed as part of the enterprise’s impact in the world. Aligning the whole “extended enterprise” around TBL goals can in fact make these easier and less expensive for each separate company in the system, and can lead to breakthroughs that can only be achieved at this larger system’s level. 

   Industry Leadership and Advocacy Role—Once a company has made its way up the first six rungs of the ladder, advocacy becomes its next opportunity. Today, many CEOs and company founders are taking leadership roles in demonstrating sustainability and TBL principles for other businesses and for their industry as a whole. Some examples include Patagonia founder Yvon Chouinard, Body Shop founder Anita Roddick, and Ben & Jerry’s cofounder Ben Cohen. 

   Moving Players into Position

   Like almost any corporate initiative, TBL goals call for the creation of teams of people whose jobs are to bring these goals to fruition. “When a company has committed to TBL goals,” says Friedman, “three groups of people make the difference between plan and reality: the leaders, the stakeholders, and the change support group.” 

   Leaders—Typically, a company needs at least one executive-level sponsor on board to see a TBL strategy through. That executive’s role is to clear the way and give or get authorization, support, and resources for necessary activities.

   Stakeholders—This group takes responsibility for implementing a TBL plan. “With this group,” Friedman explains, “it’s about how to get people motivated and inspired. Basic training and education are critical to ensure buy-in and build capability among stakeholders.

   Change Support—“The changes are often large and complex enough that the company needs a support team to enable a broad-scale migration,” says Friedman. The change support team acts as facilitators, gathering resources, linking people to expert resources, coordinating meetings, and spotting and solving problems.

   The Next Industrial Revolution

   Incorporating sustainability into business is part of a larger transformation that sustainability leaders such as McDonough and Braungart and Amory Lovins call “the next industrial revolution.” As with the first industrial revolution, the challenges are clear and present. While the goal of the first industrial revolution was to create financial value, the challenge in this next era is to simultaneously create financial, social, and ecological value. Friedman’s point of view is that there is a significant advantage for those working to enhance sustainability in this new era: It is still open territory — there is much to be accomplished and plenty of room for innovation. Pioneers are needed at all levels, and interventions now can make important contributions and have profound impact on our future. 

   
   

   
   

   Source:

   Anderson, Ray. Mid-Course Correction: Toward a Sustainable Enterprise — The Interface Model. Atlanta: The Peregrinzilla Press, 1998.

   Berry, Thomas. The Great Work: Our Way into the Future. NY: Bell Tower – Random House, Inc., 1999. 

   Friedman, Lisa, & Gyr, Herman. The Dynamic Enterprise: Tools for Turning Chaos into Strategy and Strategy into Action. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass Business and Management Series / John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998.

   Hawken, Paul; Lovins, Amory; & Lovins, L. Hunter. Natural Capitalism: Creating the Next Industrial Revolution. Boston: Little, Brown and Company, 1999.

   Liebes, Sid; Sahtouris, Elizabeth; & Swimme, Brian. The Walk Through Time: From Stardust to Us — The Evolution of Life on Earth. NY: John Wiley & Sons, Inc., 1998.

   McDonough, William and Braungart, Michael. Cradle to Cradle: Re-Making the Way we Make Things. NY: North Point Press, 2002. 

   ecoOpportunities

In the Philippines, less than 1/3 can afford proper shelter. In Metro Manila alone, there is a 3 to 1 ratio of informal settlers; 23% stay in government land, 22% in private properties, 15% in danger zones (which include the streets, bridges, riversides, and along train tracks), and 40% on infrastructure sites. (gmanews.tv) There still exists a huge problem on housing in the Philippines. Various factors affect this such as financing, government policies and interventions, institutional subsidies, and the values and culture the Filipino people illustrate.The concern for housing should grow because of the fact that the Philippines is considered to be part of the ‘typhoon belt.’ More and more people would suffer in such disasters if proper housing is not addressed.

Furthermore, half a billion pesos is being spent yearly on disaster and calamity damages. Just imagine where else we could allocate that cost if only we can do a better job in preventing such damages through a better housing program.So how do we actually solve this housing problem? There are countless of reasons on how to, but the main factors would hugely depend on the government (both national and local), people, and non-governmental organizations willing to help in the housing program of the Philippines.

It is the role of the government to create policies that will suit well with the country’s needs. It is also the government’s role to properly manage and regulate the Filipino people in following such policies. Laws have to be examined and cleared especially with regards land use. This is specifically addressed to illegal squatting issues. People have to be given notice about these rules, then they can strictly implement the policies and violators should be apprehended justly. We all know that ignorance to the law is not an excuse, but of course, being a poor country, not all people have access to basic information. It is still, I believe, the task of government to convey these important information to public.

Another issue that can be touched here is taxation. There is a need for systematic information on land and real estate properties in the Philippines; this would enhance a better taxation. Better taxation can lead to more budget for programs in helping the housing problem in the Philippines. Of course, corruption is another issue that surfaces from here. This is where the values of the Filipino people have to be fixed. The Filipino people should start valuing other people’s lives. We are sacrificing here lives of millions of people while the few get filthy rich through corruption. It’s basic, try to lessen corruption; not necessarily eradicate totally, but minimize it to the lowest level that we can. Everywhere else in the world exists corruption, but the Philippine corruption level is high. The worse corruption gets, the deeper the Philippines will get into the poverty trap. People’s money should go to the right places, and these are projects and programs to uplift human existence.

The next solution is fixing the financial side of housing. The government still has a role here; and that is to create the right regulatory policies in financing for housing projects or programs. This is specifically in line with middle-cost housing. It shouldn’t be too tight or too relaxed. Making it too tight would limit the opportunity for citizens to actually take part in such programs. Making it to lenient on the other hand could be cumbersome as well; just like what the recent financial crisis in America demonstrates.

When people see opportunities such as relaxed rates, they obviously would take it, even though a lot of them actually take more than what they can afford, it’s a common reflex of human nature. Banks on one hand will tend to take advantage of the relaxed policies because more people would sure want to borrow money from them for financing. But as we see, the market does fail also at times. By the end of the day, the policy that triggers such events is still the policy that gets most of the blame. So government has the biggest responsibility to play and weigh things right.

Subsidies and other sources of funding is also a solution to this problem. International organizations and non-governmental organizations do play a huge role in addressing such problems. It is a fact that government cannot do everything effectively and efficiently. This is where the role of these organizations comes in. These organizations do not exist to compete with government or to make government look bad. They do exist to complement the government in areas where it lacks in providing its services. Subsidies and funding are good; it’s just that these organizations need to communicate and work with the right people. I still believe in the effectiveness of such organizations working with the government especially the local government units (LGUs).

They should integrate planning with one another to make sure that things don’t overlap; as this would waste resources. I would also want to stress out that such grants should be directed at the right projects. Middle-cost housing should be more focused on financial funding from banks; and these banks should always a have a reliable basis in lending credit. Direct subsidies on the other hand should be more directed at low-cost housing where more people do need grants.

Lastly, I would just want to point out alternative housing. Alternative housing which costs 40-50% less are now being done such an Enviro Board Corporation Net-Zero Energy homes.  I think it is time for the Philippine people to open their eyes to opportunities being given to them. Some people stick to the olden traditional way of doing things that can hinder development because of problems such as costs. We have to move forward and be open to innovations and other technological breakthroughs. These small things are sometimes the solution to big problems. Help is around the corner, sometimes it’s our slow movements and resistance that make us lag behind.

Sources:

http://www.gmanews.tv/video/14050/Sine-Totoo-Philippine-Agenda-Housing

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5BC2Qme8Mrw&feature=related

Ballesteros, M. 2002. Philippine Institute for Development Studies: Policy Notes. “A

Second Look at Institutional Reforms in the Housing Sector.”

Torres

What we need is a better approach to help the poor, an approach that involves partnering with them to innovate and achieve sustainable win-win scenarios where the poor are actively engaged and, at the same time, the companies providing products and services to them are profitable. This collaboration between the poor, civil society organizations, governments, and large firms can create the largest and fastest-growing markets in the world. Large-scale and wide-spread entrepreneurship is at the heart of the business solution to poverty.

Such an approach exists and has, in several instances, gone well past the idea stage as a private enterprises, both large and small, have begun to successfully build markets at the bottom of the pyramid (BOP) as a way of eradicating poverty. There are banks adapting to the financial needs of the poor, power companies reaching out to meet the energy needs, and construction companies doing what they can to house the poor in affordable ways that allow for pride.

The strength of these innovative approaches, as you will come to appreciate, is that they tend to create opportunities for the poor by offering them choices and encouraging self-esteem.

Source: The Fortune at The Bottom of The Pyramid

There are two great forces of human nature: self-interest and caring for others. Capitalism harnesses self-interest in a helpful and sustainable way, but only on behalf of those that can pay. Government aid and philanthropy channel our caring for those who can’t pay. But to provide rapid improvement for the poor we need a system that draws in innovators and businesses in a far better way than we do today. 

Such a system would have a twin mission: making profits and also improving lives of those who don’t fully benefit from today’s market forces. For sustainability we need to use profit incentives wherever we can. At the same time, profits are not always possible when business tries to serve the very poor. In such cases there needs to be another incentive, and that incentive is recognition. Recognition enhances a company’s reputation and appeals to customers; above all, it attracts good people to the organization. As such, recognition triggers a market-based reward for good behavior. In markets where profits are not possible, recognition is a proxy: where profits are possible, recognition is an added incentive.

The challenge here is to design a system where market incentives, including profits and recognition, drive those principles to do more for the poor. I like to call the idea creative capitalism, an approach where governments, businesses, and nonprofits work together to stretch the reach of market forces so that more people can make a profit, or gain recognition, doing work that eases the world’s inequities. 

Source: Bill Gates

He said, ” For one, there is a growing recognition that the social and environmental challenges facing us in the twenty-first century are so complex and so multi-dimentional that they cannot be solved by government alone. Industry has to be part of the solution. But perhaps the biggest catalyst for change has been the increasing awareness within business itself that many of the big social and environmental challenges of our age, once seen as obstacles to progress, have become opportunities for innovation and business development. We have come to a point now were the agenda of sustainability and corporate responsibility is not only central to business strategy but has become a critical driver of business growth”

Source: The Fortune at the Bottom of the Pyramid.

This is the time to look at globalization strategies through a new lens. For companies with the resources and persistance to compete at the bottom of the world economic pyramid, the prospective rewards include growth, profits, and incalcullable contributions to humankind.

Countries that still don’t have the modern infrastructure of products to meet basic human needs are an ideal testing ground for developing environmentally sustainable technologies and products for the entire world.

Furthermore, Investment at “the bottom of the pyramid”  means lifting billions of people out of poverty and desperation, averting the social decay, political chaos, terrorism, and environmental meltdown that is certain to continue if the gap between the rich and poor countries continues to widen.

Doing business with the world’s 4 billion poorest people  two-thirds of the world’s population will require radical innovations in technology and business models. It will require us to reevaluate price-performance relationships for products and services. It will demand a new level of capital efficiency and new ways of measuring financial value and financial success.

Companies will be forced to transform their understanding of scale, from a “bigger is better”  ideal to an ideal of highly distributed small-scale operations married to world-scale capabilities. In short, the poorest populations raise a prodigious new managerial challenge: Selling to the poor and helping them improve their lives by producing and distributing products and services in culturally sensitive, environmentally sustainable, and economically profitable ways.

Source: Strategy+Business Magazine

Four billion low-income people, a majority of the world’s population, constitute the base of the economic pyramid. New empirical measures of their behavior as consumers and their aggregate purchasing power suggest significant opportunities for market-based approaches to better meet their needs, increase their productivity and incomes, and empower their entry into the formal economy. 

]]> http://enviroboard.com/2012/01/the-next-four-billion/feed/ 0 http://enviroboard.com/2011/12/green-technologies-wanted/ http://enviroboard.com/2011/12/green-technologies-wanted/#comments Sun, 01 Jan 2012 01:01:17 +0000 Joshua Mosshart http://enviroboard.com/?p=1334
The following is a list of green technologies that are currently in high demand in emerging markets to address the geographic problems of energy consumption; many of these are particularly necessary for large, public, and high-density buildings. 

HVAC systems.
Solar products.
Water source heat pump systems.
Low energy consumption air conditioners.
Ventilation systems.
Solar energy applications.
Green light systems (such as LEED)
Day-lighting technology.
Low noise complex heating and cooling systems.
City water recycle systems and rain ...]]>

It introduces cost per impact as the fundamental measure of any philanthropic investment. In order to assess cost per impact, philanthropists must be able to assess, to the extent possible, its two components: 1) social impact, as measured by specific, objective criteria for success; and 2) cost, as measured by the investments made by philanthropists or other sources to realize the impact. Assessment requires objective, reliable information on what ís effective, what ís not, and how much capital is required to achieve a given impact.

“The noblest question in the world is what good may I do in it?”

Benjamin Franklin, Poor Richardís Almanac, 1737 

Source: The Wharton School