The Sustainability Imperative
As organizations struggle to define a strategy that balances purpose and profit, opportunities are increasingly emerging to take the lead in sustainability initiatives. Front-line advances in areas such as net-zero emissions, AI-powered solutions for the underserved, precision agriculture, digital healthcare, and more are delivering business benefits, while simultaneously contributing to the realization of the UN’s 17 SDGs. We provide the expert thinking, debate, and guidance to help your organization reposition and transform in the era of sustainability.
Recently Published
This issue of Amplify provides insights into how to interpret ESG information in the current environment, what information is needed to make better decisions, and why we need increased disclosure and greater transparency. The articles offer guidance on how to act now and how to prepare for a more regulated future.
Rachael R. Doubledee, Matthew Nestler, and Kelley-Frances Fenelon highlight focus group data on the American public’s perception of corporate disclosures and corporate transparency. Spoiler alert: Americans want more accessible, honest disclosures, including confessions about missteps. After showing how low disclosure rates are in America’s largest public companies, the authors go into detail about how business leaders can meaningfully communicate corporate impact on people and communities.
Cynthia E. Clark focuses on strategies for navigating the climate-related information-disclosure landscape. Clark describes the current status of disclosure regulations in the US and Europe, as well as actions being taken by various stock exchanges. She then delves into strategies for boards of directors, including avoiding greenwashing, staying up to speed on potential regulatory changes, reporting on the risks of transitioning to net zero, and having a dedicated team accountable for ESG reporting to ensure information accuracy.
Alex Saric looks at applying circular economy principles to supply chain emissions. Sustainability goals consistently rank as a top corporate priority, and Scope 3 sources (greenhouse gases produced by external suppliers and customer activities) make up at least 70% of overall emissions for most industries. Saric says companies should leverage data provided by suppliers and third-party data sources to create a verification framework and, with that in hand, look for circular economy methods to reduce emissions.
Food systems are highly interlinked, from production to distribution to consumption, and there are significant social, cultural, economic, environmental, and political factors that interact with those processes. Understanding how vertical agriculture fits within these larger food systems is critical to advancing more sustainable food production. This Advisor presents three guiding principles for how vertical agriculture businesses can contribute to biodiversity conservation.
This Advisor examines the potential of offshore wind farms and the challenges of balancing climate change mitigation with biodiversity protection goals. Significant advances in technology and expanded government support have led to increased development of offshore wind farms, but large-scale renewable energy projects should be planned and implemented with biodiversity considerations embedded, so that one environmental goal is not sacrificed for another.
Concerns have been raised about wider environmental and social sustainability factors being neglected in circular economy (CE)-related thinking. As we explore in this Advisor, one of these crucial blind spots relates to biodiversity.
In Part II of this Advisor series on reducing methane, we examine several developments designed to help reduce methane emissions originating from waste in landfills.