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Brought together on Sir Richard Branson's Caribbean island retreat by the Carbon War Room and Rocky Mountain Institute, to work out a framework to effect a transition away from fossil fuels, six Caribbean island nations have agreed to replace diesel-fueled power with a mix of clean, sustainable renewable power generation, energy storage systems, and greater energy efficiency.

The founder of both the Virgin Group and Carbon War Room, Branson is spearheading the “Ten Island Renewable Challenge,” an initiative that aims to promote and foster renewable energy development, enhance climate change resiliency, and support entrepreneurs and local businesses across the Caribbean Basin.

“Islands are a microcosm of larger energy systems around the world and offer an excellent test bed to demonstrate and scale innovative clean energy solutions,” Rocky Mountain Institute co-founder and chief scientist Amory Lovins stated.

On the Front Lines of Global Warming

Island nations are on the front lines when it comes to global warming, as sea levels rise and threaten sparse freshwater resources and stronger storm surges raise the threat of inundation and loss of life and property. Typically reliant on imports of diesel and fossil fuels, island nations can also boast some of the highest energy prices in the world.

Looking on the bright side, island nations typically have a lot going for them when it comes to renewable energy potential, as well as the wherewithal to adapt and develop modern ways of life that are sustainable ecologically and socially, as well as economically.

Joining with the Rocky Mountain Institute, Carbon War Room this past week hosted a congress of Caribbean island nation leaders at Sir Richard's Necker Island retreat. While there, governments of six Caribbean islands – the British Virgin Islands, Colombia (of which the Caribbean island of San Andres is a part), Dominica, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, and Turks and Caicos – agreed to join the Carbon War Room's Ten Island Renewable Challenge.

Operation Smart Island Economies

Launched in 2012 during Rio+20, the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, Branson and Virgin Limited Edition gave the Ten Island Renewable Challenge a big boost earlier this month when it announced it was partnering with NRG, one of the largest power companies in the U.S., to power Necker almost entirely from renewable energy resources.

Virgin Limited Edition and NRG signed a Diesel Reduction Agreement that calls for the latter to develop a renewable energy microgrid for Necker that would meet at least 75 percent of the island retreat's power needs. It's envisioned that the clean energy microgrid will employ a mix of wind and solar energy generation along with smart energy storage systems.

The Ten Island Renewable Challenge is part-and-parcel of a broader Carbon War Room initiative: Operation Smart Island Economies, the aim of which is to effect a transition to a 100 percent renewable energy infrastructure.

The keys to realizing these aims, Branson emphasizes, is mobilizing investment and human capital in efforts to drive the cost of renewable energy down below that for the fossil fuels upon which we have come to be so dependent. As Branson stated,

“The only way we're going to win this war is by creative entrepreneurship, to make the price of clean energy cheaper than that of energy from fossil fuels.”

Toward that end, three cross-island initiatives were identified for advancement during the Ten Island Renewable Challenge Summit:

• A CARILEC/CARICOM electricity sector capacity building initiative to help support deployment of energy efficiency and renewables in the region;


• Stimulation of a regional ESCO market through PACE program development, loan guarantees and training programs; and


• Codification of standardized efficiency "playbooks" for hospitals and hotels to ensure all sites have access to proven energy solutions.

In addition, more than $300 million in capital was raised to support renewable energy and energy efficiency projects for hotels, hospitals, schools and utilities.

Image courtesy Carbon War Room/Ten Island Renewable Challenge

By Ben Goldfarb

In October 2011, as rising floodwaters threatened to submerge Bangkok, the Thai government stumbled. Officials issued conflicting reports and warnings. The city’s governor assured citizens that everything was under control, even as water began to pour into Bangkok’s northern suburbs. The flood’s toll – 815 people dead and $45 billion in damages – was exacerbated by a government that proved unprepared in the face of a crisis. Yet even as the Thai Government was bungling the disaster, Bangkok’s citizens began springing into action.

In Sai Noi, a suburb, a local residents’ committee came together to fight the flood with sand bags and water pumps, distribute food and water, and defend the area from looters. Thanks largely to the swift work of the residents’ committee--which collected money from neighbors to buy a new pump, and initiated a system of barter and labour exchange to rebuild homes--not a single resident was killed or injured, and villages were restored in less than a week. Writing in Next City, a media organization dedicated to connecting cities, the Cambodian journalist Dustin Moasa marvelled that, “With minimal help from the government, the neighborhood had survived the worst disaster ever to hit Thailand.”

The Sai Noi residents’ committee isn’t an isolated success story. All over the world, similarly informal systems and networks are delivering services typically provided by government or big private sector companies: potable water, waste collection, even ambulances. In the global South’s municipalities, these underground economies, unregulated neighborhoods and undocumented businesses flourish beneath a regulated veneer. In Lima, Peru, "shadow economies," from orange juice vendors on bicycle carts to traditional healers peddling bat carcasses, account for 60 to 70 percent of total economic activity. In some Asian cities, informal jobs contribute to the production of global commodities like garments, textiles and sport shoes--employing up to 85 percent of the workforce.

These informal structures don’t just drive economies--they also administer crucial resources and enhance urban resilience. In Accra, Ghana, a patchwork of unregulated urban farms grows everything from cucumbers to papayas, strengthening food security. In Nairobi, Kenya, garbage pickers sort through waste, performing the recycling services that the city disregards. Slum-dwellers all over the world devise innovative ways to obtain potable water, including digging makeshift wells, installing rainwatercollecting cisterns and relying on vendors selling individual plastic bags of water.

“These are cities where the government honestly doesn’t do much”, says Will Doig, Next City’s editor for the Informal City Dialogues. “Informal systems are some of the best sustainability systems they have.”

For all their nimbleness and ingenuity, informal systems confer hazards as well as benefits. Accra’s urban farms are watered with untreated gutter water, perhaps contributing to cholera outbreaks; Nairobi’s garbage pickers burn themselves with chemical waste; and illegal sewage channels in Chennai, India, pollute groundwater and coastlines. In other words, the informal institutions pioneered by the urban poor are boundlessly creative, but they can also create new public health and environmental problems.

For this reason--and because governments can feel undermined by informal solutions--such systems are frequently targeted for harassment or eradication, often with ruinous consequences for the people who depend on them. In Johannesburg, South Africa, urban "street cleansing" programs have swept away unlicensed food vendors whose stalls are critical sources of nutrition and income for impoverished families. “As cities develop, governments often try to push informal communities out to the edges, marginalizing them geographically, socially and economically--or try to formalise them," says Jessica Rosen, sustainability advisor at Forum for the Future.

That’s a problem, says Rosen, since many of the qualities intrinsic to informal communities--their mobility, their adaptability and their reliance on social networks--are the same ones that make them so valuable. In Bangkok, where state hospitals can’t meet the needs of the city’s 8 million residents, a corps of more than 4,000 volunteer ambulances acts as a vast first-responder system. Although Bangkok’s "body-snatchers" have been accused of thievery, taking bribes and even witchcraft, Doig warns that simply formalizing the ambulances would likely make them less effective. “Ideally you would figure out a way to use the ambulance system’s flexibility and nimbleness to work with the city and the hospitals," he says. “The goal is to integrate the formal and informal, to let them coexist.”

Durban, South Africa, offers a vision for how municipalities might nourish informal systems without suffocating them. For years, Warwick Junction, a sprawling marketplace on the edge of Durban’s inner city, thrived as a hotbed of informal trade--but it was also neglected and run-down. Instead of bulldozing the bazaar, in 1996 the city launched the Warwick Junction Project, an initiative headed by South African architect Richard Dobson that built pedestrian bridges, provided childcare and established buyback programs for cardboard salvagers. Keith Hart, the anthropologist who coined the term "informal sector" has called Warwick Junction a model for how poor people can "enliven a city center, generate employment for themselves and expand services" in cooperation with urban planners.

Can the success of Warwick Junction be replicated? That’s the question that the Informal City Dialogues, a collaboration funded by The Rockefeller Foundation, with Forum for the Future and Next City, set out to answer. Over two years, this global, multi-stakeholder project aimed to foster a conversation about the role of informality in creating inclusive and resilient future cities. Crucially, the dialogues involved six local partners: the African Center for Economic Transformation (ACET) in Accra; Chulalongkorn University Department of Urban and Rural Planning in Bangkok; Transparent Chennai in Chennai; FORO Nacional Internacional in Lima; Ateneo de Manila University School of Government (ASoG) in Metro Manila; and the Institute of Economic Affairs (IEA) in Nairobi.

Between 2012 and 2013, the dialogues brought together an eclectic group of stakeholders in each city, from government officials in London to slum leaders from South Africa. In early 2013, stakeholders in each city convened to develop "futures scenarios": visions of what the six cities--Accra, Bangkok, Chennai, Lima, Manila, and Nairobi--will look like in 2030. Later, the same groups got together and used those future scenarios to come up with innovations that will help those cities remain resilient against the pressures like climate change and population growth and create a more inclusive city for the informal sector. The innovations range from an initiative that will provide legal knowledge and access to affordable legal support to informal groups in Bangkok, to an economic forum for local traders to promote more secured livelihoods of the sector in Accra. The Rockefeller Foundation has awarded generous grants to organizations in each of the six cities as seed funding for the innovations.

As the world’s urban planners gain a better appreciation for the informal sector, some designers are also trying to apply its lessons in developed nations. Baltimore-based architects Kuo Pao Lian and Pavlina Ilieva argue for what they call "self-generative communities," or urban environments that mimic the mixed-use layouts, energy independence and versatility of informal systems. Lian and Ilieva have drawn inspiration from informality in cities like Tijuana, Mexico, Rio de Janeiro and Caracas, Venezuela, when designing urban environments in Baltimore, Dallas and New Orleans. “You’re seeing massive populations [in informal communities] creating their own electricity, collecting their own water, building their own dwellings, educating their own children, against a backdrop of poverty and violence”, says Lian. “We’re not celebrating that situation, but we can learn from it.”

Photo credits: Next City, B A Raju/Next City

Ben Goldfarb is a postgraduate at Yale University and the Editor of Sage Magazine.

Thanks to a new Long John Silver's ad campaign and its upcoming elimination of trans fats, one of my guilty pleasures could soon feel a bit less guilty.

A new set of ads raise the Jolly Roger in honor of sustainable food and more environmentally sound eating, citing the benefits of fish from fewer methane emissions when compared to livestock, and real free-range food from "the final frontier," otherwise known as the North Pacific.

It's no accident this brand change is coming at the breakwater of Lent, when millions of consumers switch their diets and many fast food restaurants start promoting their fish sandwiches. Judging from the networks on which the new campaign will premier--Discovery Channel, the Weather Channel, HGTV, ESPN2 and TNT--Long John Silver's is arguably targeting an environmentally conscious and educated audience.

Of course there's always the potential for greenwashing here. According to Long John Silver's, the fish it uses for its "core" products is wild caught. Those delicious crunchy white meat fish fillets and the crunchy, yummy bits of batter around it. Environmental groups warn about the disatrous practice of overfishing. According to Overfishing.org, at least 25 percent of fish stocks around the world are over-exploited or depleted, while 52 percent are already fully exploited.

Long John Silver's, however, states that it relies on sustainable fishing practices--sourcing its "core" products from certified supplies and sustainable fisheries in the North Pacific, in the Bearing Sea, while the lobster is sourced from Norway Lobster in Northern Europe. "Sustainable," of course, meaning that the fisheries aren't depleted to the point where the fish cannot reproduce. Most of the rest of the product, such as shrimp, is sourced from farms.  Long John Silver's points out, as well, that fish is more environmentally friendly than red meat and burgers based on the lower methane and greenhouse gas footprint of fish.

What fish, exactly, is Long John Silver's using for its delicious fried fish, which they just list as "fish"?  Well, they're a bit cagey about that, which doesn't help consumers who want to make their own informed decisions about what is or is not sustainably harvested. However LJS is making an important step forward by opening themselves up to these questions in the first place as they claim sustainable fishing practices.

Long John Silver's has also been overhauling its menu to offer healthier options. This comes after the Center for Science in the Public Interest publicly keelhauled the franchise for having one of the unhealthiest restaurant meals in America. The Big Catch plate was lambasted for having a heart-stopping 333 grams of trans fats.

Of course it will continue offering the items that I, particularly, crave in the middle of the night: the fried fish and clam strips. The chain claimed that it would end its use of trans fat oils at the end of 2013. That's a great start. They're also opening up a menu of unfried foods, such as baked cod and shrimp.

Frankly, as a huge fan of Long John Silver's, I'm heartened to see this rebranding and hope it's followed up with continued and deepened efforts toward sustainability and health.

Image credit: Nicholas Eckhart: Source (cropped)

By Richard Eidlin

Voluntary corporate sustainability initiatives and social enterprises are essential but are not game changers by themselves. In addition, we need laws and regulations that guide our economy toward sound, long-term decision-making, with full recognition of social and environmental externalities. As business leaders, we can and must support policy changes to help make the economy more sustainable.

A sustainable economy will depend on policies that will help advance change on a societal level.  Here are three important policies that will help--and specific actions you can take.

1. A Sustainable Future for Retirement

Experts say the typical worker approaching retirement needs about $250,000 in a 401(k). Most don't come close. The average is closer to $98,000--only a bit more than a third of the recommended amount. This is only one aspect of the growing retirement crisis facing our economy and our nation. Social Security expects future shortfalls since more workers are collecting benefits while fewer are paying in; the recent financial crisis forced many workers to collect early on 401(k) plans; and of course, state pension programs are going underfunded. Seventy-five million Americans do not have a retirement plan, and 50 percent of all Americans have less than $10,000 in savings.

According to polling of small business owners commissioned by the American Sustainable Business Council (ASBC) and the Main Street Alliance last year, 70 percent of small business owners identified the lack of retirement security as a critical issue to their business interests. Yet the same poll showed that only 30 percent of small businesses offer a retirement plan. The most common reason given for not offering a plan was cost, which means that most small employers want to offer a plan but believe that they cannot afford it.

What’s at Stake

Sen. Tom Harkin (D-Iowa) announced a new retirement bill at a press conference in Washington, D.C. recently. The introduction of the USA Retirement Funds Act came on the heels of President Barack Obama’s proposal of a new IRA plan in his State of the Union address this year. Sen. Harkin’s plan would create an automatic enrollment and deposit system, where workers could designate part of their paychecks to go into a low-cost, easy–to-administer retirement plan.

What You Can Do

• Contact Sen. Harkin and your own senator on the committee


• See the USA Retirement Funds Act bill summary


• Read a PEW study that outlines retirement security across generations

2. Innovation for Ownership Models

One path to more economic sustainability in business is through expanding the use of different ownership models.

An Employee Stock Ownership Plan, or ESOP, is a strategy to give some ownership of a company to its employees as part of a transition from one owner to another. Rather than selling a company to new owners who may consolidate or close it - resulting in job losses - ESOPs allow owners to give employees more control over the company and more of a stake in its success.

According to the New York Times, more than 10,000 firms--including other ASBC business members like Dansko and Eileen Fisher--across almost all sectors operate with an ESOP in place. The National Center for Employee Ownership (NCEO) notes that those companies employ 13 million people.

Another model is represented by cooperative organizations, or co-ops. As the name suggests, co-ops are controlled by customers and employees who work together (in cooperation) to benefit each other and the community at large. They can be large or small businesses, and contrary to a popular perception of co-ops as being mostly grocery stores, they can exist in any sector, including finance, energy and agriculture.

Cooperatives tend to operate with a more democratic structure, with larger groups of stakeholders involved in the decision-making process. The intention is that decisions are made for the benefit of the community, rather than shareholders, whose only goal is maximizing profit.

The economic benefits are significant: Cooperatives in the U.S. boast more than $3 trillion in assets and employ 1 million people, paying out $25 billion a year in wages and benefits. These benefits go directly back into the community, creating broadly shared opportunity and spurring even more job creation.

What’s at Stake

Under current laws, an ESOP in an S corporation is not eligible for the same tax benefits as those offered by C corporations. This reduces the incentives for those company owners to offer ESPOs. A Senate bill, the Promotion and Expansion of Private Employee Ownership Act (S.742), was introduced last year that would expand the tax code to cover ESOPs for S corporations.

Since co-ops remain a well-kept secret, a U.S. House bill, introduced by Rep. Chaka Fattah (D-Pa.), would create a Department of Housing and Urban Development program to promote cooperative development.

What You Can Do

• Send supportive messages to the sponsors of the ESOPs legislation


• Find four business reasons to expand ESOPs by Dansko CEO Mandy Cabot


• Contact the sponsor of Creating Jobs Through Cooperatives Act (H.R. 2437)


• Learn about a recent U.S. Department of Labor meeting on Workers Cooperatives

3. More Investment and Ownership Opportunities with Crowdfunding

Crowdfunding refers to raising investment funding in small increments from a large number of people, often through Internet marketing. Currently, crowdfunding exists mostly in the form of websites like Kickstarter and Indiegogo, where funders can support a project in exchange for rewards like early access to products or services, but not an ownership stake in the company.

What’s At Stake

When done correctly, crowdfunding has the potential to be a very useful tool in opening up access to capital for business, especially in the context of community-based financing of local projects. In much the same way as cooperatives, they can offer a path for individuals to invest in community businesses, giving them a chance to make money from an ownership stake and offering local businesses a new funding stream.

However, Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) rules have previously made this type of small dollar investment cost-prohibitive due to registration and reporting requirements at both the state and federal levels. Following the passage of the JOBS Act in 2012, the SEC began developing final rules for how crowdfunding would be regulated.

What You Can Do

• Read these comments (PDF) on crowdfunding regulations under the JOBS Act


• Read about some possible changes to the SEC's proposed regulations


• Visit a crowdfunding platform created by the South Carolina Small Business Chamber of Commerce and the American Sustainable Business Council

Image credit: Flickr/LendingMemo

Policy Points is produced by the American Sustainable Business Council. The editor is Richard Eidlin, Director – Public Policy and Business Engagement.

By Jasmine Youssefzadeh 

We live in a time where technology is growing so rapidly that it's mind-blowing to imagine where our society will be in 10 years. This rapid change allows organizations to scale their businesses through teams of virtual employees--workers who are not physically present in the workplace. While the virtual workplace results in many positive outcomes for companies, particularly when it comes to global expansion and rapid growth, one challenge to be mindful of is a lessening sense of community and social connectivity in the work culture.

For #GiveHalf companies--social enterprises who commit 50 percent of their efforts towards pro-bono services--this challenge is something we tackle daily. The nature of our business model embeds heavy reliance on a network of volunteers to scale our pro-bono offerings, so we are forced to be introspective and creative with cultivating a strong sense of community amongst our virtual volunteers.

As early adopters of the Give Half model, we’re excited to share insight on how we foster a sense of community in a predominantly virtual work culture. It might come as a surprise that four different and highly geographically dispersed organizations can cross-pollinate skillsets, ideas and volunteer networks. But for verynice, filmanthropos, Soul Bucket and No Typical Moments, skill and idea sharing is a part of our everyday philosophy. Encouraging and supporting each other has and will continue to be fundamental to our growth and overall happiness in the workplace.

As such, we use the following underlying principles to ensure a solid sense of community exists for our volunteer network:

Spread happiness daily

The greatest productivity hack out there is simply being happy. When you're happy with your work, you'll be more productive. And when you're more productive, your business will grow.

To ensure our volunteers experience an elevated level of happiness and fulfillment from their work, we empower them with a collaborative and supportive environment and encourage them to be hands-on with leading projects. We use our social media platforms to inspire our team, and connect them with others in our network that could help advance their careers.

Let them use their passions to pursue a larger purpose

We encourage volunteers to use their unique skills towards a cause that they are passionate about. For instance, if a volunteer is passionate about eliminating global poverty, we might match them with a nonprofit client that works in Haiti.

By doing so, volunteers feel fulfilled with their work, enhance their skillsets for future employment, and are able to tangibly measure how their contributions aided a nonprofit’s mission.

Give them a sense of belonging

It’s essential for our team to feel that they're a part of a movement that's bigger than themselves and that pushes humanity forward. Beyond this, we want to foster a sense of emotional connectivity among volunteers to build an internal structure of safety, love and acceptance.

This is where creative initiatives come into play. At filmanthropos, we host quarterly Produce-A-Thons, where volunteers come together for 24 hours straight to produce a video for a cause. The experience is, above all, an incredibly unique bonding experience for volunteers to connect both with each other and with the client. At verynice, volunteers participate in fun, internal team-building initiatives as well as community workshops.

One of our most recent culture hacks involves an effort where four #GiveHalf organizations pooled their networks to participate in a virtual spin of MindValley’s LoveWeek. Loveweek is a global movement where employees give and experience love and appreciation at the workplace for five consecutive days. Given the virtual nature of our businesses, we launched #GiveHalfLove--a way for us to show virtual appreciation to our team, volunteers and friends--which has led to participants forming new friendships and has transformed the way people perceive themselves. The excitement of the initiative can be re-experienced here. Below are some of our fantastic volunteers:

Cultivating a sense of community and belonging within a predominantly virtual workforce is vital to the growth and success of any business. With a commitment to seeking creative ways to engage our volunteer network, we are pushing the boundaries of the service industry.

If you'd like to join our growing community of pro-bono volunteers, we'd love to hear from you! Please contact any of our organizations through the emails provided below to find out more about our ongoing volunteer initiatives.

Co-authored by Andrew Gottlieb, Graphics and Illustrations Courtesy of Alina Leang and Kate Slovin

As originally seen on GOOD

Jasmine Youssefzadeh is a social entrepreneur committed to finding innovative mediums for non-profits and corporates to build alliances through new media. She is Founder and Director of Production of filmanthropos, a creative agency that specializes in multi-platform storytelling for philanthropies, causes, and corporate social responsibility initiatives.

Andrew Gottleib quit his job in the sports industry with 6 months of cash to live on, zero clients, and no formal business plan to launch No Typical Moments. He stands for envisioning a world of possibility, giving back as much as receiving and helping others realize their unique genius. 

As Columbia Law School publishes a report slating the human rights record of several Indian tea plantations, a new collaboration between key players in the global tea industry has been launched by sustainability non-profit, Forum for the Future.

The Tea 2030 partners include four of the seven companies responsible for 90% of the world tea market: Unilever, Tata Global Beverages, James Finlay and Twinings, together with the Ethical Tea Partnership, Fairtrade International, IDH, Rainforest Alliance, S&D Coffee and Tea and Yorkshire Tea. It is also supported by the International Tea Committee.

The initiative calls for the sector to find legal ways to collaborate – while continuing to compete – to turn tea from a standard commodity into a ‘hero crop’ which benefits the millions who work in all parts of the industry as well as the wider environment and economy.

Collaboration will focus on three key areas: sustainable production, market mechanisms and consumer engagement.

Forum for the Future has published ‘The Future of Tea – A Hero Crop for 2030’ which identifies the challenges facing the industry including climate change, population growth, and competition for agricultural land and water. It presents four possible scenarios for the year 2030 which are designed as a tool to help businesses plan for the future and develop sustainable products and business models.

For the full story see the March issue of Ethical Performance. Subscribe today!

 

Picture credit: © Parys | Dreamstime.com
 

Labelled a 'responsible business guru' by The Guardian newspaper, and termed a 'corporate raider' by Third Sector magazine, Manny is a trusted adviser to some of the world's foremost companies and NGOs. Following careers in the business and NGO sectors, Manny has been a consultancy leader for over ten years, founding and leading the cross-sector business and society consultancy, C&E Advisory, to help clients create sustainable, commercial, social and environmental value.

He is fascinated by the inclusive development agenda and energised by the growing role that shared value can play in driving commercial, social and environmental change at scale.

Manny advises, coaches and writes on sustainable business, stakeholder engagement, corporate responsibility and community issues. His contributions have been published in a range of sources, including TIME Magazine, Newsweek and The Economist. With a passion for business and its contribution to society, Manny has worked in an advisory capacity on a wide range of issues with leading multi-national companies including Accenture, ArcelorMittal, E.ON AG, Vodafone Group, BP, Mars inc, Microsoft and Aviva.

Manny maintains a deep commitment to community and societal issues. In addition to working professionally with a wide range of NGOs, including Greenpeace, UNICEF, Cancer Research UK and Nelson Mandela's Children's Fund, he advises a number of local, national and international NGOs in a voluntary capacity. He is a non-executive/trustee of V, the major implementation body set up to significantly increase youth engagement in their communities through volunteering, a governor of the Charter School and a Fellow of the RSA.

Manny has been awarded a number of honours, including selection in 2000 as a GLT (Global Leader for Tomorrow) by the Davos-based World Economic Forum. In 1999, he was awarded an MVO (Member of the Royal Victorian Order) by HM The Queen, for services to the community. He is married with four sons and lives in London.
 

If you've never heard the phrase "hero crop" before, you will soon. Relatively new to the lexicon, hero crop refers to sustainable crops that fulfill social benefit goals for the communities that grow them. That will include tea, if the global non-profit organization Forum for the Future has anything to say about it.

Forum for the Future has just launched a new initiative called "The Future of Tea - A Hero Crop for 2030" with several of the seven companies responsible for 90 percent of the global tea market (yes, only seven). The group encompasses at least three brands familiar to U.S. tea drinkers: Lipton (parent company Unilever), Tetley (parent company Tata Global Beverages), and Twinings. A fourth company, Finlays, is a leading tea trader, manufacturer, and processor among other diverse activities including coffee, produce, flowers, rubber, and forestry products.

Sustainable tea as a hero crop

In addition to the aforementioned four companies, the Forum for the Future effort includes other companies and stakeholders including the Ethical Tea Partnership, Fairtrade International, IDH – the Sustainable Trade Initiative, Rainforest Alliance, S&D Coffee and Tea, Yorkshire Tea, and the International Tea Committee.

As a companion to the new initiative, Forum for the Future has released a report under the same title, The Future of Tea - A Hero Crop for 2030. The report is relatively brief at 34 pages and well worth a read in full, but here are some highlights for those of you in a hurry.

The first thing that stands out is a radical rethinking of the definition of a commodity.

In conventional thinking, a commodity is simply an inert object that is produced, sold, and consumed. The Future of Tea recasts tea as an agent that has a powerful impact on the lives of the people it encounters along the way from production to consumption.

If that rings a bell, you may be familiar with the thinking of Levi Strauss CEO and President John Anderson, which he articulated in a 2011 speech urging the apparel industry to leap ahead of local, site-specific environmental regulations and embrace a more holistic approach that includes social and economic sustainability for local communities.

Forum for the Future sums it up this way:

Every cup of tea you drink should help better the lives of the people who produce it, improve the environment where it is grown, and contribute to a thriving global industry...

From that brief summary it's clear that the new collaboration is steadfastly focused on the bottom line, but it also firmly places profitability in the context of production practices that contribute to the quality of life in local communities, in addition to enabling environmental sustainability.

Challenges for the tea industry

Within the context of the commodity-as-agent, the new report connects the tea industry to ten emerging challenges common across many different industries, including climate change, population growth, land availbility, and water resource issues.

The water issue is especially timely, as it dovetails with efforts by Carbon Trust, Ceres, and other sustainable business organizations to urge businesses to adapt to a world in which competition for water will become an even more critical factor in profitability models than it is today.

Other challenges include demographic changes and related issues including labor availability and mechanization as well as the potential for wage and conditions improvements. Overall resource constraints, new business models, emerging economies, supply chain balance-of-power, and consumer attitudes about food value also come into play.

In that regard, the new report argues that social and civic improvements in tea-growing communities -- which are among the world's poorest -- will lead to a more engaged workforce and improvements in local agricultural practices.

The profitability factor also rests solidly on the factor of consumer engagement throughout the tea lifecycle. That involves the goal of encouraging tea drinkers to demand more sustainable practices from tea producers, while also attending to the impacts of tea consumption.

That angle can pack a lot of punch. According to Forum for the Future, more than three billion cups of tea are consumed every day, making it the most popular drink after water.

When it comes to consumer engagement, the new initiative will take some cues from the coffee industry, which has been focusing its consumers on brewed coffee over instant, in Fairtrade and organic products, and in engaging in lifecycle responsibilities such as recycling coffee grounds.

As for direct environmental concerns, Forum for the Future notes that in addition to being hosted by some of the world's poorest communities, tea production is also located in some of the regions most exposed to the impacts of climate change, and consequently, increased competition for land with food crops.

That demands a proactive approach by the tea industry to address all aspects of environmental sustainability, including reforestation, biodiversity, water management, and soil quality.

[Image: Teapot by Gangster Car Driver]

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Submitted by Guest Contributor

By Steven Katz, Lawyer

Taking advantage of a flooded legal labor market, large Wall Street law firms, aided and abetted by temporary agencies, are exploiting transient document reviewers. It is the antithesis of responsible social and professional practice and harms both clients and the Bar.

New Lawyers Face Low Pay, Long Hours and Crushing Debt

Enforced overtime and weekend work (including Sunday), lack of overtime pay in many cases for work clearly outside the professional exemption, keeping and public sharing of logs of the number of records done by each reviewer, unhealthy working conditions, and the totally one-sided power of the law firms is crushing the lives and careers of many young lawyers drowning in school debt, as well as older lawyers trying to make ends meet.

It is the one percent against the 99 percent, with no holds barred.

Too Many Lawyers, Too Few Rights

“Document review” gives new lawyers no experience that will be useful in real practice with the local firms who will in all likelihood (someday, maybe) offer them a job. It does not teach them how to try a case, make a motion or do arbitration.

Yet, because law schools irresponsibly admit many more students than can be employed to boost their own revenues, document review is the only work available to most new lawyers—and even many with experience—in this depressed labor market. The word is getting out, and new applications to law schools are dropping, but this will not have an effect on the legal labor market for at least three years (and probably longer).

Apparently, for the well-heeled Wall Street partners, the days of the Victorian sweatshop are not over! This is the best-kept secret and suppressed situation of thousands of lawyers in New York City and throughout the country. However, the story is getting out and major news media are now working on it. I know of at least one now putting investigative reporters on the story.

There's more.

The average salary of a Wall Street partner is between $1 – 2 million. A first year associate makes about $150,000. Minimum wage workers are asking for $15 per hour and unionized janitors are now making $35 per hour. However, the average wage for temporary document review lawyers is now between $25 and $30 per hour (often without overtime).

Law firms and agencies are making obscene profits while new lawyers struggle, demoralized, with education debt that frequently reaches six figures. Lawyers who have put in thousands of hours of education, work and internship deserve better.

Don’t Mourn. Organize!

Document review lawyers have been talking for some time of collective union organizing to deal with this situation. Under discussion among the legal labor force are the following options:

• Complaints filed with the state labor boards wages and hours divisions
• Complaints filed with OHSA and City / State Health Boards on overcrowded and airless work spaces
• Unionization drives
• Meetings with state and federal bar representatives to enact guidelines for the protection of lawyers and clients
• Lobbying of state and federal elected officials to enact new legislation to protect all temporary workers, including professional temporary workers
• Promoting a Social Responsibility Board of Law Partners from the major firms

Lenny Bruce, the great comic, once said, “The only justice in the Halls of Justice are in the halls.” Isn't it time socially responsible corporate, legal and Bar authorities see that this statement does not apply to this situation any longer?

About the Author:

Steven Katz practices law in New York City. He also spent many years in legal publishing, including in the International Law Department of Oxford University Press USA. Currently, he works on document review projects and does per diem court appearances.

By Beth Gerstein, Co-Founder of Brilliant Earth

Valentine’s Day is just around the corner, and this year, thousands of Americans are planning on buying something beyond just flowers and chocolates. Feb. 14 is one of the biggest days of the year to give jewelry, not to mention one of the most popular days for marriage proposals. This Valentine’s Day, Americans are expected to spend more than $4 billion on baubles for their loved ones.

As the co-CEO of a jewelry company, I find it meaningful to take part in a holiday that celebrates love and commitment. But I know that behind the sparkle of Valentine’s Day lies the reality of gold mining, one of the most polluting industries on Earth.

Mining enough gold for just one engagement ring generates 20 tons of mine waste. The average large gold mine uses 1,900 tons of cyanide per year. Mining companies are also notorious for destroying pristine forest, displacing people from their homes and upending local economies. Here are just a few examples of gold mining’s destructive impacts around the world:

• Bristol Bay, Alaska: If developed, the proposed Pebble Mine would destroy miles of streams that are home to the world’s largest sockeye salmon population. This gold mine would devastate a great piece of American wilderness.


• Cajamarca, Peru: Newmont’s Conga mine has provoked immense social unrest and protests. Residents oppose the enormous threat the mine poses to their limited water supply.


• Papua New Guinea: The Ok Tedi gold and copper mine dumps, on average, 20 million metric tons of waste each year. The resulting water contamination has reduced the local fish population by 60 to 80 percent.

Apart from examples like this, there’s also the harm done by artisanal gold mining, which is gold mining done by individuals working independently from the large mining companies. Artisanal gold mining is the leading cause of global mercury pollution. It is also riddled with abuses like child labor and a factor behind a civil war in the Democratic Republic of Congo that has claimed more than 5 million lives.

What could possibly justify the harm that irresponsible gold mining does to people and the planet? Nothing could justify it—not even jewelry, the most common use for gold.

Which is why, when my business partner and I founded our jewelry company, Brilliant Earth, we decided to offer fine jewelry handcrafted from recycled precious metals. Gold and other metals can be recycled repeatedly without any degradation in quality. This decision was key to achieving our goal of becoming a leading provider of eco-friendly, ethically sourced jewelry.

But even as we support alternatives like recycled gold and vintage jewelry, which reduce the need for gold mining, we also recognize that it’s vital for mining companies to change how they operate. Jewelers need to speak out and demand an end to practices that exploit people and the environment. And one of the best ways for jewelers to do that is to support Earthworks’ No Dirty Gold campaign and its Golden Rules.

The Golden Rules are 11 basic rules for more responsible gold mining. They include respecting the human rights of local communities, avoiding mining in protected natural areas and improving the management of waste, among others. I’m proud that Brilliant Earth was an early signatory of the Golden Rules. And I’m encouraged that more than 100 jewelers representing 13 percent of the U.S. jewelry market have signed on too. Together, these jewelers are calling on the gold mining industry to clean up its practices and pledging to avoid gold from irresponsible mining companies.

But a more responsible gold mining industry also depends on jewelry consumers. So this Valentine’s Day, choose recycled gold or vintage jewelry. Choose a jeweler that has signed the Golden Rules, or encourage your jeweler to become a signatory. Join us in saying no to dirty gold – and yes to clean water, safe jobs, and healthy communities.

• Valentine’s Day Dirty Gold Fact Sheet: http://bit.ly/NDG-Vday-FS


• No Dirty Gold website: http://nodirtygold.org


• No Dirty Gold on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/nodirtygold

Image credit: Flickr/State Farm

Beth Gerstein is the co-founder and co-CEO of Brilliant Earth, a leading provider of eco-friendly and ethically sourced fine jewelry.