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Truckers are in short supply in the U.S. due to a difficult labor market caused by harsh schedules, wage stagnation, and high up-front costs. Despite the high demand, the trucking industry has had a shortage of drivers for over 15 years. The demand for truck drivers is compounding as the popularity of online shopping and next-day delivery continues to rise. Without major changes, the industry will require an extra 160,000 drivers by 2030.

To address the trucker shortage, the mobile energy delivery company Booster created its internal training program for truckers called CDL (Commercial Driver’s License) Academy. “CDL Academy helps improve the lives of people in the communities we serve,” said Samuel Steinmetz, the company’s manager of ops quality and training. “In 2021, the median personal income in the U.S. was $37,552. At Booster, entry-level service professionals earn $52,000 to $62,400 per year.”

Other trucking companies have CDL training programs, but they often come with up-front costs and low beginning wages that keep many would-be truckers from getting their license.

The idea to create a trucker training program at Booster started with Steinmetz. After working at Booster for two years, he saw how difficult it was to find licensed truck drivers willing to do the work that Booster service professionals do — and to retain those drivers once they’re hired.

“I lobbied our leadership to do our commercial driver training in-house and teach them how to go get their license,” Steinmetz said. “We saw such a big opportunity to drive value for all our stakeholders, they gave me a crack at it. Our pilot had 15 people, and it changed the culture of that yard permanently. From there, it turned into a full-time job. Running CDL Academy and expanding it into our other markets has become a part of the way Booster does business.”

Candidates wanting to get a job with Booster and become service professionals with a clear career path must first go through typical pre-hire Department of Transportation (DOT) requirements including background screening and fingerprinting. After progressing through the background check, candidates are assigned to shifts. They spend the first two hours of each shift learning how to get a commercial driver’s license, and the next six to eight hours learning how to do the job of a Booster service professional, pumping fuel and servicing customer accounts. “We have small equipment that does not require a CDL to operate, so while they’re in training, they operate the smaller equipment,” Steinmetz explained. Candidates have up to 90 days to complete the training program, but Steinmetz noted that he has seen people complete the program in as little as 30 days. 

For Booster, investing in growth and development has been a success. “Looking at our data, it’s clear that our CDL Academy produces high-quality teammates who are committed to what we're doing, as seen by the low attrition rates of graduates,” Steinmetz said. 

Bringing in high-quality employees is especially critical for Booster because the service professionals’  job is different from the ‘typical’ trucking job. 

Steinmetz noted that the national trends that have contributed to the trucker shortage, such as aging labor pools and stagnant wages, are not the same issues that affect Booster. “We look for a different talent profile than many other companies in the industry. There are a lot of people who are interested in driving and would like to enter the industry, but aren’t looking for a job that requires them to drive for 10 straight hours or be away from home for long stretches. That’s where Booster comes in.” 

Steinmetz believes candidates who come to CDL Academy and want to work for Booster are attracted to the company because the company provides ample opportunity for career advancement and benefits that other companies in the industry can’t offer. “Booster is different,” Steinmetz said. "We offer our service professionals the chance to be home every day, flexible schedules, tech-enabled work, and a balance between service and driving. And on top of that, we give them the training they need to build a career they love and can grow in.”

The trucking industry has a 5.4 percent unemployment rate, but turnover remains high, with about 40 percent of truckers staying at a given carrier for less than a year before moving on. “That last part hurts us. We need people to learn the job and stay,” Steinmetz said. “It’s easy to teach people how to drive a truck, but it is difficult to learn the job and choose to stay long-term. We need to find people who are already a good cultural fit and then teach them what they need to know.” 

This article series is sponsored by Booster and produced by the TriplePundit editorial team.

Image courtesy of Booster

The First Amendment to the U.S. Constitution guarantees everyone the right to speak their minds without fear the government will punish them. But some business leaders say this basic tenet of American democracy is under threat, and they're taking legal action to make their voices heard.

Citing free speech concerns, more business leaders weigh in on Disney v. DeSantis

You may or may not remember the conflict between Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis and one of the state's biggest employers, Walt Disney Co., last year. Maybe you saw it in the headlines for a few weeks before forgetting all about it. But some say the implications of what happened between Disney and DeSantis could dampen free speech — and particularly corporate activism — for years to come. 

So, what happened anyway? Here's a quick refresh. Florida's Parental Rights in Education Act went into effect in 2022. Labeled by critics as the "Don't Say Gay" law, the legislation effectively banned discussions of sexual orientation and gender identity in Florida public schools. Disney was initially slow to make a public statement. But after employees took to social media in protest, then-CEO Bob Chapek voiced opposition to the legislation at the company’s annual shareholder meeting in March of last year.

After Chapek's remarks, DeSantis and his administration moved to take control over the commercial district that includes the sprawling Disney World complex — which Disney was granted autonomy to operate over five decades ago. Disney responded with a lawsuit, arguing the state's actions were "patently retaliatory, patently anti-business and patently unconstitutional." 

Others agree. Earlier this month, the Leadership Now Project — a bipartisan, pro-democracy group made up of 400 business leaders across industries — filed an amicus brief in Walt Disney Parks v. DeSantis. Latin for "friend of the court," amicus curiae briefs are filed by groups or individuals who are not part of a legal case but offer assistance to the court by way of insight or expertise. Leadership Now's brief in support of Disney makes the business case for the dangers of government overreach and retaliation against companies and executives for exercising their free speech rights. 

"We've been concerned for some time about political retribution against companies starting to emerge in the U.S. political context, particularly in reaction to their use of free speech," said Daniella Ballou-Aares, CEO and cofounder of Leadership Now. "We decided to do the amicus brief on the Disney case because this had gone a step further. The governor of Florida had actually sought to enact legislation in response to Disney making a public argument around something they thought was important to their employees, customers and business operations." 

Beyond Disney: Political retaliation casts a shadow on free speech in the U.S. 

In his 2017 book "On Tyranny," renowned Yale University historian Timothy Snyder outlined 20 government actions that pose a threat to democracy, based on historical context across the 20th century. Political retaliation is one of them — and the Disney case provides a stark example as to why. 

"It casts a pretty dramatic chilling effect on the free speech rights of corporations and individuals," Sean Burton, a Leadership Now member and CEO of the real estate investment manager Cityview, said of the Disney case. "Companies represent shareholders. They have employees, they have customers. And in this day and age, people want to know the values of the companies they do business with, and companies have to be able to react to that. They have to speak their mind on that issue without fear they're somehow going to end up in trouble with the government for legally protected speech."

In particular, Snyder discusses a phenomenon he calls "anticipatory obedience" — in which the government takes a strong action against one person or group for exercising a protected right, and people start to fall in line even before they're directly compelled to do so.

"It's part of the psychology behind tyranny and autocracy," Ballou-Aares said. "Companies and business leaders, without even being directly targeted, are going to modify their behavior based on this type of action and take steps they didn't need to take. That is a real risk factor, and educating business audiences that proactively taking actions they don't need to in response to this type of action will only invite more of it."

Business leaders push back

Through their brief, Leadership Now's business members not only hope to persuade the court in favor of Disney, but also to raise awareness of what they say are serious threats to free speech and democracy hiding in plain sight. 

"A lot of people and business leaders see the media headlines about this kind of case and write it off as, 'This is just political and I don't want to get involved,' or 'Who knows what really happened?' But this is a very clear case of political retribution," Burton said. "Disney said something — they spoke their mind about an issue — and there was a very specific and public decision made to punish them and to interfere with a private contract, which is unprecedented. That's the kind of thing that happens in autocracies, not democracies. The hope of Leadership Now is to make people aware of that." 

This isn't the first time Leadership Now has weighed in on a legal case with potentially far-reaching consequences. Last year, the group filed an amicus brief in Moore v. Harper, a landmark test of the "independent state legislature" theory, which asserts that state legislatures have the authority to set election laws without input from state courts, a position Leadership Now opposed. The case, which rose out of a gerrymandering dispute in North Carolina, made it all the way to the Supreme Court, which decided against the theory and upheld the right of state courts to review election laws. The group also weighed in on a 2020 Arizona case, in which the Supreme Court ultimately stripped away much of the Voting Rights Act, going against Leadership Now's position. 

Business leaders beyond Leadership Now's membership are already responding positively to the group's action on the Disney case — and interest is expected to build as the case goes forward. "What we've found is a great deal of encouragement for this position,"  Ballou-Aares said. "This is an early phase in the case — we expect it can go to appeals, it could end up in the Supreme Court, or it could be that another case ends up taking precedent — so we thought it was important at this earlier stage to put this position out there, be able to engage and build support. As the case progresses, we can expect that others will join us or echo those sentiments as we get closer to the critical decisions in the case." 

But the courts are only one way business leaders can push back. "It's important for business leaders not to sit by and watch it happen, but to be vigilant and be aware," Burton said. "Business leaders should be supporting candidates that are pro-democracy, not election deniers, but people who put democracy first, regardless of political persuasion. That's something that businesses can and should get more involved in." He listed analyzing financial support for political candidates and giving employees time off to vote as just two examples of how business leaders can get involved in a measurable way. 

"A core value and reason for existence for Leadership Now is to make people aware that democracy is a critical issue for our country — and not just in the ways it's usually talked about, but critical in terms of economic growth, investment and the ability to raise wages," Burton said. "There's a real practical effect of these challenges to democracy and to this political instability. We would like business leaders to recognize that. And it doesn't have to be in a partisan way. This is not about politics, this is about stability." 

Image credit: Patrícia Ferreira/Unsplash

When Russia launched an unprovoked attack on Ukraine in February of 2022, hundreds of high-profile U.S. and global corporations responded by voluntarily withdrawing their brands from Russia. The exodus added an important element of private-sector support to the international economic sanctions against Russia. That support has become all the more important as the war drags on to a second year.

The importance of private-sector action

The Barack Obama administration and the international community imposed initial sanctions on Russia in 2014 after the country was accused of fostering a separatist campaign in parts of Ukraine. However, the business community failed to take strong parallel measures against Russia. Without meaningful action from the private sector, Russian aggression in Ukraine did not make a strong impression on the public at large, here in the U.S. and elsewhere.

The situation was different after Russia launched an all-out invasion against Ukraine on February 24, 2022. Russian President Vladimir Putin has persistently portrayed the war as a limited “special military operation,” with the Russian economy conducting business as usual. However, that effort was quickly undercut by the hundreds of business leaders who withdrew their companies from Russia. Many left quietly, but the withdrawals were also publicized and amplified by researchers at the Yale School of Management and other organizations tracking the business response.

Among more recent evidence that the Russian economy is not functioning as normal, earlier this year the Russian government took over operations of two companies that failed to withdraw, the global French firm Danone and the Danish brewer Carlsberg. 

Heineken was reportedly also facing a takeover, but last week it finally closed the sale of its operations for the symbolic price of just one euro. “The Dutch brewer is taking a €300 million loss, or roughly $325 million, by selling its business to Russian manufacturer Arnest Group, making Heineken one of the latest companies to pull out of Russia since the start of the war in Ukraine in February 2022,” CBS reported.

Are the sanctions on Russia working?

In recent months, some evidence emerged of cracks and loopholes in government sanctions against Russia, as well as shortcomings in the business response.

Alternative supply routes, for example, enabled global brands including Coca-Cola and Ikea to remain relatively accessible in Russia, even though their parent companies are no longer operating in the country. However, as Reuters reported earlier this year, the business boycott has had an impact on consumer prices and delivery schedules.

More importantly, when high-profile brands like McDonald’s, KFC and Starbucks disappear — and are replaced by the new names Rostics, Vkusno & Tochka, and Stars, respectively — it is impossible to pretend that an economy is functioning normally.

The sanctions are having an impact

To be clear, impact of the business boycott has not turned the majority of the Russian public against the war. In fact, some Russia observers maintain that it has had the opposite effect.

“Putin’s unique selling point for the nation — a 'special operation' and the sharing of responsibility for the country’s isolation and regression — has turned out to be so atypical for the 21st century that the shock has reverberated through all of the normative models of behavior in modern consumer societies,” observed Andrei Kolesnikov, a senior fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center, in an article published in April.

While activists in Russia continue to oppose the war, Kolesnikov argues that the overall effect of the Ukraine invasion has been to bend Russian society toward authoritarianism, not away from it. “Russian society is giving Putin carte blanche to continue both his war on the country’s borders and the repressive practices within it,” he concludes.

If observers like Kolesnikov are correct, there will be no internal opposition of sufficient strength to compel Russia to withdraw from Ukraine. Only international sanctions can do that, and the full impact of those sanctions is beginning to emerge.

“Since the start of the invasion of Ukraine, the EU has imposed 11 rounds of ever-tighter sanctions against Russia. Some people claim these sanctions have not worked. This is simply not true,” Josep Borrell, the Vice-President of the European Commission, wrote in a blog post last week.

“Within a year, [the sanctions] have already limited Moscow’s options considerably, causing financial strain, cutting the country from key markets, and significantly degrading Russia’s industrial and technological capacity,” Borrell concluded.

In particular, Borrell draws attention to Russia’s revenues from oil and gas exports. Oil and gas prices were high in 2022, boosting the Russian economy and partially shielding it from the impact of sanctions. But prices fell this year. Though the volume of exports has remained relatively steady, Borrell cites an estimated 27 percent drop in revenue in 2023, among other evidence of significant contraction in the Russian economy. 

A steep drop in the value of the ruble earlier this month is another indication of Russia’s economic woes. Earlier this week, Reuters columnist Pierre Briancon also argued that Russia’s increasingly contorted attempts to avoid sanctions indicate that these sanctions are working, while also charting a roadmap for tightening up loopholes.

U.S. and global business leaders took a risk when they hastened to withdraw from Russia in 2022, and global sanctions supported that decision with concrete action. As Borrell notes, though, the sanctions are a process of increasing pressure, not a single point in time. Even those businesses that have cut ties with Russia need to stay informed about the progress of war, and advocate to keep the pressure up.

Interest in regenerative agriculture is on an upsurge globally, spurred by the need to address topsoil depletion, environmental concerns and even profit margins. Leading the charge, the Regenerative Organic Alliance (ROA) has certified over a million acres around the world in just three years.

The nonprofit is taking a comprehensive approach to regenerative farming — focusing on soil health, social fairness and animal welfare. And the program is setting the bar for farmers and brands invested in reversing the damage done by industrial farming methods.

Looking at the bigger picture

“[In] all these other regenerative certifications that are popping up, there's a big focus on soil health, and that's a great start,” Elizabeth Whitlow, ROA’s executive director, told TriplePundit. “But you need to consider the whole picture. You have to have a holistic approach.”

Regenerative agriculture incudes a range of farming practices. And since the term remains unregulated, certifications can vary greatly. Farms must focus on the bigger picture to be Regenerative Organic Certified by the alliance — meaning they not only improve soil health, but also seek to better their farm's impact on local ecosystems and communities, Whitlow said. 

“We need to also recognize that regenerative agriculture draws 100 percent from Indigenous approaches to being one with the land,” she said. “At the end of the day — ecosystems, humans, animals — we are all fundamentally, unequivocally intertwined. And so to that end, if we want to truly regenerate anything, all of these elements need close attention.”

The three pillars of certified regenerative agriculture

The certification program builds on the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s USDA organic standards. Beyond guidelines on fertilizer and pesticide use, the primary focus of the USDA organic standard, the Regenerative Organic program also encourages practices like cover cropping and minimizing soil disturbance to improve soil health and protect topsoil from blowing away. Crop rotation is also a huge part of soil health, so the land isn’t just going back and forth between corn and soy, Whitlow said. 

The certification also ensures the well-being of animals. Livestock provide organic fertilization and keep the plants mowed as they graze. Not only are livestock good for the crops, but allowing cattle to feed in agricultural fields is also better for their health. The digestive systems of animals like cows and sheep are not designed to consume corn and soy, Whitlow said. 

Fair wages and working conditions are the third pillar of the program. “No one’s talking about the farmer and the farm worker,” Whitlow said. But they’re an integral part of the certification process with the alliance. The program does not allow any child or forced labor, and farms must be proactive against sexual harassment, which is a major problem in agriculture, she said. Female farm workers experience extremely high levels of gender-based harassment and violence.

Before certification, ROA ensures farms have the capacity to handle worker complaints in a way that doesn't instill fear of retribution or losing their job, Whitlow said. 

A million acres and growing

“We have just surpassed a million acres,” Whitlow said, noting that certified acreage accounts for 320 different types of crops. “And it’s growing quickly. We've got about 360 applications in the queue.”

Smallholder farms are grouped together to make up larger farms, so the alliance has certified 140 farms that consist of about 50,000 smallholders. “One farm could be 2000 smallholders,” she said. “If you consider where you get your coffee or bananas, oftentimes it comes from smallholders ... They produce bananas on one or two hectares, and then they all gather it in one place. And a co-op — or a growers group — will organize it for exporting.”

Brand interest in regenerative agriculture is building fast

The alliance works directly with brands to license products made from certified farms. “We have full transparency with our brands. Any brand that is licensed to use our mark has to undergo a desk audit with us and they have to show all the documents [involved],” Whitlow said. For example, quinoa with the Regenerative Organic Certified label purchased in Bolivia is tracked through milling, export, import, and all the way to the salad bar where it is served to consumers.

The alliance has licensed about 120 brands including Patagonia, Dr. Bronner's and Outerknown, she said. Licensing includes foods, supplements, textiles, and clothing and personal care.

Organic agriculture lags in the U.S.

Internationally, certified farmers are inspiring change in their regions, but U.S. farmers have much less flexibility, Whitlow said. “Farmers are terrified. They are operating on the thinnest of margins … They have to grow what our USDA Farm Bill tells them to grow for crop insurance,” she said. “They have to grow those crops because it's the only sure bet. If they have a failed harvest, which is probably likely given the extreme weather conditions they farm under, they will get the maximum back from insurance. We need to change that.”

And though demand for organic products has been steadily increasing, only about 1 percent of U.S. farmland is organic. That means most organic crops have to be imported, Whitlow said. “We should be turning that around and letting our farmers benefit by growing organically. And we need public policy that helps incentivize that,” she said.

Results on the field

Data on the alliance's results isn’t available just yet. Whitlow said she recognizes it’s a problem to have to wait for solid data because they don’t have the time to do so, but she’s moving forward based on the anecdotal results farmers are seeing in the field. “And the results are pretty extraordinary,” she said. “Do we need to wait for 10 more years until we prove with science that we're doing this right, that this is possible? I don't think so. I think we do it now and we continue to gather the science.”

Images courtesy of Regenerative Organic Alliance

Imagine a future in which every item of clothing on the planet could be traced from the factory it was woven in, to the ship that carried it, to the store that sold it, to the customer who took it home. 

But that’s not all. Clothing could also be encoded with information that makes it easier to resell, or data allowing recyclers to properly and efficiently give it a new life. That is the dream of Avery Dennison, the nearly 90-year-old company best known for its innovations in labeling. Now a digital-first company, it sees an opportunity to use its tracing technology to transform the textile industry toward a more circular economy.

A growing garment problem

“We believe that we can, through intelligent labeling and digital technologies, enable things like recyclability of clothing, transparency of the supply chain and even things like resale,” said Mike Colarossi, vice president of innovation and product line management at Ohio-based Avery Dennison. 

Right now, the textile and fashion industry is, as a whole, very unsustainable. The rise in so-called “fast fashion” — quickly produced, cheap but fashionable products — led to a massive increase in textile production over the past decade. The textile industry is estimated to be responsible for about 10 percent of global carbon emissions, according to the United Nations Environment Program.

In 2018, the United States alone generated 17 million tons of textile waste, which mostly consisted of discarded clothing, according to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. Of that textile waste, 11.3 million tons ended up in landfills.  

Recent headlines described mountains of discarded clothing dumped in Chile’s Atacama desert that got so big they could be seen from space. And the impacts are far greater than landfills, with garments clogging gutters or harming air quality as they are burned in residential areas in many parts of the world.

“Many people succumb to buying seasonal trends that then get thrown away within a couple of months, and it’s just not sustainable,” said Nadya Hutagalung, an Indonesian-Australian model and ambassador for the United Nations Alliance for Sustainable Fashion, in a statement.

Tech-enabled care labels open the door for a circular economy in fashion

Avery Dennison does not produce clothing or textiles for the consumer goods market, yet it sees itself as playing a central role in the industry. In fact, the company has long produced a tiny, but important, component of many clothes we use daily: the care labels that come attached to clothing, explain what it’s made of, and provide instructions on how to clean it. 

“Our products end up on most consumer-facing goods and business-to-business goods,” Colarossi said. “Labels are ubiquitous, and by digitizing them, we believe we can unlock a host of different value creation opportunities.”

That includes products that currently have no value, like discarded clothing. Old care labels can easily be removed or fade, but an increasing amount of clothing includes Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) — a wireless system used for tracking and identification — or other forms of digital labels woven into the fabric, which can be more long-lasting and provide more data than traditional tags.

Avery Dennison wants to enable the creation of something that has, literally, never been done before — a circular economy for clothing that gives it a new life and economic value. 

For Colarossi, empowering recyclers is key to unlocking the next step necessary for a circular textile economy.

“Knowing what's in that garment determines whether you can simply mechanically recycle something or if you need to go to a more sophisticated process,” Colarossi said. “What we do is provide a label that can be read using digital ID technology, and that information can help automate the [sorting] process and then optimize the recycling process.”

In June, the company launched a partnership with garment recycler Texaid that Colarossi hopes will show an actionable, scalable model to achieve that.

Texaid is a European company that describes itself as “a circular service specialist for the fashion and textile industry.” The company sees Avery Dennison’s Atma.io connected cloud platform for digital IDs, which carries information about the fiber makeup of every garment, as crucial to expanding its work.

“Existing textile recycling facilities will be woefully inadequate if they remain small-scale,” Texaid CEO Martin Böschen said in a statement announcing the partnership. “Technology can scale up processing so that we can generate the volumes of high-quality feedstock the industry is going to need."

Of course, the role of digital labels and data is only a piece of the circular economy puzzle. Addressing the need for simpler fabric blends and better materials sourcing is also key. Consumers, too, have a role to play by buying less fast fashion and wearing clothes more often before discarding them.

Creating a circular economy, and eliminating the flow of discarded clothing to landfills (and deserts) around the world will be a major undertaking for the entire industry — and for those like Avery Dennison that help create innovative, actionable and scalable solutions.

Image credit: Anna Nekrashevich/Pexels

Early next month, representatives from more than 500 banks from around the world will gather to explore how to promote sustainable development and “align financial flows” with the Paris Agreement on Climate Change. Participants in the upcoming Finance in Common Summit account for 12 percent of global investment annually with $23 trillion in assets combined, allowing for enormous potential impact. 
 
Not surprisingly, financing energy transitions will be central to the discussions, including Just Energy Transition Partnerships (JETPs), or creative financing packages to support developing countries’ transitions away from coal. Four JETPs have been announced so far with South Africa, Indonesia, Vietnam and Senegal. India is next in line. G7 countries and development banks are instrumental to financing these initiatives. 
 
But like anything that requires a massive infrastructure shift, transparency and accountability are essential to ensure that the billions of allocated dollars are actually used for their intended purpose. In the case of the JETPs, this means moving toward renewable energy to benefit all communities. Such transparency and accountability is only possible where local NGOs and civil society experts can participate freely and fully in public discussions, provide independent monitoring of social and environmental impacts, and support communities to advocate for their rights.

This is what the “just” aspect of the just transition is all about — which is why financial institutions should be paying very close attention to the situation of civil society voices in the countries they are prioritizing. 
 
Take Vietnam as an example.
 
Two development banks — the International Finance Corp. and the Asian Development Bank — joined forces with the U.S., U.K. and other G7 nations to finance a $15.5 billion JETP with Vietnam. Meanwhile, in the last couple of years, the Vietnamese government has arrested and detained five of the country’s most prominent climate leaders who should be at the forefront of this process. The charges all relate to “tax evasion,” but ample evidence, including multiple declarations from U.N. experts and treaty bodies, point to these vague laws being used to silence environmental defenders in Vietnam. 
 
One of the climate justice heroes currently serving a five-year prison sentence in Vietnam is Mr. Dang Dinh Bach (“Bach”), whom I know personally both as a former student and as a partner in a U.S.-funded law reform project. His work centered around protecting vulnerable communities from pollution, including plastic waste, asbestos and coal-fired power plants. I was impressed with his strong sense of values, always respecting the Vietnamese legal system and speaking highly of the government. He’s still in jail despite numerous high-level calls for his release and a U.N. opinion that found his imprisonment a “violation of international law” in the context of a “systemic problem with arbitrary detention” of environmental defenders in Vietnam.
 
Just a few months ago, another climate champion in Vietnam, Obama Foundation Scholar Hoang Thi Minh Hong, was detained on similar charges, continuing this highly concerning trend. The U.N. and several governments, including the U.S. and the U.K., have all released statements calling for her release, but to no avail. 
 
Internationally-renowned climate leader and Goldman Environmental Prize Winner Ms. Nguy Thi Khanh was recently released after serving 16 months in prison on similar tax-evasion charges. Environmental groups continue to face threats, and many have shut down in reaction to this chilling situation. 

For all banks that will be participating in the upcoming Finance in Common Summit, these arrests should be a red flag. Even more so for the International Finance Corp. and the Asian Development Bank, as they have recognized the link between dissent and sustainable financing, having adopted specific policies protecting those who voice opinions about the projects they fund. 
 
The World Bank, of which the International Finance Corp. is a part, has a zero-tolerance policy around reprisals and retaliation against those who openly share their views about projects it funds, stating: “Any form of intimidation against people who comment on Bank projects, research, activities and their impact, goes against our core values of respecting the people we work for and acting with utmost integrity." The Asian Development Bank's policy similarly says that civil society participation in its projects “fundamentally supports good governance, citizenship and accountability of the state.”
 
Both development banks must know that funding a JETP in Vietnam while the government is punishing those who argued for this precise transition violates the spirit of their policies and undermines the ultimate effectiveness of their JETP investments.  
 
Banks should not be supporting JETPs in any country where advocating for clean energy is treated as a crime under the guise of tax fraud. If Bach, Hoang and Khanh can be arrested for taking reasoned positions against coal-fired power plants or other projects that exacerbate climate change, then anybody is at risk of being arbitrarily imprisoned in Vietnam for supporting the goals of the JETP in the future. Each of these individuals worked within the system and was eager to help monitor and implement the JETP on behalf of impacted communities. 
 
To achieve a truly just energy transition in Vietnam, financing of the JETP must be contingent upon the urgent release of Bach, Hoang, and the other environmental defenders serving harsh and unjust sentences. In addition, civil society must be able to safely and freely contribute to the work needed for Vietnam to meet its net-zero emission target by 2050 and the JETP commitments without retaliation or threat of imprisonment. The same should be true for all countries receiving billions of dollars to meet the Paris Agreement goals. 
 
At this year’s Finance in Common Summit, I urge the participating banks that finance JETPs or any other type of climate-forward initiatives to do their due diligence and make sure their money will actually be used to fund truly just energy transitions. 

Image credits: Victoria Pickering/Flickr and Markus Spiske/Unsplash