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According to the Dutch banking giant Rabobank, one of the world’s largest lenders for the food and agriculture sector, meat consumption in the U.S. increased by 5 percent in 2015 -- the largest such increase since the 1970s. While Rabobank’s analysts say such growth was relatively flat for beef consumption, one of the beef industry’s competing trade groups, the National Chicken Council, suggests American beef consumption is on an uptick after years of decline, with another incremental increase most likely to occur next year.

Those numbers reverse decades of trends. After all, the rise of the poultry industry came at the expense of the beef industry and also of pork producers, which saw sales stagnate for years. Americans’ affinity for beef hit an all-time high in 1976, with per-capita consumption at 94.3 pounds. But over the years, that number continued to decline steadily, down to 53.9 pounds in 2015 before this recent boost.

Indeed, food trends -- including the popularity of low-carb diets, along with the success of new burger restaurant chains such as Five Guys and Shake Shack -- are helping to lift the U.S. beef industry from decades of flat-lined growth.

The reality, however, is that if U.S. beef sales recover and even continue to increase in the coming years, we can expect similar trends in developed countries and emerging economies alike. In fact, for several years the evidence made it clear that meat consumption in developing countries is tied to income growth.

While meat consumption increases, awareness of this industry’s impact on the planet, people and, of course, animals, is also on the rise. More consumers want the global meat sector to be more conscious of animal welfare, ensure that human rights are respected across its entire value chain, and mitigate environmental problems such as deforestation. Furthermore, as the world’s population increases to the oft-predicted 9 billion by 2050, there are countless questions as to how we can feed a hungry world using the same amount of resources while also meeting the surging demand for animal protein.

To that end, this week the Global Roundtable for Sustainable Beef (GRSB) held an international conference in a major beef-producing nation, Canada. This loose association of national sustainable beef councils says it met in Banff, Alberta, Canada, to reconcile localized approaches with the desire to ensure the industry can be more responsible and offer a global solution. One of the biggest challenges the association faces is its ties to deforestation, a problem many environmentalists pin on the beef industry, notably in Brazil but especially in Paraguay, an emerging beef power.

But according to GRSB’s executive director, Ruaraidh Petre, the links between land use and raising cattle are nuanced. Petre says the careful raising of cattle can actually provide a net environmental benefit and, in some cases, ranching makes more sense on the environmental front than raising many crops -- an argument he made to TriplePundit in the past.

As an effort to restore forests worldwide continues to gain momentum, the global beef industry must figure out how it can use the lands already available in a much smarter way – and how it can do its part to ensure beef producers do not continue deforestation that uproots communities and contributes to climate change. This is one way in which the industry can work to mitigate its climate change impact, as report after report urges people to reduce their meat consumption in order to slash the world’s food-related emissions.

The beef industry needs to tackle these problems if it wishes to preserve its business in the long term. After all, climate change is threatening to reduce worldwide yields of grain, which ranchers in North America covet during the last stages of cattle’s feeding cycle in order to score that marbling consumers in this part of the world want – a trend that most likely will spread to other countries in the future. Hence beef producers and retailers have to work together, and engage other industries across the global food supply chain. if they really want to show they can offer answers instead of only receiving criticism over their long-term impacts on the environment.

Image credit: Library and Archives Canada/Flickr

Disclosure: The GRSB has partially funded Leon Kaye’s trip to Alberta. Neither the author nor TriplePundit were required to write about the experience. 

Unbeknownst to him, Donald Trump may have precipitated a major advance in the battle to curb the worst impacts of climate change. Trump’s rhetoric about canceling or renegotiating the Paris Agreement was, according to Devin Henry at The Hill, a major impetus toward the European Union's decision to speed up the process of ratification.

Henry called the EU's move “a power play against Trump.” Robert Stavins, director of the Harvard Project on the Climate Agreements, told Henry: “[Trump's] threat stimulated this rapid series of ratifications - China, the USA, Europe, and many others.”

American presidential politics aside, the unwavering voice of climate change denial certainly played a role, experts said. John Coequyt, global climate policy director for the Sierra Club, told Henry: “I think having that idea out there, that the world still is debating this in some way, I think puts pressure on countries to act quickly, to solidify the process and continue to move forward.”

The EU's decision to ratify the Paris Agreement, which makes the agreement legally binding, may put a nail in the coffin of that debate.

At a press conference held by the World Resources Institute (WRI) on Wednesday, experts weighed in on this historic milestone. Paula Caballero and David Waskow of the Climate Program at WRI underscored that this is one of the most quickly ratified agreements in U.N. history. Andrew Light, WRI Distinguished Senior Fellow and former senior climate change advisor for the U.S. Department of State, said it was “one of only four agreements to have come into force within a year.”

The requirements for the entry into force were as follows:

First, a total of 55 nations had to sign on. Second, a minimum of 55 percent of world greenhouse gas emissions needed to be represented among the signatories. Only 52 percent of global emissions were accounted for at the beginning of this week. But a flurry of activity -- including India's decision to sign on last weekend, combined with action by the EU -- put both tallies well over the top. At this writing, 72 parties have signed on, representing 56.75 percent of global emissions, according to the UNFCC website. France, the U.K. and New Zealand have all signed on.

The agreement automatically goes into effect 30 days after the thresholds are crossed. With the agreement now in place, any nation wishing to withdraw must follow a four-year process. But such a decision would carry "significant diplomatic implications," David Waskow of WRI said on Wednesday. Recent actions, particularly among the world’s largest powers, show this issue "is no longer in the diplomatic silo that it once was," Waskow continued.

Indeed, outside of the Republican delegation in the U.S. Congress, the world’s leaders take this issue very seriously.

After the dual threshold passed, WRI President and CEO Andrew Steer had this to say: “With the Agreement in full force, countries can shift their focus from commitment to action.

"We need to increase investment in sustainable infrastructure and accelerate the uptake of renewable energy. We must create more livable, low-carbon cities and expand the supply of land and forests for carbon storage. We must slash food loss and waste, a major source of emissions and a travesty for people who lack enough food. And, we must continue to work at all levels – global, national, cities and communities – to build the political will for this transformation."

Moving forward, what comes next is CMA1, which will take place as part of the COP22 meeting in Marrakech, Morocco, this November. In the CMA1, parties to the agreement will sit down and hammer out the detailed rules, procedures and guidelines that will determine precisely how the agreement will be carried out. It’s very much parallel to the way new laws are translated into regulations here in the U.S. Only parties that have signed on will have voting rights at CMA1, but all are welcome to attend as observers.

While the entry into force is encouraging, experts insist we mustn't rest on our laurels: "The Paris Agreement is a turning point in the global fight to end climate change, but the hard work begins now," Heather Coleman, who manages Oxfam America's climate policy work, said in a statement on Wednesday.

"Oxfam estimates that the communities most vulnerable to feeling the effects of climate change are only receiving a fraction of the money that rich countries pledged to adaption. Figuring out how to close this gap and strengthen the resilience of these communities should be high on the list of priorities ahead of November’s United Nations climate change conference in Morocco."

Trip Van Noppen, president of nonprofit environmental law organization Earthjustice, agreed: “Today we are accelerating the transition to clean energy, and sending a powerful signal to business, investors and communities that fossil fuels are not our future," he said in a statement on Wednesday. "But we must do more and fast. Now that the Paris Agreement is in force, all nations, including the U.S., must double down on efforts to increase our ambition and reduce emissions further and faster."

With grim news on the climate front becoming a regular feature, it’s good to see something positive for a change. World governmental leaders have overwhelmingly recognized both the seriousness and the urgency of the problem, as have hundreds of state and local leaders, as well as many businesses. Measures and achievements already in place were unthinkable just a few years ago.

We are, all of us, in a race against time, whether we know it or not. But the sooner we all know it, the better our chances will be of taking meaningful action before it’s too late.

Image credit: Thomas Galvez: Flickr Creative Commons

Last week, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) advised consumers to stop using homeopathic teething tablets and gels. The warning cited health risks including seizures, breathing difficulties, excessive sleepiness and other symptoms. This warning comes six years after the FDA advised consumers that one popular brand, Hyland’s, was manufacturing teething tablets that presented similar health problems.

The culprit is the herb belladonna, which means “beautiful lady” in Italian but is also regarded by many medical professionals as unsafe to use as a sedative. Belladonna is also used in ointments and salves for joint pain and even in hemorrhoid suppositories.

Homeopathic remedies for teething gained popularity in recent years after the FDA issued a warning in 2011 that urged adults not to treat teething children under the age of 2 with over-the-counter remedies such as Anbesol. That product, along with others such as Orajel, Orabase and Hurricane, contain the local anesthetic benzocaine. FDA researchers said the risk from using benzocaine is the rare but sometimes fatal condition methemoglobinemia, a health disorder that greatly reduces the amount of oxygen circulated through a child’s bloodstream.

Instead of a remedy containing belladonna or any other herbal or homeopathic remedy (and these non-conventional remedies share one thing in common: they are not based on science), the FDA suggests two simple alternatives: Rub or massage the child’s gums with a finger,  or offer a cool teething ring or a wet, clean and cool washcloth for the teething child to bite.

But the FDA warnings serve as an advisory and have no legal teeth. And homeopathic companies are responding in kind as they refuse to take any responsibility or accountability for the products they sell as they put profit ahead of product safety.

Take the example of Hyland’s dismissive response to the FDA warning. The company claims its products are made with “good manufacturing practices” without explaining further, and said the FDA inspects its products as if they were over-the-counter drug remedies. The company also perpetuates the myth that all homeopathic products are regulated exactly as drugs are by the FDA. Of course, on its website, Hyland’s also prints the disclaimer that its products' uses “have not been reviewed by the Food and Drug Administration.”

And in another rambling and defensive statement insisting its products are safe, Iris Bell, Hyland’s director of scientific affairs, minimized the risk of belladonna and said the company’s teething gel contains the ingredient in only small amounts. Once again, Bell said these products are manufactured using a “validated process” – without disclosing any details. And the legal hair-splitting over the insistence that homeopathic remedies are regulated by the FDA ignores the fact that the agency does not evaluate these potions for safety or effectiveness.

The bottom line is that the homeopathic product industry has long profited from its snake oil promise that the further dilution and “succession” of their ingredients increases their potency. So, should Hyland’s shake and dilute its products even more, or increase the amount of elixirs? Then there is the “like cures like” explanation, which posits the logic that an ingredient that produces negative results in healthy people will cure those same conditions in unhealthy people. The problem is that in the rush to soothe a child’s pain, many parents are buying something they believe is “natural” – and do not stop to ascertain whether they are giving potentially harmful substances to a perfectly healthy child.

At the very least, these statements are head-scratchers. At worst, they exhibit hypocrisy as these companies resent the very idea that they should be held to the same level of product safety as the makers of conventional products containing benzocaine. And their allies are the tightly-knit, eco-conscious “mommy blogger” community who often react to a criticism of one product as an attack on everyone. A typical response to concern over herbal remedies is an objection to “chomping on plastic” out of fears of BPA or other chemicals, though a walk through any store reveals that the makers of children’s products clearly denote when their products are free of such materials.

And now, stores are doing what they can to remove such products from their shelves. CVS, for example, recently announced it will voluntarily remove all homeopathic teething remedies from its shelves, including Hyland’s, Baby Orajel and its private-label products.

Image credit: Daniel Schwen/Wiki Commons

By Eliza Clark

In the not-too-distant past, sustainability leadership often meant an organization or individual was bold enough to sound the rally call to others. As the environmental movement has gained steam over the past decade, sustainability leadership has moved beyond advocating that environmental risks are real, to requiring real action and delivering real results.

But what does sustainability leadership look like if you are one of the 400 parks in the U.S. National Park Service? Five years ago, Yellowstone National Park launched the Yellowstone Environmental Stewardship (YES!) initiative, a collaborative effort to help Yellowstone become the world’s greenest park. The goals accomplished in this initiative offer lessons in successful sustainability efforts not just for other parks, but other organizations around the world.

Yellowstone set ambitious goals to improve its environmental performance. Using 2003 figures as the baseline, the park defined success as:

• 30 percent less greenhouse gas emissions


• 15 percent less electricity consumption


• 18 percent less fossil fuel consumption


• 15 percent less water consumption


• Divert 100 percent of municipal solid waste from landfills

Imagine applying those goals across the whole park – all 2.2 million acres of it, with nine visitor centers and museums, more than 2,000 hotel rooms and cabins, over 1,500 buildings, and well over 400 miles of roads – and the daunting scale grabs your attention. Even more daunting, perhaps, was the mission to educate and engage the estimated 4 million annual visitors and 16,000 staff.

That is why Yellowstone partnered with core group of public/private sector partners, including Andersen Corp., to help design and implement improvements and educational strategies to help meet its goals. These partners worked to help the Park drive significant improvements while reinforcing the powerful message that progress can also be realized by the collective, small efforts of the millions of people who set foot in the park each year. Just a few examples of Yellowstone’s sustainable building projects include:

Lamar Buffalo Ranch (right): In the Lamar Valley, where temperatures dip down to 40 degrees below zero in the winter months, the park replaced windows, upgraded insulation and installed programmable thermostats and new signage throughout the visitor cabins, amounting to a 50 percent reduction in energy use within the first 12 months.

Mammoth Clinic (above): This 1960s era building, open year-round, serves park staff and visitors, but a checkup of the building revealed retrofit opportunities that dramatically improved the building’s efficiency and energy performance.

Paintbrush: This employee dormitory located near Old Faithful is the first LEED Platinum building in the National Park Service. Home to 80 employees, Paintbrush embodies the Park’s whole-building approach to providing healthy, sustainable environments for its staff.

Canyon Lodge: This new lodging concept was designed to build visitor awareness of ways they can help sustain our natural environment. Educational opportunities are incorporated throughout the space, from waste sorting stations to tips about resource conservation.

Andersen was proud to support the YES! Initiative – both through our sustainability expertise as well as through products, helping park leaders reduce energy use while educating and inspiring the people of Yellowstone. Our company has been committed to preserving the view outside our windows for more than a century, so our shared values made the collaboration a natural fit. We believe our responsibility extends beyond designing sustainable products to partnering with others within and outside our industry to make a positive impact on our communities and world.

Like Yellowstone, we are proud of how much we have accomplished but are awed by how much there is still yet to do. The real success of Yellowstone’s efforts will be measured in the years to come, as future generations of park visitors and employees revel in the beauty of a glimpse of the world as it was at the beginning and embrace the responsibility we all share in preserving that view. Yellowstone and its partners have helped make YES a vibrant chapter in the park’s history – and have established a powerful model for bringing together collaborators to share expertise and solutions, catalyze innovation, and ultimately meaningfully reduce environmental impacts both within and beyond the boundaries of the Park.

Eliza Clark is Director of Sustainability and Environmental at Andersen Corporation.

By Megan Wild

You turn on the tap and clean, drinkable water comes pouring out. This is a luxury many of us in the working world take for granted.

But this isn’t the reality in many parts of the world. A recent study found that 1.1 billion individuals, about 17 percent of the world’s population, don’t have access to improved water. An even higher number of people don’t have safe drinking water. So, it should go without saying that having the luxury of ample water on demand comes with responsibility.

Just because we have a supply of water available to our businesses doesn’t mean we should use it all, or that we should ignore the possibilities for reuse after we're done with the water. In our workplaces, it’s important to consider the use of water and the resulting impact on the environment. This is good for the bottom line, the environment and also public perception.

One way to do this is to reconsider how we dispose of our water – wastewater doesn’t need to be wasted. In fact, there are many potential uses for a wastewater system that can have a positive impact on your company.

What is wastewater?

As the term implies, wastewater is water that has been used. It’s been consumed in office kitchens for cooking and cleaning, has been flushed down the toilet or has been used for industrial purposes.

When wastewater is expelled, it can contain human waste, soaps and various chemicals. Wastewater can also incorporate landscaping residue and storm runoff with potentially harmful materials from lawns, roads and rooftops.

Try not to think of wastewater as a dirty, unusable product, but rather as a resource that you can tap into for your company’s benefit. Creating a wastewater system can help you realize the long-term benefits of reusing water.

How can wastewater be reused?

Wastewater doesn’t need to be a problem – it can be a resource. Businesses can use it in many ways and in many places that can help both the environment and the business world.

Greywater systems divert lightly used water for landscaping. Businesses can then reuse water to irrigate a business’s lawn and can help sustain streams, create artificial wetlands or enhance natural ones on the property.

Businesses can also tie into the fire protection of a building or the plumbing system to flush toilets. Also, it has purposes in heating and cooling systems or in processing materials and/or products.

What are the benefits?

The benefit of lowering the demand of fresh water in any office means saving the resource. By doing so, it frees up the fresh water for others to use -- creating a broader community benefit.

It means more reliable water in case of a drought. You don’t need to look any further than California for evidence of this. The Golden State is in the midst of one of the most severe droughts in its history. But it is implementing these initiatives and finding this kind of reduction helpful.

Even if you’re not facing drought, the lowering of fresh water usage has other benefits including cutting utility bills. Less fresh water use translates into less cost. This will impact a business’s bottom line and also further its corporate responsibility mission.

In addition to the individual impact, the reduction of wastewater entering sewers means less demand on treatment systems. This means lower costs for the community at large, and certainly something that’s good for a business to contribute to.

What comes next?

The setup and implementation of water recycling can be expensive. Let’s face it: It’s cheapest to just draw water from a natural freshwater source – that’s why there hasn’t been a real push to pursue wastewater reuse. However, we need to think ahead and see that we won’t always necessarily have the option of seemingly limitless fresh water.  

Probably one of the most difficult aspects of wastewater reuse is public acceptance. The notion of "toilet to tap" technology can make many people uneasy. Each city, community or business undertaking this type of project needs to find the system and method that works best for them – it isn’t one size fits all.

The abundance of fresh water in the developed world has enabled us to take the precious resource for granted – for better and for worse. We are able to turn on the sink to make coffee for the morning meeting or run the dishwasher in the staff kitchen, not worrying about if the water is available or safe.

Now that places like California are facing devastating droughts, we must start to ask ourselves how we use our water and if we can reuse it. The answer is a resounding yes.

The technology and know-how exist, with new innovations constantly emerging. However, there needs to be a demand for it. Business owners can take up this cause and save themselves money while contributing to the greater good.

Image credit: Pixabay

Megan Wild is a writer who is interested in sustainable construction and design. When she isn’t brushing up on the latest in green technology, you can find her tweeting about the latest developments in technology @Megan_Wild.

Toyota gave automotive reporters a sneak peek at its 2017 lineup last month. The event included a chance to test-drive the 2017 Prius plug-in hybrid electric vehicle models along the winding canyon roads outside of Ojai, California. I was invited to attend on behalf of TriplePundit.

Aside from an all-around great driving experience, the trip underscored one good reason why companies like Toyota are so successful: They plan ahead and don't let temporary trends throw them off message.

Toyota 2017 lineup saves gas -- so there, OPEC

In the kickoff presentation for the media event, Toyota execs said the here-and-now reality of low gasoline prices has dampened the enthusiasm for EVs in the mass market. As a result, Toyota foresees relatively soft demand for EVs over the next few years.

Nevertheless, the automaker was emphatic about its commitment to investing in fuel-efficiency improvements, including its hybrid EV technology.

That's where the long bet comes in. The presentation took place on Sept. 22, and barely two weeks later, OPEC announced its first production curtailment in a generation.

The news has already caused global oil prices to rise. According to some analysts, that doesn't necessarily mean an extreme price spike is coming. However, it does indicate the cycle of low-cost gasoline is likely coming to an end.

Once the oil price increase trickles into the retail gasoline market, it should motivate a new surge of demand for fuel-efficient vehicles in general and EVs in particular.

So, hats off to Toyota for sticking with its commitment to fuel efficiency.

That said, if you're in the market for a small, fuel-efficient new car, the 2017 Corolla should make your list of test drives. The handling on steep inclines and curves out in the desert was as smooth and easy as driving through local traffic. (We also got a chance to drive the sporty 86, and the handling on the Corolla compares favorably.)

For those of you who need a minivan or SUV, the Highlander and Sienna were much more agile on the road than you might expect from a large vehicle.

Toyota focused particular care on improving the Prius, and it shows. In addition to the fuel-efficiency focus, the company was careful to provide current Prius owners with a motivation to upgrade in terms of aesthetics, convenience, comfort and safety.

The safety angle is also an important one. If gas prices remain relatively low, new technologies for a safer road experience provide a motivating sales angle.

An EV for the EV-curious

Speaking of the Prius, if you'd like to drive an EV but need a car with high range, this is the model that lets you dip a toe in the EV water.

The challenge is to keep the cost of the car competitive. Long-range batteries are heavy and expensive, so Toyota went with a smaller, lighter battery. The range is relatively low by some standards. But according to Toyota, about half of its U.S. drivers could easily use the Prius in full EV mode for their daily commutes and errands.

For drivers with workplace charging (an increasingly common circumstance), the number bumps up to 80 percent.

To prove the point, Toyota sent us out on a "mandatory" route on full EV. Aside from the comfortable feeling of not burning gasoline, the extra-quiet, battery-powered ride made for a seamless driving experience.

Another cost factor for EV owners is the installation of a home charging station. The Prius gets around that one by using a battery that can be charged from an ordinary household outlet.

Toyota also partnered with ChargePoint to make using public charging stations as easy as pumping gas.

Another reason to go EV

The full effects of the OPEC announcement haven't trickled down to the retail level yet, but drivers across the southeastern U.S. got a major hint of things to come last month.

Just a few days before Toyota executives gave us their pitch in California, halfway across the country in Alabama a major leak was discovered in the Colonial Pipeline. That's a key transportation route for petroleum products originating from Texas refineries, destined for points east.

The pipeline was shut down after the leak was discovered on Sept. 9. As a result, Georgia and several other states across the Southeast declared emergencies to ward off the price-gouging that typically results from shortages.

Nevertheless, gas prices spiked and panic-buying set in, leading to the kind of long lines at gas stations not seen since the 1970s oil crisis.

That's one experience an EV owner could skip entirely.

When a gas crisis is not news

If you don't live in the Southeast and this shortage is news to you, join the club. Last month's gasoline crisis did not gain much traction in the national media spotlight.

Part of the reason could be that the Colonial Pipeline leak occurred in a relatively remote area. It did not impact neighborhoods or public water supplies.

In addition, at least some of the leakage was contained in an existing retention pond affiliated with an unused mining site. It does not appear to have affected the nearby Peel Creek and Cahaba River.

The high drama of the 2016 presidential election cycle is probably another factor that edged the southeastern gas crisis out of the national spotlight.

Now that the pipeline has been fixed, the story has been almost entirely dropped. All in all, the pipeline owners (which include the Koch brothers' Koch Capital Investments) are probably relieved they escaped an excess of negative attention.

However, the fact is that the U.S. is cross-hatched by aging pipelines. Keeping up with repairs and replacement could begin to exert more upward pressure on the price of petroleum products. And price volatility could very well lead to a rise in EV adoption. If that happens, it appears Toyota is ready.

Photo: Toyota plug-in hybrid Prius EV by Tina Casey.

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As concerns over the impact of America's obesity crisis rise, the “fat acceptance” social movement is also becoming more vocal.

Proponents of what is also called “size acceptance” say they want to end the bias society often directs toward overweight people, especially women. They also point out that it is more than possible to be “fit and fat.” Critics of this movement, including journalist Cathy Young in a 2013 Boston Globe op-ed, respond that this movement's supporters downplay the dangers of obesity on human health and say anyone who suggests one can be overweight yet healthy is in “denial.”

This discussion is a personal one for me, as I have had my share of body image issues over the years and am close to several friends and family members who have struggled with their weight. I often think of two good friends, akin to two peas in a pod, that I've known for over 20 years. One of them is thin; the other, while not obese, is definitely more than full-figured. Most would assume that it's the thin one who excelled in taekwondo and bicycled across entire countries as an adult -- but it's actually the reverse.

Hence we have a debate that stirs plenty of emotion, and even invective, on both sides, with no obvious middle ground. Indeed, it does not take much research to find the links between obesity and heart disease, as well as the risk of strokes, type 2 diabetes and cancer.

But it also does not take many Web searches to realize that overweight people are subjected to a long list of indignities. One can argue that discrimination in the workplace is the last frontier of bias, as society has made far more progress on guaranteeing the acceptance and equality of women, racial and ethnic minorities and, more recently, the LBGT community. Whether the punishment is body shaming on social media, unconscious or direct bias during the job interview process, or comments that range from the inappropriate to the downright hurtful, overweight people confront indignities day-in and day-out. And again, women shoulder most of this pain.

In recent years, research suggested that “fat shaming” does not help obese people lose weight, but instead can actually cause even more weight gain. If the definition of insanity is doing the same thing over and over again, only to expect different results, then we need to look for an approach to obesity that is not focused on humiliation and punishment. Society must confront the fact that the collective struggle with weight gain is more complex than a lack of restraint or dismissal of personal responsibility.

Opponents of the fat acceptance movement often insist the solution to obesity is simple. People need to recognize they are overweight, or even obese, and that will motivate them to transition to a healthier lifestyle. But last year, a study in the United Kingdom concluded that, in fact, such thinking often causes a feeling of stigmatization which can lead to stress eating. Add several other factors, and the fact is that finding common ground on how to tackle the challenges of weight and health deserves more thoughtful discussion. So, where does this conversation start?

True, we can point to the proliferation of huge restaurant portions, fast food and processed junk. In many communities, poverty exacts its toll. The images and ideas with which the media bombard us, which were at their most grotesque during the 1990s with the “heroin-chic” look of Kate Moss and later Erin O’Conner (who in 2011 slammed the industry and said she sometimes could not fit in to what she was asked to wear on the catwalk), also do not help. Furthermore, the stubborn science called genetics remains. But one constant obstacle that must be addressed is the often unhealthy psychological relationship people have with food.

On that last point, TriplePundit spoke with Cynthia Stadd, whose Colorado-based practice, Eat Empowered, works with clients to change their relationship with food and their bodies. Much of Stadd’s approach is based on her personal experience, which included years of weight struggles, compulsive eating and chronic health problems such as sinus infections.

Stadd believes for those seeking to change how their weight impacts their lifestyle, the key breakthrough is to gain personal acceptance of his or her body type. “Thin is not the norm,” she told TriplePundit. “So the question to be answered is: What would your body look like if you were eating correctly? Then the next question is: What is getting in the way of realizing this ‘right’ body type?”

To that end, Stadd focuses on eliminating unhealthy behaviors. Examples include the obvious culprits, such as eating while bored or under stress. She also finds herself addressing the problem of binge eating. But then the problems start to become more complicated. However if a resolution can be found, it can result in far greater rewards. “The path to success is to figure out a person’s relationship with food,” she explained. “What is that emotional connection? The answers involve an emotional process gained through enhanced personal awareness.”

It is that personal awareness where one can find the balance between living a lifestyle with fewer risks and the acceptance of one’s body size that may always be imperfect, but still vibrant and healthy. And it is in those messages of personal awareness and confidence that the oft-maligned fat acceptance movement finds its most important and strongest voice.

Read the words of these people, who again are mostly women, and you will find the vast majority of them are hardly glorifying obesity or dismissing its health challenges. But what they're saying is that it is possible to carry some extra weight and be healthy, athletic and burst with self-esteem. They say the current narrative, which is often loud, demeaning and insists fat people have a problem, is simply not sustainable.

The larger problem is with a society that insists health and happiness are only attainable if a person is thin. If we are going to tackle the statistics suggesting that almost 70 percent of Americans are overweight, then the task at hand is to understand that solutions are more complex than diet, exercise and simplistic body mass index calculators. Those same calculators also suggest that I'm overweight, despite the fact that I cycle hundreds of miles a month.

Image credit: Classic Film/Flickr

Weed, California, home to around 2,500 people and just south of the Oregon border in the shadow of Mount Shasta, is best known for its offbeat name and its appearance in John Steinbeck’s classic "Of Mice and Men."

But now this small town in Siskiyou County is the focal point in the fight between a community’s right to local water and a company's right to sell it. In an area still recovering from the devastating 2014 Boles Fire, Weed is the David trying to find a voice against a Goliath that insists the town's water is better served if it is bottled and exported to Japan.

Weed’s residents often tap into the nearby Beaughan Spring, especially during times of drought. Many homes scattered around this remote area in Northern California have piped this source of water onto their properties for years.

But the land surrounding the spring is owned by Roseburg Forest Products. Two years ago, the timber company, which has had its share of financial struggles, entered into a controversial agreement with Crystal Geyser. The bottled water company, which now bottles spring water in a plant abandoned by Coca-Cola earlier this decade, is part of a conglomerate co-owned by the French billionaire Pierre Papillaud. The owner of several bottled water brands worldwide, Papillaud has even starred in advertisements for France’s Rozana Mineral Water.

The Beaughan Spring, which along with other springs surrounding Mount Shasta are considered sacred to local Native Americans, is next on Papillaud’s list. Weed residents have been granted access to this water for $1 a year for the past half-century. But this year, Roseburg hiked up the annual fee to $97,500, with a stipulation in the contract that directs the town to find other water sources of water for its citizens. And tensions flared between one of the poorer regions in California and the companies determined to win this water war, the New York Times reported this week.

The mayor of Weed, Ken Palfini, told Thomas Fuller of the Times that Papillaud’s relations with local officials bordered on abusive. Weed officials claimed the octogenarian demanded that the city release its rights to the Beaughan Spring, threatening to “blow up the bottling plant" if he didn't get his way. Papillaud’s son eventually visited the city to apologize, but the damage was done.

Residents and civic officials in Weed insist they have documentation proving water rights to this spring. Those claims date back to when the previous owner of Roseburg’s timber lands, International Paper, sold those holdings in 1982 with the stipulation that the city could have unrestricted access to this source of water. And in any event, the city insists it has no other options in an area where some sources of water could be extremely toxic.

The Times story outlines Roseburg’s suggestion that the city drill a well elsewhere on the company's property, but the city balked at the fact it is located only a few hundred yards from what is now an EPA Superfund site. For a city with a municipal budget of only a few million dollars, to spend as much as $2 million to drill a well in a dubious area makes no sense: No one wants anything remotely close to the Flint water crisis.

Earlier this summer, an alliance of citizens filed a lawsuit against Roseburg and the city of Weed. The plaintiffs argue the arrangement between the city and Roseburg was made without a proper environmental review. And they're seeking an extension of the current water lease.

Weed citizens are emboldened by a recent decision by the Montana Supreme Court. That state’s high court ruled in August that the city of Missoula could seize water sources by eminent domain in order to protect municipal water supplies for the public good.

Papillaud, meanwhile, did not help his company’s cause, as he downplayed local concerns over water in Weed by rationalizing that there is no “blood water” or anything nefarious such as child labor involved.

Image credit: Josh Steinitz/Flickr

By Geoff Ledford

On Friday, Sept. 24, thinkPARALLAX and TriplePundit organized a meet-up and discussion between leading sustainability influencers in the Bay Area at Autodesk’s San Francisco headquarters.

The event built on thinkPARALLAX’s most recent thought leadership piece on Sustainable Brands – Discerning taste: sustainability reporting for evolving audiences – which looks at how sustainability audiences have evolved in recent years and examines the ways that leading organizations have begun to adapt. The morning saw industry peers come together to discuss tactics for engaging audiences through sustainability messages.

The event featured a panel discussion featuring Ben Thompson, senior manager of sustainability at Autodesk; Stephanie Rico, senior VP of environmental affairs at Wells Fargo; and Laurel Peacock, senior manager of sustainability at NRG Energy. It was moderated by thinkPARALLAX’s Tyler Wagner and TriplePundit’s Nick Aster. In line with the other events in this series, the audience participated extensively and supported the conversation with insights of their own. What follows are a few of the lessons we learned based on the discussion:

The diverse role of modern sustainability communicators

The role of the modern sustainability department is becoming more varied, as the importance of sustainability continues to increase across all areas of a company’s operations. Although the companies and industries represented in the room were varied and diverse, all companies seemingly had this common denominator: the need for communications that reached across departmental boundaries to foster collaboration has never been more important.

"Our key power as sustainability practitioners is our ability to influence. We can be the ‘canary in the coal mine’ about emerging issues and risks that can affect our business long-term – and then bring those issues to the people that can actually mitigate them." -- Laurel Peacock, NRG

The importance of identifying different audiences

Much like the baristas on-hand to serve personalized drinks to attendees, the conversation centered on the idea that sustainability practitioners are like “sustainability baristas” – who can identify the tastes and preferences of an audiences and serve them accordingly.

“We’re a lot like baristas – if we’re in an influencer or manager role, we have to deliver our message in a way that others will accept.” -- Ben Thompson, Autodesk

In order to effectively reach target audiences, Thompson described an important lesson he learned from his marketing team earlier in his career. When asked who his sustainability message was supposed to reach, he answered: “It’s for everyone.” He was informed that this wasn’t how communications worked and that blanket messaging is rarely effective.

“Learn how to segment your audience. And maybe even prioritize those audiences. It will make your communications more effective.” --Ben Thompson, Autodesk

Talking to investors about sustainability

As mentioned in our piece on Sustainable Brands, investors have become increasingly interested in how sustainability and ESG data can help inform investment decisions. However, many attendees said they didn’t know what investors want to hear when it comes to sustainability.

Laurel Peacock of NRG told a story about an executive from BlackRock who (rather bluntly) told her that most investors simply don’t bother with traditional sustainability communications. If sustainability messaging is intended to reach investors, they’ll have to get it somewhere other than a report. Several other questions followed about what kind of data best catered to this audience and (with limited resources and staff) how sustainability departments could best serve them.

One member of the audience with a background in investing offered insight that helped explain the mixed messages investors sometimes give. Although most investors have ESG investment teams, they themselves are not entirely sure what to do with ESG data: “Investors are going back and weighing ESG data against portfolios historically and figuring out how to use ESG," the attendee said. "They’re still grappling with it.”

Until investors have finished figuring out the relationship between sustainability data and investment performance, their tastes will likely continue to shift.

The importance of a bigger sustainability story

Ben Thompson of Autodesk had an interesting take on investors that stressed the importance of never losing sight of the larger sustainability story that a company is trying to tell.

Autodesk was recently included in a major Socially Responsible Investor (SRI) index. In Thompson's opinion, this success shouldn’t be attributed to Autodesk filling out the correct surveys or checking the right boxes. As he sees it, Autodesk’s success with SRIs is a result of the company’s entire body of sustainability communications – which the details can support.

If sustainability practitioners become too focused on the details of sustainability, they can lose sight of the bigger story they are trying to tell. And this big story is what enables sustainability communications to be effective and engaging.

“Analyst surveys are important. And stakeholder feedback is good. But the rest of the body of comms, like the CEO message and other external messages, are what give that data legs and can really improve a company’s reputation.” -- Ben Thompson, Autodesk

How to reach employees (and customers too)

Stephanie Rico spoke to the strategy behind Wells Fargo’s sustainability communications. At Wells Fargo, her ultimate goal is to reach a wide range of end customers. However, her primary audience is internal – because, in the long term, the more Wells Fargo can embed elements of CSR thinking into all parts of the company, the more customers it will reach -- especially if it hopes to recover from recent bad press and damage to its reputation.

To reach both of these audiences, Wells Fargo created a stories site. As Rico put it, most employees have a taste for stories – not data: “It’s the human interest stories that are compelling and that people will read.”

“If you want to be heard, you have to serve your message in a way that people understand it.” -- Stephanie Rico, Wells Fargo

How to get leadership on board

The topic of CEO and leadership buy-in emerged several times over the course of the discussion, as few things can boost the role of sustainability at a company like a leadership team who fully understands and buys into its value. Some of the companies represented in the discussion came from places where executives understood and championed the value of sustainability. Others came from organizations who were not quite as far along on in their journey toward sustainability – and they wanted to know how to garner support for sustainability from leadership.

According to the panelists, the key to achieving this kind of buy-in depends on communicating with leadership in terms that each leader can understand. Autodesk’s leadership team are staunch advocates for sustainability, but it wasn’t always so.

Ben Thompson recounted how much work it is to meet with leaders and argue for sustainability priorities, all in terms that each leader would understand. But the results have been worth the effort and are helping create sales: “Now, sales teams usually take the CEO letter (from the sustainability report) and a fact sheet to customers.”

Thompson added a word of warning to the discussion: “But watch out. Because one day the lightbulb will go off and then you have to make sure they have the right data and talking points all lined out for them. Because they’ll just run off with it.”

Conclusion

Hopefully, the insights from our discussion at Autodesk will help you and your organization in your sustainability journey. Because, whether you’re trying to reach customers, motivate employees, or turn an executive into a champion of sustainability, the effectiveness of a sustainability initiative always hinges on the ability of an organization to communicate it.

We have to learn to understand our audiences, consider their values, and then speak to them in ways that resonate. As sustainability audiences grow and evolve, learning how to implement such tactics requires strategy, consideration, and practice.

Image credit: Pixabay