Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

Sustainable development
Sustainable development (SD) is a pattern of economic growth in which resource use aims to meet human needs while preserving the environment so that these needs can be met not only in the present, but also for generations to come (sometimes taught as ELF-Environment, Local people, Future. The term 'sustainable development' was used by the Brundtland Commission which coined what has become the most often-quoted definition of sustainable development as development that "meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs." Alternatively, sustainability educator Michael Thomas Needham referred to 'Sustainable Development' "as the ability to meet the needs of the present while contributing to the future generations needs." There is an additional focus on the present generations responsibility to improve the future generations life by restoring the previous ecosystem damage and resisting to contribute to further ecosystem damage.

Sustainable development ties together concern for the carrying capacity of natural systems with the social challenges faced by humanity. As early as the 1970s, "sustainability" was employed to describe an economy "in equilibrium with basic ecological support systems." Ecologists have pointed to The Limits to Growth, and presented the alternative of a "steady state economy" in order to address environmental concerns.

The concept of sustainable development is often broken out into three constituent parts: environmental sustainability, economic sustainability and sociopolitical sustainability.

Business and sustainable development

This is about the concepts of sustainable development and its relationship with business success. What is sustainable business develpoment Global Context

The work of the World Commission on Environment and Development, generally known as the Brundtland Commission (1987), is widely recognized as the genesis of efforts in sustainable development over the past fifteen years. Although its title implies a focus on environment issues, the definitions employed by the Commission in its deliberations were extremely broad: Environment where we all live, development what we all do in attempting to improve our lot within that abode. Thus both environmental and social issues were clearly included, and that breadth of scope was reflected in the breadth of interests represented on the Commission. Page | 1

Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

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The definition of sustainable development arrived at by the Brundtland Commission (1987) is widely acknowledged by active groups in the field, such as the World Business Council for Sustainable Development, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the United Nations and the European Union. Humanity has the ability to make development sustainable to ensure that it meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs. The Brundtland Commissions work was not limited to developing this goal statement for sustainable development. The outcomes of several years of deliberation on the complexities surrounding the competing pressures of development, environment and the future were distilled, and provide useful insights on the boundary issues listed below, and which are drawn on for the purposes of this study.

In Practice The Brundtland Commission (1987) took a global perspective for their assessment of sustainable development issues. These challenges cut across the divides of national sovereignty, of limited strategies for economic gain, and of separated disciplines of science. The profound effects of development, resource use and new technology, coupled with a predicted doubling of the Worlds population, more than 90% occurring in the poorest countries, were the basis for the Commissions work. They provided a philosophical backdrop for the more detailed work to follow. This included ideas about priority setting: Needs, in particular the essential needs of the Worlds poor to which overriding priority should be given; for goal setting and equity in goals: Perceived needs are socially and culturally determined, and sustainable development requires the promotion of values that encourage consumption standards that are within the bounds of the ecological possible and to which all can reasonably aspire.; and for addressing issues of constraint, for example the issue of human rights which can create or limit the capacity for other issues to be addressed. These ideas can be summarized as requiring balance and equity in the pursuit of sustainable development goals. The Commission acknowledged that these ideas would be difficult to realize: Painful choices will have to be madesustainable development must rest on political will. This research does not intend to address the global context of sustainable development beyond its use of a globally accepted, consistent scope for what issues are covered by the term. The focus for this research is the business enterprise, viewed in the context of its industry and the

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Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

What are the sustainable development practices?

The Brundtland Commission (1987) clearly viewed sustainable development as a progressive goal, rather than an absolute one when they stated: The concept of sustainable development does imply limits not absolute limits but limitations imposed by the present state of technology and social organisation on environmental resources and by the ability of the biosphere to absorb the effects of human activities. But the technology and social organisation can be managed to make way for a new era of economic growth. The practices of sustainable development can be viewed as the means by which technology and social organisation are so managed. The Brundtland Commission takes this further, describing in more detail what sustainable development practices might include: sustainable development is not a fixed state of harmony, but rather a process of change in which the exploitation of resources, the direction of investments, the orientation of technological development, and institutional change are made consistent with future as well as present needs. Including ideas developed in Unit of Analysis above, balance, equity and progress are key definitional concepts for sustainable development practices.

What is long term business success?

Can we expect to distinguish between enterprises in terms of their long-term business success? Should all businesses view long-term success in the same way, or are there differences depending on their environment and strategy? Built to Last (Collins and Porras 2000) found A detailed pair by pair analysis showed that the visionary companies have generally been more ideologically driven and less purely profit driven than the comparison companies in seventeen out of eighteen pairs. This is one of the clearest differences we found between the visionary and comparison companies. What we can draw from the Collins & Porras study is at least the suggestion that, taken on a very long view, companies that have been more ideologically driven as well as profit driven reap greater success. (Collins & Porras do not suggest that visionary companies ignore profitability, rather that it is not their sole aim or guide.) Whereas short-term studies of the relationship between sustainable development practices and corporate performance have produced mixed results, the Collins & Porras study is one which supports the benefits over the long run argument so often advanced by protagonists of sustainability. Collins & Porras visionary companies were not apparent in a ten year view of profitability or most admired. However, they yielded markedly better returns than their peers did over the long (50+ year) haul. This suggests we should be extremely careful with our understanding of the role of time in our assessment of sustainable development practices and business success.

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Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

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Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

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Sustainable business development and long term business success

SUCCESS: AMODEL Sustainability Orientation There is no one set of practices which comprises sustainable development practices and applies to all enterprises across all industries. To explore the relationship between sustainable development practices and business success, we have developed a model (Figure 1) which places sustainable development practices in the context of an individual enterprise, its strategy, and the industry or supply chain to which it belongs. This model helps pursue the question of which sustainable development practices a business should adopt, and challenges the assumption that the outcomes from the variety of sustainable development practices available are simply additive and always congruent with business success. Is there an optimum mix of practices which maximizes efficiency and effectiveness in terms of both the needs of sustainable development and the strategic objectives of the business? We propose an interim construct, called sustainability orientation, which attempts to capture this optimum mix and explain the differences between different enterprises and industries.

Environmental factors

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Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality

ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

Sustainable Business Development and Environment

Sustainability and environment are highly interrelated. And environmental quality ensures the sustainability of business. He are some activities the business people can take into action which will improve the environmental quality and result in sustainable business development. Resource Productivity: This refers to getting more goods or services from less material or energy; it is sometimes referred to as dematerialization. Knowledge flows are substituted for material flows. There are a wide range of examples where this approach has been successfully applied:

carpet manufacturers have reduced energy, water and waste flows from 35 to 89% redesigning windows resulted in enhancing daylight by 600 % and reducing solar heat penetration by 400%

Interface, and Collins and Aikens, two of the worlds largest commercial carpet manufacturers, have reduced the amount of virgin material that goes into their carpet manufacturing by as much as 40% through redesign of their operations to accept recycled carpet, which would otherwise have gone into landfills. This has reduced air pollution tremendously. The rate of CO,CO2 and other harmful gasses are emitting in less rate. This is helping in controlling environmental quality. Lean Production: Sustainable businesses practices are applicable to all business operations and go beyond the traditional green businesses of recycling and waste management. Everything from razor blades and ball-point pens are being made with less materials and resources than they were in the past. Even the ways large buildings are being designed and constructed are affected by this approach. This approach creates few incentives for any group to reduce either construction or operating costs, or to make the building environmentally friendly. An innovative total systems approach to buildings pays special attention not only to the types of materials that are used (low waste, non-polluting, local origin if possible, etc.) but also to the design process itself. By designing the building environmentally friendly, it can lead to reducing material and energy needs. The ING Banks head office in Amsterdam is an example of such an approach. This approach is driving toward 3R method- reduce, reuse and recycle which is the main moto of environmental quality control. One of the reasons that businesses have been attracted to increased resource productivity is that these redesign investments can save money. The less energy and materials used, the lower their operating costs. Another reason dematerialization is attractive to many businesses is that it results in less waste, another goal of sustainable business development.

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Sustainable business development is dependent on ensuring environment quality Waste Management:

ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

Waste from a business operation can be costly disposed and is hazardous. If an industrial process is wasteful, it also means input costs will be higher. Many companies are beginning to view waste as a measure of inefficiency and several have set a goal of zero waste for their operations. This approach is also referred to as closed loop production, whereby output from one operation becomes input for another. Remanufacturing is a process several businesses are using to reduce waste and get more productivity from what they produce. Waste control is useful to prevent environmental quality. This reuse of wastes is helping business to be sustainable. Xerox, for example, developed a remanufacturing process for its copiers, using old parts and materials to make new units, generating new revenues and saving material inputs. Industries situated near rivers dispose their waste into them which imbalance the ecological life by damaging plants and Pisces living under water. The reduction of toxic and chemical wastage can help in reducing soil and water pollution. Green business is helping to less the environmental pollution and it would prevent the environments quality. Divert to Renewable sources: Current energy technologies are creating serious environmental problems and it is possible that global energy supply will not be able to keep pace with anticipated demand. The world is beginning to experience the end of the fossil fuel era, and a transition to renewable energy sources is needed. Businesses have responded by reducing their dependence on fossil fuels and increasing their use of solar, wind and other renewable sources of energy. Several of the major oil companies are becoming producers of renewable energy. Research and development is contributing to solar and wind turbine technologies becoming increasingly efficient. Experience has shown that dramatic reductions in greenhouse gases and other pollutants can be achieved with simple efficiency improvements such as cogeneration, and the use of wastes from agriculture and landfills. Businesses are preparing both by exploring the direct use of renewable, as well as by reducing their energy needs. Producer Responsibility: In the past, when goods were manufactured which had toxic components, the toxicity was a problem for those who purchased the products, or those affected by their disposal. With the idea of extended producer responsibility, businesses become much more interested in the design of their goods, because once the useful life of the goods is over; the goods come back to the producer. This increases the producers interests in designing goods that are either biodegradable or recyclable. It encourages designs which are more durable, easily disassembled, reused or composted. It may helps to obtain the maximum productivity from materials over repeated loops through the production cycle. Examples: European automobile manufacturers have agreed with the European Union to take back their motor vehicles after their useful life is over. Imitating Nature: Another process that includes both waste production and extended producer responsibility is "biomimicry". This approach can be applied to developing new products, or processes. This line of thinking has created new Page | 7

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ENV 107_Introduction to Environmental Science

fields of study such as industrial ecology, in which sustainability principles are applied to how various industries are sited in relation to each other to make the most of all resources available. Several ecological industrial parks have been built where the traditional waste from one industry is used as input to another, imitating natural processes in a mature ecosystem where nothing is wasted. Physical proximity is not necessary for sustainable business associations to promote sharing of information and strategies not only among members, but also to individual businesses around the world. Being Green by Buying Green: Green procurement programs are contributing to the popularity of green products and services. Green procurement involves identifying and giving priority to green products and services in corporate and government purchasing decisions. Green Certification: One of the aids to public and private sector green procurement programs, as well as to individual consumers, are a variety of green certification programs. These programs generally focus on a specific industry or sector and establish standards for best practices from an environmental perspective. These standards are then applied to particular companies in that sector, and if standards are met, the company or its products gets a certificate of approval attesting to its environmental practices. Green certification is an important step in moving to a more sustainable economy, but much remains to be done. More rigorous standards are needed with respect to sustainable ecological scale; and certification standards need to become the norm, either through legislation or strong social or market incentives.

Accountability for the Environment: The sustainable business development movement is one aspect of the growing interest in corporate social responsibility. Some individual corporations have developed their own unique triple bottom line (covering financial, environmental and social performance), or supplementary environmental reporting formats. The rigor and quality of these reports is highly varied. Some are very thorough and admit to ongoing problems as well as record successes in environmental improvements. Without explicit standards, corporations can chose what they report, and the report format may change from year to year, allowing the corporation to hide certain aspects of their performance record. Some companies have joined with others in their industry or region to collectively set standards and agree on reporting formats. Several dozen groups have emerged that articulate shared standards and work collectively to provide adequate performance records. One of the most comprehensive and rigorous is the Global Reporting Initiative, developed in 1997 by the Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES) and the UNEP3. It involves a long term, multi-stakeholder process with inputs from NGOs, governments, business groups, and professional accountants. The goal is to develop corporate reporting guidelines which include reports on social and environmental performance which has at least the same rigor and comprehensiveness as the standards for corporate financial reporting. Without protecting environments quality sustainable business development is not possible. Whatever steps have been and will be taken should revolve around the environment. Because our social life, economical sustainability and business progress is dependent on the life of human and human is one of the most valuable Page | 8

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element of the environment. A green, pure and ecologically balanced environment can ensure a sustainable development in business arena.

Conclusion
The sustainable business development movement through ensuring better environmental quality is an important step toward a sustainable economy. Wide spread adoption of the approaches described above could mean significant reductions in the use of non-renewable virgin resources, a transition to renewable, elimination of toxins, and a reduction in waste. In addition, unions are supportive because more jobs are generally created as the company expands the services it provides. These examples show that reduced throughput is possible while still meeting human needs, and profits and jobs can be retained in the process. The difficulty regarding the sustainable business movement is that it remains a voluntary process. Those corporations committed to sustainable practices are to be congratulated and supported for their pioneering efforts. They have demonstrated what is possible and point the way to new opportunities. Governments could ease the transition to sustainability regulations by announcing a commitment to implement such standards over an extended multiyear timeline. This would give corporations an opportunity to plan for the changes required, with the knowledge that change was certain. A second approach would be to initially set relatively easy to achieve targets with respect to limits, and to provide significant incentives for exceeding the targets. Government support for the research and development required to make the necessary transitions would also assist, as would the removal of subsidies that currently encourage clearly unsustainable business practices. Most important is that governments recognize the absolute necessity of achieving ecological sustainability, and carry out the many roles they have of supporting this goal. Governments establish the framework, in which individual businesses operate, and this framework will either encourage sustainable or destructive business processes; it will not be neutral. Sustainable scale has local and regional implications but these cannot be adequately addressed without first addressing scale at the global level. International agreements are needed to set scale at global limits before individual nations are allocated their share of resources or sinks. This will not be an easy task if experience with the Kyoto Protocol provides any indication of the complexities involved. The global economy is coming under growing pressure to pay for the restoration of damaged environments. But this economic engine is being asked to help solve other pressing problems at the same time. The challenge is to solve all of these problems in a sustainable manner, so as to generate continuing development.

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