Corporate Social Responsibility

Mushroom Packaging: Don’t Throw It Out! Compost It!

When you’ve finished with EcoCradle packaging, you don’t throw it out. You compost it. That’s because it  is made from filamentous fungi (mushroom roots), which can be bonded into any shape. According to Ecovative Design, which grows the packaging (yes, I meant to say “grows”), EcoCradle provides the same cushioning, strength and protection as petrochemical […]

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P&G to Use Sugarcane-Based Plastic Packaging for Beauty Brands

Earlier this month, Proctor & Gamble announced plans to use renewable, sustainable, sugarcane-based plastic for packaging on its Pantene Pro-V, Covergirl and Max Factor brands. I’m happy to see that P&G did its research and chose not to use corn-based plastic. Corn-based plastic has been all the rage lately and can be found in everything

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“Bayer-ing” It All – How Bayer Reports on Sustainability

The words “pharmaceutical company,” “sustainability” and “Corporate Social Responsibility” rarely go hand in hand, but a global Pharmaceutical Company boasting local impact in the Pittsburgh region might just be what the Doctor ordered. Bayer recently released it’s 2009 Sustainability Report and with it some lofty goals for Bayer’s operations in the Pittsburgh region, among them a

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WSJ: The Illusion of Corporate Social Responsibility

In a WSJ op/ed entitled “The Case Against Corporate Social Responsibility,” University of Michigan strategy professor (Ross School of Management) Aneel Karnani argues that CSR fails when it is not a by-product of profit maximization. Karnani goes deeper to note that there exists a grave fallacy in CSR investment when a business model is not

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Minimum Impact Logging?

Feller-gatherer harvesting trees in the FSC- and SFI-certified forests of the Adirondacks for Finch Paper Recently, I blogged about a trip I made to Finch Paper in Glens Falls, NY, where I got to see sustainable forestry and integrated, environmentally sensitive papermaking in action. One of the most powerful images in my mind from the

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Net Impact Publishes Business As UnUsual 2010 Report

Hot off the presses comes Net Impact’s rather comprehensive report on business schools focusing on “sustainability” programs. “Net Impact is an international nonprofit organization with a mission to inspire, educate, and equip individuals to use the power of business to create a more socially and environmentally sustainable world.” The organization is active on campuses and

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Ohio Takes on California in a Winter Produce Gambit

Yesterday I took a little bit of a swipe at Bon Appétit Management’s cage-free SHELL egg commitment asking whether or not such move could push the $590 billion commercial food-service market to raise animal welfare standards nationally. Today Bon Appétit (BAMCO) is back in the news with a compelling initiative that preserves summer produce for

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A Meeting of the Minds: Sustainable Agricultural Summit Begins

Today kicks off the American Business Conference’s 4th part of a global series of Sustainable Agricultural Summits. And what better city for this summit to take place, but San Francisco. California is home to 81,500 farms and ranches and tallied revenues of $36.2 billion last year alone. That figure represents 11.2% of the nation’s total.

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If Cutting Trees Is Bad, Why Are Foresters Helping Them Do It?

I just spent three days at Finch Paper, one of the few remaining small, integrated paper mills in the country. Nestled in the Adirondacks, the Glens Falls, NY company invited a few industry analysts to tour their mill and forests and get an inside look at their environmental commitment. Finch Paper is one of the

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CDFIs: Community Investing as Part of Your SRI Portfolio

Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) has become a nearly $3 trillion dollar industry in the United States.  Investors in SRI use screening and shareholder advocacy to influence corporations to improve their environmental practices, social impact and governance issues.  What I was surprised to find out was that community investing is the fastest growing area of SRI. 

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The Hospital That Heals The Earth (Part II)

Federal Government Asks Fletcher Allen to Teach the Nation How to Scale Local Sourcing in Healthcare (Part II: Taking Local From Trendy to Essential) “The Hospital That Heals The Earth” is a two-part series on the intersection of sustainability innovation and healthcare at Fletcher Allen Health Care in Burlington, Vermont. Part 1 of the series

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The Hospital That Heals The Earth (Part I)

Vermont Hospital Wants To Be The Greenest Health Care Facility in the US — And Makes a Convincing Case (Part I: Mainstreaming Sustainability) Sustainability, clean energy investment, green jobs and health care reform have all been resounding themes of the first 18 months of the Obama administration.  But rarely do we conceive of healthcare reform

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Conflict Minerals: The Plot Thickens with the Help of Capitol Hill (Part II)

So the US government decided to sneak a rider into the Financial Reform Bill in an attempt to address the issue of conflict minerals coming out of the eastern Democratic Republic of the Congo. The goal is to dry up revenue that fuels rebel fighting in the region. As I mentioned in Part I last

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Walmart and Seventh Generation Join Forces to Bring Sustainable Products to the Masses

Indeed, sustainable business makes for strange bedfellows. Just this week, Seventh Generation announced it will soon offer its environmentally-friendly products in more than 1500 Walmart stores nationwide and on Walmart.com. And according to Treehugger, this is a complete about-face for the “esteemed nontoxic, enviro-friendly household product maker”. Not so long ago, Seventh Generation refused to

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Weyerhaeuser and GRI Reporting Meet Again

While many companies are still try to figure out what their CSR strategy is (or in some cases, what CSR is period), lumber and paper giant Weyerhaeuser has recently issued its 2009 Sustainability Report. Weyerhaeuser was an early adopter of the voluntary Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) report. The company started publishing a report of their

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“FUEL” for thought: We all have Responsibilities.

I recently watched FUEL and thought:  Why have I not seen this before???  FUEL is a 2008 documentary on America’s dependence on foreign oil which explored a possible solution to the looming energy crisis.  I had three overwhelmingly strong and immediate responses from watching this film. First, we have some extremely intelligent and passionate people

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Accenture Joins McKinsey in the Battle Cry for Corporate CSR

A recent United Nations Global Compact (UNGC)/Accenture study of 766 corporate CEOs has found that 93% of executives surveyed believe that sustainability will be a key factor in the future of their businesses.  So, I suppose CSR is the new Tiger Woods for the global management consulting behemoth?

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Where does the U.S. Stand on Sustainability?

Piggy-backing on my recent post regarding Pittsburgh’s # 6 spot in a sustainability ranking of most sustainable metros conducted by Site Selection magazine,  I wanted to point out that the United States is not to be found on the “top ten list”  of its sustainable nations.   This news is not surprising.  A similar ranking regarding global

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