Sustainable businesses continue to increase worldwide. Many try to get started, but only a few seek assistance from providers that offer corporate sustainability for startups and large businesses.
It’s highly necessary for every business, despite the industry, to apply sustainability practices as it’s the singular focus in the future as people continue to deal with the effects of environmental abuse. In this article, we’ll check a couple of companies leading the way for sustainability and their strategy.
What can a business do to become sustainable?
There are multiple ways to start becoming sustainable: preventing pollution, reducing waste, conserving water, adopting clean energy, greening the planet through tree-planting, making their products sustainable, using sustainable materials, and adopting sustainable business travel policies.
While these measures speak for themselves, sustainable business travel may need more explanation. Sustainable business travel includes all ways that limit the impact that business travel has on the planet, such as:
Offsetting CO2 emissions
Businesses can engage in CO2 reduction projects and encourage employees to follow suit or help in their way.
Making business processes sustainable doesn’t only benefit the environment but also the company. By reducing energy use and switching to green power, companies can cut down on costs significantly and reduce greenhouse emissions.
Below are just some of the frontrunners in corporate sustainability practices.
Tony’s Chocolonely
Tony’s Chocolonely is a Dutch company and the winner of the Sustainable Brand Index 2019. They focus on making the cocoa industry fair trade and free from slave work. They checked the true social cost of their chocolate bar, which includes even the negative social impact and impact on the environment, like CO2 emissions and child labor.
Besides having a positive social impact, Tony’s Chocolonely also limits its environmental impact. Rank a Brand also claims that they don’t use palm oil and implement measures to offset and minimize climate change emissions, like measuring the climate impact of its activities and working with Justdiggit. This non-profit organization tries to restore landscapes and regreen dry lands in Africa to push a positive impact on the climate.
Patagonia. Patagonia is currently one of the most sustainable clothing brands in the sport & outdoor sector. Patagonia started developing into an environmentally friendly business for decades. A percentage of their revenue goes to environmental institutions.
Patagonia also organizes for consumers to learn personal repair, or Patagonia fixes it for them – the garment doesn’t even have to be Patagonia’s. They also engage in sustainable travel by organizing an annual event in June, where their bicycle-loving employees gather and celebrate.
Patagonia strives to be completely CO2 neutral by 2025 and will try to utilize a fully sustainable production cycle. They plan on using solar energy and complying with production and raw materials standards.
WWF
Based on the report from Hays Journal, WWF’s “Living Planet Centre” (a workplace for about 300 employees) received an “excellent” rating by the Building Research Establishment Environmental Assessment Method (BREEAM). CO2 emissions got reduced by 25 percent compared to WWF’s previous office building and the center. Fifty percent of WWF’s water is captured through rain collection and recycling used water. Other worthwhile, sustainable initiatives include the production of 20 percent of their electricity via water pumps and solar panels.
If you’re looking for a partner to support your sustainability practice and acquire financing for your project, consider corporate sustainability products like green loans, sustainable bonds, green fixed deposits, and more.
