Monthly Archives: October 2011
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The Kind of Business Leadership We Need for Our Evolution
The following is a guest post by our friends at Saybrook University’s Organizational Systems Program (a 3p sponsor) – designed for students who want to understand the nature of organizations, collaborative practices, and transformative change. By Jorge Taborga, Ph.D. student in organizational systems, Saybrook University Leadership in our modern cultures is not only highly valued [...]
Chrysler Touts Turnaround, Emissions, Diversity in Sustainability Report
Having endured a painful restructuring, Chrysler Group LLC is on the path towards recovery, and released its first ever sustainability report last week.
Occupy Wall Street’s Silver Bullet: Publicly Financed Campaigns
Occupy Wall Street lacks specific demands, deriving its power through its inclusivity. This will eventually change. Demanding publicly financed elections is broad enough for all to support and strategic enough to have real impact on the problems of wealth disparity and corporate-government collusion.
PepsiCo Invests in Ethiopian Chickpea Production
Chickpea enthusiasts might be pleased to learn that this super food has the potential to start showing up in many more products. That’s because PepsiCo recently partnered with the United States Agency for International Development (USAID) and the World Food Program (WFP) to institute Enterprise EthioPEA, a program with simultaneous goals of dramatically raising Ethiopia’s [...]
House Democrats Introduce Carbon Tax Bill
Nine House Democrats introduced a bill on October 24 which would create a “simple tax on carbon,” in the words of its lead sponsor, Rep. Pete Stark (D-CA). The bill, the Save Our Climate Act (HR 3242), probably doesn’t have a proverbial snowball’s chance in hell making it out of committee with the Republicans in [...]
California Attorney General Files Plastic Water Bottle Lawsuit
California Attorney General Kamala D. Harris filed a lawsuit against three companies over claims that they misled consumers by marketing plastic water bottles as biodegradable. Harris filed the lawsuit in the Orange County Superior Court on October 26 against ENSO Plastics, Balance Water and AquaMantra. Balance and Aquamantra sell plastic water bottles marketed by ENSO [...]
7 Billion Scariest Things This Halloween
You know those articles that are so prevalent online…9 tips to a flatter stomach, 6 ways to get her to notice you, 3 top ingredients for a souffle with coconut? I promise not to actually list 7 billion things in this article, but suffice to say that this Halloween, we have 7 billion reasons to [...]
Is the Occupy Wall Street Movement Sustainable?
Yes, I admit, the title is a double-entendre. There are two ways it can be read. Mostly, when this question has been asked, it is referring to how long the people will remain at the site. Will they stay once it really gets cold? Last week’s storm was a test of that. I would say [...]
The Global Economy: Just a Trough in the Business Cycle?
3p is proud to partner with the Presidio Graduate School’s Macroeconomics course on a blogging series about “the economics of sustainability.” This post is part of that series. To follow along, please click here. By Maggie Winslow What should we be thinking about the state of the global economy? Are we just in the bottom [...]
Feeding Seven Billion People: The Emerging Farm Tech Revolution
Today, October 31, 2011, the world will have “officially” grown to 7 billion in population. Among those 7 billion, approximately one billion are malnourished. Even in America, a bread basket for the world, there is emerging awareness of “urban food deserts” where people face limited healthy food options. The 21st Century’s farming challenge is to: [...]
Net Impact 2011 Conference Panel: Finance Careers for Good
By Jacen Greene “We’re going to occupy Wall Street from the inside.” Those words, spoken as part of the introductory speech of the 2011 Net Impact Conference, certainly applied to the topics and audience of a conference panel on “Finance for Good: Creating a Career with Impact.” The wide-ranging discussion covered topics such as how [...]
Social Media is a Conversation
As pervasive as social media may be, what does social media really do? How can it benefit sustainability?
Leading Sustainability Consultancy Emphasizes the Importance of Value Chain Management
The Tomorrow’s Value Ratings (TVR) is out with some surprising findings about the state of sustainable business. TVR is an annual assessment of corporate sustainability practices among leading companies worldwide. It is run by corporate sustainability agency Two Tomorrows and it aims to further the debate on sustainable business. This year’s ratings rated 92 companies and notes several trends:
Socially Responsible Investing: How Small Investors Can Drive Change
By Jacen Greene From Quaker prohibitions on slave trading, to boycotts of firms doing business in apartheid South Africa, to analyzing corporate carbon emissions, Socially Responsible Investing (SRI) has come a long way. In a panel session called “SRI 3.0: the Evolution of Socially Responsible Investing” at the 2011 Net Impact Conference, a group of [...]
REI President and CEO Sally Jewell Opens Net Impact Conference
By Jacen Greene After a five-week trip to climb mountains in Antarctica—including several first ascents—answering questions for an audience of more than 2000 must not be very intimidating for REI President and CEO Sally Jewell. For the opening keynote of the 2011 Net Impact Conference, she was interviewed on-stage by journalist and writer Marc Gunther about [...]
NBC’s Green Week is Here
Having just watched Morgan Spurlock’s “Pom Wonderful Presents: The Greatest Movie Ever Sold,” I’ve begun noticing product placement more. But it got me wondering
Better-For-You Foods Are a Company’s BFF
A new study that the Hudson Institute recently issued suggests that by offering good healthy foods, companies can do well by doing good.
Water Shortages Now Affect Companies’ Bottom Lines
Water crises from Texas to Australia have hit commodity supplies. Changes in the world’s weather patterns now affect corporate profits across various industries.
Nature Valley Creates Campaign To Market U.S. National Parks
In a time when many Americans have less to spend on expensive vacations, a trip to a national park is a cheaper but still enjoyable alternative. In order to market the national parks, Nature Valley, a General Mills brand, created Trail View, a campaign to bring awareness to national parks by taking teams to the [...]
Bank of America – Now with “Fee” Checking!
Bank of America is the first of a number of banks looking to unveil a monthly debit card fee upon its’ customers. This announcement has received a large amount of public backlash and media attention. At a point in time in which consumer debt is decreasing as people utilize debit cards for payment, the banks are looking to impose fee constraints on that behavior. Why? Aren’t smart financial decisions by our people a good thing?
Vertical Folding Containers Reduce Wasted Ship Space
Staxxon, a development-stage start-up based in Montclair, NJ, has developed a vertical folding container. The Staxxon system allows a standard 20-foot container to fold flat into a mere wisp of its usual footprint. It folds into itself much like those white cardboard packing boxes used for storage and on moving day.
Food vs Biofuels with Limited Land
Hawai’i’s agricultural system makes an interesting case study in the debate of food versus fuel in agricultural lands. Hawai’i has a tropical climate suited for growing in all seasons, and multiple crops in one year can be rotated in and out of arable land. The challenge, and it’s sort of a microcosm of what’s happening [...]
Aging Farmers
If someone were to ask you how old the average farmer in the United States was, what would your guess be? Up until a few years ago, the number of small farms in America had been dropping every year, as large scale operations bought out, outcompeted, or just took over small family farms that were [...]
California Finalized Details of Its Cap-and-Trade Program
The California Air Resources Board (CARB) finalized the rules for the golden state’s cap-and-trade program last week. The cap-and-trade program is part of California’s climate change law (AB 32) which mandates greenhouse gas emissions (GHG) be reduced to 1990 levels by 2020. The program covers 360 businesses representing 600 facilities, and will be implemented in [...]
E-Waste – Reducing Its Impact through Innovation
According to the U.S. EPA, Americans generate approximately 2.5 million tons of e-waste each year and only 25 percent of that is recycled. That’s a problem considering select electronics contain environmentally sensitive materials that can pose health risks if not disposed of properly.
The Role of Philanthropy in Recruitment: Working for a Corporation with a Heart
At the core, a prospective candidate wants a combination of priorities to be fulfilled at work: Constant learning, leadership opportunities, fair compensation, and schedule flexibility (especially for those with children). Generosity? That’s not so much a top tier, or even a second tier, criteria.
Cola-Cola Goes White to Help Protect Polar Bears’ Arctic Home
On November 1, those red cans of Coca-Cola will fade away. In a partnership with WWF, white cans will roll out to highlight the plight of the polar bear.
Google Earth’s New Geothermal Map Reveals New Opportunities
The U.S. is a global leader in installed geothermal capacity, but so far almost all of the activity has been confined to a few western states, primarily California and Nevada with Utah running a distant third. Now a new geothermal study viewable on Google Earth reveals that some of the hottest regions for future geothermal [...]
Nest Learning Thermostat: Shiny Toy or Serious Tool?
It looks a bit like a hockey puck, but it’s designed to keep your home warm in the winter, while cooling it in the summer. But while it is indeed slick, it’s a lot smarter than a hockey puck; so smart, in fact that it can learn. I’m talking, of course, of the Nest Learning [...]
Child Labor on U.S. Farms Widespread, Says New Film
While the UN estimates there are approximately 250 million child laborers worldwide, some might be alarmed to know that 400,000 of those children are working on U.S. farms. Filmmaker U. Roberto Romano was even surprised himself.
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