{"id":6103,"date":"2014-10-24T08:16:13","date_gmt":"2014-10-24T08:16:13","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/?p=6103"},"modified":"2014-10-24T08:16:13","modified_gmt":"2014-10-24T08:16:13","slug":"when-is-sustainability-more-than-just-efficiency","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/2014\/10\/24\/when-is-sustainability-more-than-just-efficiency\/","title":{"rendered":"When is sustainability more than just efficiency?"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Economist's Schumpeter<\/a>\u00a0blog recently carried an article \"A new green wave<\/em>\" which suggests that \"a few pioneering businesses are developing sustainability policies worthy of the name.\" \u00a0 Really?, you might think. \u00a0Is that news? \u00a0Surely this has been going on for years? \u00a0What about the much trumpeted Plan A<\/a>, for example,<\/p>\n

The point Schumpeter makes is that many corporate sustainability plans are modest \u2013 little more than adhering to current regulatory norms and attempts at\u00a0greater efficiency, in terms, for example, of energy savings, cutting waste, and streamlining logistics \u2013 which, the blog argues, should be being done anyway. \u00a0Quite. \u00a0These are the no-brainers which increase sales and profits, and enhance shareholder value in the immediate term \u2013 or, if you're a university, help institutional margins, and bring\u00a0PR (and, on a good day, even\u00a0educational) value.<\/p>\n

But, Schumpeter says that these are evidence of\u00a0efficiency (<\/em>not sustainability) policies and plans because they have\u00a0little actual effect on the environment or social equity. \u00a0That is, as the Economist might have said but didn't, they do nothing to restore natural or social capital. \u00a0This seems\u00a0a good test, and is a point I find myself making\u00a0now and then.<\/p>\n

Schumpeter says that none of this puts \"sustainability at the heart of what the firms do\". \u00a0The purpose of the blogpost was\u00a0to identify firms that are starting to go beyond this limited point and which are part of \"a new wave of sustainability plans\" where targets relate, not just to the company, but to suppliers and customers, and are about society at large and not just the environment. \u00a0Another test, I think.<\/p>\n

In all this, sustainability is becoming \"a core part of their strategy\" and not just a \"green way to cut costs\". \u00a0Schumpeter says that whilst these new policies may not pay for themselves in the immediate term, they do act to boost the long-term fundamentals of a\u00a0company (or university). \u00a0Still, you can see why they are marginalised by ultra-cautions, nervous managers \u2013 and by those whose minds are fixated\u00a0by\u00a0the tyranny of quarterly\u00a0data \u2013 or, dare I\u00a0say, annual national student survey (or green league) scores.<\/p>\n

The column ends with this:<\/p>\n

The first wave of sustainability rewarded itself. \u00a0The new wave will not do that. \u00a0It is more akin to investing now to have a licence to operate in future, when consumers, lobbyists and regulators will be ever more demanding about the way firms behave. \u00a0That does not mean the new wave will not reward its adopters. \u00a0But it will boost their long-term competitive position, rather than their short-term profits. \u00a0Unlike the rewards of the superficial first wave, those of deeper sustainability could take years to sink in.<\/em><\/p><\/blockquote>\n

It seems obvious to me that all this applies as much to universities as to other businesses, although we might have to adjust the language a little.<\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Economist's Schumpeter\u00a0blog recently carried an article \"A new green wave\" which suggests that \"a few pioneering businesses are developing sustainability policies worthy of the name.\" \u00a0 Really?, you might think. \u00a0Is that news? \u00a0Surely this has been going on...<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":237,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[2,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-6103","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-comment","category-news-and-updates"],"acf":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack-related-posts":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6103","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/237"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=6103"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/6103\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=6103"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=6103"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.bath.ac.uk\/edswahs\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=6103"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}