Business Ethics, Sustainability Ethics & Corporate Social Responsibility
26 Sep 2010 Leave a Comment
in environment Tags: ceres, CSR, greenwashing, sustainability
Becoming sustainable makes business sense and moves towards the ‘3 Ps’ of focussing on People, Planet and Profits, in that order. Even though some companies have a good honest concern for the environment, their bottom line is to maximize profits, and this ironically is often the reason why companies are showing concern for people and the planet.
It’s easy to get on the bandwagon for sustainability, precisely to offset any harm that might be done to their reputation and thus to the bottom line of profit. But let’s be careful of ‘Greenwashing’.
Of course it is very easy to take aim at any major company, find problems and from that conclude that their environmental concern is a cynical front. The dynamics surrounding attempts to develop sustainability in large companies can easily become polarized and be characterized as greenwashing. Behind this is the ethics of the perfection argument – in that a company cannot be deemed ethical if it does not get everything right. For most discerning critics, they know not to expect perfection.
So it is important these companies make it clear that their message is not making a claim to perfection and notes that sustainability involves the development of awareness and capacity to respond to need, and is thus a continuing process. It must work carefully to develop corporate integrity – in this sense a corporate version of the professional virtue. This is defined as developing a consistency between principles and practice across all contexts and necessarily involves a process of continual learning.
A good example of an attempt to bring together sustainable business principles and practice is the CERES principles. The Coalition of Environmentally Responsible Economies (CERES) set out some basic principles in response to the Exxon Valdez disaster of 1989.
CERES Principles:
- Protection of the biosphere
- Sustainable use of natural resources
- Reduction and disposal of waste
- Energy conservation & efficiency
- Risk reduction for health and safety risks
- Safe products and services – seeks protection of consumers and environment by making products safe and providing information about their effect on the environment
- Environmental restoration
- Informing the public and transparency
- Management commitment to implement and monitor the principles
- Audits and reports for assessment of compliance
*On a same but different note…
“Same Same, But Different”
CERES is an awesome acronym. When I first read about the CERES Principles, I was thinking about the CERES – Centre for Education and Research in Environmental Strategies, a non-profit, environmental education centre and urban farm located in East Brunswick, Melbourne.
Ceres is also the goddess of agriculture…(wiki)
malaysia – the home of the world’s most notorious wildlife dealer >:(
22 Sep 2010 Leave a Comment
in environment, malaysia Tags: anson wong, bryan christy, PERHILITAN, wildlife trafficking
This photo taken from The National Geographicarticle by investigative journalist Bryan Christy.
Malaysians are outraged at this man Anson Wong + co. + Perhilitan:
Monday September 20, 2010
By YUEN MEIKENG
PETALING JAYA: Convicted smugglers like Anson Wong should be denied licences to sell or possess wildlife if the authorities are serious about putting an end to illegal trafficking.
American writer Bryan Christy said Wong, or anyone related to him, should not be given any more licences by the Department of Wildlife and National Parks (Perhilitan) in order to protect endangered species.
Christy, who wrote an expose on Wong entitled “The Kingpin” in the National Geographic magazine, said the man should have been given a tougher sentence, given his history as a wildlife smuggler.
“Certainly, his sentence sends a weak message. But an even weaker message is the fact that Perhilitan did not catch him nor did the Customs Department. An airline employee did,” Christy said in an email interview.
Christy did not believe that Wong, despite being jailed six months and fined RM190,000 for trying to smuggle 95 snakes without a permit recently, would change his ways.
“Absolutely not. He did not clean up after serving more than five years of his sentence in the US, and some of those years were in a Mexican prison,” said Christy, who is also the author of The Lizard King, a book on wildlife smuggling.
Christy urged the Natural Resources and Environment Ministry to reform Perhilitan from the top down and exercise its responsibility as the country’s management authority for wildlife as governed under the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species of Wild Fauna and Flora.
“It should stop coming up with weak ‘audit committee’ proposals to ‘oversee’ Perhilitan, and stop asking it to investigate itself. It should start taking real action. It is embarrassing,” he said.
Christy said he was convinced the leadership in Perhilitan was the biggest barrier to wildlife conservation in Malaysia and an even bigger obstacle than Wong.
“All you have to do is look at how they respond when a smuggler like Wong is exposed.
“They did not ask who failed to stop him. They asked who dared to expose him. “They did not apologise for failure. They said they never had any evidence. That is failure,” said Christy.
Domestic Transformer!
01 Sep 2010 Leave a Comment
in buildings, urban Tags: architecture, gary chang, hong kong
by Gary Chang
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