In the fifth of our Net Zero: The Road to 2050 podcasts, Nikki Mandow looks at how businesses have got away for so long doing so little for the environment, instead often buying loyalty from eco-conscious customers with meaningless buzzwords. Still, as she discovers talking to experts – including pioneer sustainable fashion designer Peri Drysdale – that’s changing.
“Green is my least favourite word.”
Sounds odd coming from EY New Zealand’s director of climate change and sustainability, Gerri Ward.
But, like other experts on sustainable business, she’s sick of companies using “greenwashing” terms to portray their operations as eco-friendly - more green than they actually are.
There’s even a new term - “carbonwashing” - where a company creates a misleading impression of its greenhouse gas emissions credentials.
Talking to Newsroom business editor Nikki Mandow for the latest episode of Newsroom’s podcast Net Zero: The Road to 2050, Ward and others worry underneath a sustainable facade, far too many companies are still doing far too little about reducing their carbon footprint.
Instead, climate change targets have become a proxy for action, Ward says.
“People think that setting publicly available targets and saying that they're signing up to some pledge, or joining some club, or putting a particular carbon neutral label on the product, is the same thing as being green and doing good stuff.”
“There's still a sense of denial, because I think if people all of a sudden go ‘Yes, climate change is real. And yes, there is something I have to do’, then they have to do something." - Rachel Brown, Sustainable Business Network
Also on the podcast, Rachel Brown, head of the Sustainable Business Network, says for a long time companies were bamboozled by the science around greenhouse gas emissions.
These days, the weather outside their windows and on their TV screen makes climate change hard to ignore. Still, for a lot of business leaders, the problem is too big, and they feel it’s too hard to make a start.
“There's still a sense of denial, because I think if people all of a sudden go ‘Yes, climate change is real. And yes, there is something I have to do’, then they have to do something. And for some people, that’s really hard.”
Hard, but not impossible, as Peri Drysdale, founder of the sustainable knitwear fashion label Untouched World tells Mandow.
Untouched World is living proof that running a profitable, environmentally-focused business is possible.
Drysdale founded the Christchurch-based company in 1981. But as she travelled the world selling her brands in the 1990s, she saw the pace of environmental deterioration - and the lack of commitment from to change.
“For business, it was about revenue and bottom line, there was just absolute deafening silence about the impact of any of that. It just wasn't thought about.
“You know, a PR person once said to me, ‘Aren’t you before your time? The world doesn’t want this’. I was starting a business before there was a gap in the market. It was just a commitment I made to myself, that we would see this through, no matter how long it took.”
These days, Drysdale is seen as a global ambassador for the sustainable fashion movement and her clothes have been worn by everyone from Barack Obama to Prince Harry.
Consumer apathy
There are other things holding businesses back too, Gerri Ward says. Short-term thinking is one, consumer apathy another.
Market research shows that while people say they want to buy sustainable products from environmentally conscious companies … most of us don’t. We go for what’s cheap.
‘Millenials are saying 'I expect all of your products to have embedded sustainability into your offer. And if you don't, I will never ever buy from you again.’" Gerri Ward, EY New Zealand
Meanwhile, it's easy to be bamboozled by the greenwashing that’s going on.
Still, Ward says pulling the sustainable wool over people’s eyes is an increasingly risky tactic for brands.
“What you're finding, particularly with millennials, is rather than saying, ‘I'm going to buy this particular brand of cosmetic, or face cream or clothing or shoes, because they do a sustainable version of the thing that I like’, [they’re saying] ‘I expect all of your products to have embedded sustainability into your offer. And if you don't, I will never ever buy from you again.’
Earthquake as tipping point
Mandow also talks to Christchurch Airport chief executive Malcolm Johns. After finding itself seriously short of customers after the 2012 earthquake, the airport company chose a push to sustainability as a platform to rebuild damaged staff morale.
He talks about some of the carbon reduction projects the company has initiated, including plug-in planes. And he reveals how they have been able to get often expensive changes over the line and still return a dividend to their local and national government shareholders.
“We have an internal investment hurdle that business cases have to get over to invest our capital. And we agreed if there was a strong case for changing the energy from non-renewable to renewable, that we would accept a hurdle rate half a percent below our normal investment hurdle rate.”
Half a percent might not sound a lot, but it’s a big difference, Johns says.
Since 2015, the airport has reduced emissions within its own operations by 90 percent.
Rachel Brown believes there are four things holding companies back from making necessary changes to take emissions out of their businesses.
“One is they're so busy on just daily stuff, just trying to make their own businesses still be okay and financial. Then they feel like they don't know what to do ... there's a lack of knowledge. And then they have to find some time, and they’re time poor. And they also think it's going to cost them a lot of money to do something.”
“It's harder to be a Once-ler and get away with it now.” - Rachel Brown, Sustainable Business Network
She remembers her parents reading the 1971 Dr Seuss book The Lorax to her as a child.
It’s a parable about the harm caused by industrialisation, and the powerlessness of the environmental movement.
When the greedy Once-ler comes to an idyllic place full of truffula trees and starts a factory chopping down those trees to make thneeds “that everyone needs”, he is happy to ignore his conscience, and the Lorax who “speaks for the trees”.
By the time the truffula trees are all gone, all that’s left is a wasteland.
Brown says most businesses these days know they must do something, but are hesitant to act.
“They're actually trying to do the right thing. I don't think they're evil Once-lers, I mean, there will be a couple of evil Once-lers.
“But it's harder to be a Once-ler and get away with it now.”
Did you like this article? The podcast is better! Listen to it now (link above) and to the four others in the series so far (links below). You are (almost) guaranteed to learn something new - and interesting.
Green hydrogen: How Team NZ tech is helping us power ahead.
Zombie forests, carbon sinks and the ETS
Tractor protests and hot air: How our greatest emitters put up the biggest fight
Net Zero: The Road to 2050 is a six-part Newsroom podcast series, made in collaboration with EY. Business editor Nikki Mandow looks at some of the most interesting, critical and sometimes confusing ways in which New Zealand is tackling climate change. We release a new episode every fortnight, demystifying complex issues involved in the push to get Aotearoa to net zero emissions by 2050.
