Category: Sustainable Packaging
2/12/2010
Jadina Irving
Several of us from TricorBraun's Vancouver office were pleased to be able to attend Wal-Mart's Green Business Summit on February 8, 2010.
The general focus of the summit was COLLABORATION:
- The world needs to challenge the traditional competitive viewpoints. Peers and competitors alike need to collaborate ideas, initiatives & best practice processes in the best interest of sustainable living.
- Economy cannot supersede sustainable initiatives, they go hand in hand & can actually result in major cost savings for corporations when executed effectively. Referenced by David Suzuki was the sustainable & economic successes in Sweden; they've reduced C02 emissions by 8% of 1990's levels and have still grown their economy by 44%!
- Sustainable measures are difficult to calculate entirely but the best way to start is to focus on (i) footprint, (ii) suppliers (iii) customers. Focus on using renewable energy, reducing waste (common goal: zero waste), reducing packaging, responsible qualifications of supply partners - are they focusing on the same or similar initiatives? Involve your peers, your employees, your customers & your children. It should not be the sole job for a person or persons in the company to focus on sustainability, it should be part of the everyday life of every individual. Part of the culture.
To follow through on the message of Collaboration, Walmart announced the launch of www.ShareGreen.ca which is a website allowing Canadians to "showcase environmental best practices." Take a look at the original press release.
Walmart also announced today their plans to implement a Sustainable Product Index to "... give customers transparency into the entire lifecycle of the products they buy, so they know they're safe, made-well and produced responsibly." It will be implemented in 3 phases:
- Phase 1 - Supplier assessment
- Phase 2 - Creation of database
- Phase 3 - Development and launch of customer tool
(Check out the original press release.)