We've had a flurry of research come our way recently. We'd like to take a quick moment to poke around some of it and point out some things that seem to be painfully missing. First, let's have a look at McKinsey Global Survey on Biodiversity.
Their survey asked respondents about what biodiversity means, how important it is to their businesses, and why, what specific risks their companies might face from reduced biodiversity, what actions they are taking to address issues related to it, and what kinds of regulations they would support to maintain biodiversity.
What we were particularly bemused by: that in spite of the UN and others highlighting some 30%+ of species will be extinct by 2030, and that an unprecedented human-caused destruction of the biosphere is taking place, 59 percent of companies responding to the McKinsey survey see biodiversity as more of an opportunity than a risk for their companies.
Not to go all gloom and doom, but how is this possible exactly? If the locale where a company operates is environmentally degraded, if its core ingredients and materials are compromised-- how exactly is this an opportunity?
An opportunity to change business operation and focus of the company operations, an opportunity for a dramatic paradigm shift away from business as usual? Sure.
An opportunity to sell more business as usual and be Polyanna optimistic? We think not. In fact, we think a lot of the businesses responding were pretty naive: 32% came back on the survey saying that biodiversity was not at all important, and 4% said they didn't know.
And getting back to that 59% of companies saying that biodiversity was more of an opportunity to their business-- the top reason why was "building, maintaining, or improving corporate reputation."
Sorry guys, we think you've missed the boat. If your entire supply chain is challenged, your operations threatened, and business model made obsolete by a degraded biosphere, you're pretty stuffed-- nevermind the reputation.
We'd also like to take issue with another piece of research put out by Accenture with the UN Global Compact on Sustainability and Perspectives from APAC CEOs. The study, as far as we can find, has one fundamental major flaw: they don't actually define what sustainability is before they go out to ask everyone about it and gauge the trends. As we've explored a lot on Forward Thinking, the word sustainability has a very fluid definition, and is an oft abused term. If we can't have a common definition of what we're actually talking about, how can we actually carry the conversation further to understand what it means and how it manifests in the real world?
As you might expect, both reports feature bold corporate language and try to show that business is taking issues seriously. (Side speculation: this might be to actually influence business to take the issues seriously!).
If our recent experience late last year at Business for Environment Summit, or on-the-ground observations in various markets across APAC are any judge: in reality, business is slow to change to critical issues like climate change, biodiversity, and sustainability. The reality is its more business as usual at a time when some critical shifts need to take place.