The primary purposes of Sustainability Matters are to improve the performance of New Zealand organisations from a sustainability, or "triple bottom" line perspective, and to advocate sustainability thinking and action.
Frequently this requires a change from "business as usual" to a different approach which not only reduces costs and improves financial performance but also results in much needed improved outcomes for people and our planet. We owe this to our children and to at least the next six generations i.e. seven generations.
The traditional measure of organisation success - financial outcomes - is an incomplete method of measurement and excludes key elements. These exclusions result in an "unbalanced scorecard".
Is this thinking new? No, far from it. Rachel Carson via her 1962 book "Silent Spring" was perhaps the person who more than any other alerted us to the need for changed thinking.
The thinking can be applied to entities of any size, in any sector, located anywhere.
Newsletters
As part of what we do a newsletter is published (usually) once very two weeks. It is four pages and is intended especially for chartered accountants** and those who use their services. It is distributed to subscribers by opt-in eMail. There is no ($) charge; donations are always welcome! By coincidence the newsletter is called Sustainability Matters.
** Because they have immense potential to influence others and to make huge positive differences to our world.
Sustainability Matters 8th December 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• Youths Turn Up the Heat
• A Resource of Resources –> Your feedback would be much appreciated!
• Two Seafloor Tidal Power Experiments
• Government Forms Climate Change Adaptation Technical Working Group
• Kathmandu Sustainability Report
• Chernobyl Reactor Safely Confined
• Sustainability a Big Deal for Rail Link
• It’s Different This Time. Are we Ready? And How Will it End? SingularityU NZ
• NZX Publishes Corporate Governance Code Submissions
• Better Futures Report Gives Businesses Insight into Kiwi Sustainability Mindset
• Goodwill Helping Growing List of Retailers, Consumers Eliminate Waste
• COP22 – Achievements at Marrakech
• Process or Product – Which is More Important?
• Determining the Problem to be Solved or Investment Logic Mapping
• Seeing Green: The Use and Abuse of American Environmental Images
• NZ’s First Community Owned Windfarm
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 24th November 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• Sanford Issues 2016 Integrated Report
• A Resource of Resources
• The GRI Standards
• Water Loo
• SBN Awards 2016
• Watch Humans Go From a Tiny Group in Africa to 7 Billion in 5 Minutes
• Lecturer in Management and Sustainability
• Natural Capital – Finance Sector Supplement
• Tiny Houses, Big Ideas
• Reconnect to the Biosphere
• SASB Releases Robust Research and Analytics Tool
• Global Carbon Budget 2016 Published
• Sustainable Coastlines’ Campaign to Build ‘The Flagship Education Centre’
• Rod Oram: Agriculture’s Great Opportunity to Lead the Low Carbon Race
• How Inequality Made These Western Countries Poorer
• Measure What Matters: A Framework for Action – Global Goals that work for Business, Government and People
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 10th November 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• To Deal with Climate Change We Need a New Financial System
• Environmental Advisor – Silver Fern Farms – Closes Monday 14th November
• Business and Human Rights: Evolution and Acceptance – CGMA Guidance for Assessing and Protecting Human Rights
• Fostering Sustainable Behaviour
• Birds of the West Wind – How Australia has Shaped New Zealand’s Avian Life
• Let’s Fix Wasteful Design!
• Environmental Data Visualisations
• Duty of Board of Directors
• The Rising Environmental Toll of China’s Offshore Island Grab
• Extinction: A Radical History
• Sixteen Years of Change in the Global Human Footprint
• Super Fund Shake-up to Address Climate Change
• Engagement: Unlocking the Black Box of Value Creation
• World Bank Tribunal Dismisses Mining Firm’s $250m Claim Against El Salvador
• Before the Flood – Full Movie
• Who’s Banking on the Dakota Access Pipeline?
• 8 Things you Need to Know About the PCE’s New Report on Agricultural Greenhouse Gases
• Climate Change Comments ‘Absurd’
• ‘Women Must Lead – If Humanity Is to Survive’: New Book Warns
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 27th October 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• Global Deal Reached to Limit Powerful Greenhouse Gases
• Higher Living Standards Framework Event
• Remarkable Weather of 1911: The Effect of the Combustion of Coal on the Climate – What Scientists Predict for the Future
• Apocalypse H20 – How Companies are Accounting for the True Value of Water
• NZ’s First Climate Activism Novel
• Seaweed Could Hold the Key to Cutting Methane Emissions from Cow Burps
• The Great Derangement – Climate Change and the Unthinkable
• Capital Gains – The Real Returns on Investment in Restoring Our Waters
• India Just Hit a Massive Milestone, and the Entire World should Take Note
• SDGA16: Australian Sustainable Development Goals Conference
• Tackling Poverty in New Zealand
• Measure What Matters
• Accounting for Climate Change – How Management Accountants Can Help Organisations Mitigate and Adapt to Climate Change
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 13th October 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• Norwegian Stock Exchange Issues Reporting Guidance with Strong Reference to GRI
• Recalculating the Climate Math
• A Practical Guide to ESG Integration for Equity Investing
• The Rise of Environmental Crime
• Commonwealth Climate and Law Initiative
• Why We Need a Carbon Tax, and Why it Won’t Be Enough
• Global Aircraft Emissions Deal Reached
• Waste Not Want Not: Sweden to Give Tax Breaks for Repairs
• Child Marriage: Shashida’s Story
• Public Art or Renewable Energy? New Designs Aim to Produce Both
• Australia’s Most Energy Efficient Housing Development Expands
• The People’s Monsanto Tribunal
• Before the Flood
• Natural Aquaculture: Can We Save Oceans by Farming Them?
• SBN Wins Excellence Award
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 29th September 2016
In this edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• Climate Change and Business Conference 2016
• Heavy Lifters at Mangere Marae
• Fresh Focus Needed on Climate Change Governance
• Dilmah’s Philosophy of Caring and Sharing: A Conversation with Merrill Fernando
• The TTIP is Not a Free Trade Agreement
• ‘White Helmets’ of Aleppo – Two Stories
• Charity Begins With a Home
• 2016 Quality of Life Survey – NZ
• Recycling Flip Flops from Kenya’s Ocean Shores
• Innovative Use of Cat Advertising in London Tube
• SEC Probes Exxon over Accounting for Climate Change
• Risk and Return: Two Workshops to Help You Sell the Benefits of Risk-based Training – PLUS – Simple Test to Rate Your Risk Appetite
• An ‘Unexpected’ Outcome of Climate Change and Weather Events
• Today I Learned: Bees Could Help Save Elephants – By Scaring Them
• Water Footprinting Workshop
• Zero Tillage
• Risk Based Approach to Natural Hazards Under the RMA
• Sustainability Reporting Gives Local SMEs the Chance to Go Big
To see the newsletter click here.
Sustainability Matters 15th September 2016
In this “super-sized” edition;
• Sustainability Group Events
• National Strategy for Environmental Education for Sustainability
• Government Seeking Views
• Accounting Body CEO’s Call for Low Carbon Future
• Ever Thought of Working for UNPRI?
• Smart Water Networks Not a Pipe Dream
• Bougainville – Owners Walk Away
• Beating Weeds Saves Our Biodiversity
• Finalists Announced for 2016 NZI Sustainable Business Network Awards
• Supporting Credibility and Trust in Emerging Forms of External Reporting: Ten Key Challenges for Assurance Engagements
• Banks Pump Billions into Deforestation-linked Firms in Southeast Asia: Study
• Responsible Business Forum on Sustainable Development Goals
• River Conference Planning Underway
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• Dow Jones Sustainability Indices Additions, Cuts Announced
• New Integrated Human Governance Report
• New Zealand Green Building Council Announces New Chief Executive
• The Hysteresis Effect and what It Means to Politics
• Exploring How and Why Trees ‘Talk’ to Each Other
• Total Plastic Ban in Karnataka
• Global Initiatives and UNDP Launch the Responsible Business SDG Centre
• Sick Oceans, Disease for Humans, Animals that’s Global Warming
• Named and Shamed: The Top Funds Blocking Climate Action
• The Rodale Institute’s 30-Year Farming Systems Trial Report
• 167 Tiny Maps Tell Major Change Story
• California Passes Toughest US Greenhouse Gas Laws
• Soil & Health and BioGro Merge: New Era
• A Preference for Permaculture
• Revolutionising Reporting: Why Care?
• Fossil Fuel Investments Out at Otago Uni
To see the newsletter click here.