To Business: Change Habits to Meet the Sustainability Challenge

Sustainability needs to be ‘part of the business model’,
says Unilever CEO Paul Polman and businesses need to promote sustainability in
order to fill the commitment gap from governments that fail to deliver. This
and other reports on the business of sustainability as reported by the grapevine
magazine, incuding Sainbury’s and the University of Exeters new One Plant MBA.

Sustainability needs to be ‘part of the business model’,
says Unilever CEO

Businesses need to promote sustainability in order to fill
the commitment gap from governments that fail to deliver, says Paul Polman,
Unilever’s chief executive.

Unilever has launched its ‘Five Levers for Change’
guidelines, which provide advice on how to change habits to meet the
sustainability challenge.

Mr Polman explained that, despite the current economic
instability, now is the “moment to get a different type of growth” by making
sustainability “a part of the business model”.

To coincide with a public debate on mainstreaming
sustainable living, Unilever has today published the behaviour change model its
marketers use to encourage sustainable changes in consumer living habits: ‘Five
Levers for Change’.

Based on Unilever’s long history of research and insights
into consumer behaviour, the tool is based on a set of key principles, which,
if applied consistently to behaviour change interventions, increases the
likelihood of having an effective and lasting impact. Unilever is sharing the
model in the hope that others will find it helpful and use it to inspire people
to turn their concerns about sustainability into positive actions.

The model outlines five techniques to apply when looking to
encourage new behaviours based on five key insights.  The ‘Five Levers for Change’ are:

1. Make it understood. Sometimes people don’t know
   about a behaviour and why they should do it. This Lever raises awareness and
   encourages acceptance.
2. Make it easy. People are likely to take action
   if it’s easy, but not if it requires extra effort.  This Lever establishes convenience and
   confidence.
3. Make it desirable. The new behaviour needs to
   fit with how people like to think of themselves, and how they like others to
   think of them.  This Lever is about self
   and society.
4. Make it rewarding. New behaviours need to
   articulate the tangible benefits that people care about.  This Lever demonstrates the proof and payoff.
5. Make it a habit.
   Once consumers have changed, it is important to create a strategy to
   help hold the behaviour in place over time. This Lever is about reinforcing and
   reminding.

“We have been working hard to distil those critical areas of
behaviour change insight that we all need to use to engage consumers,” said
Unilever CEO Paul Polman. “We are publishing our approach because we think that
there are wider benefits from sharing our work with others.”

“A huge part of our environmental impacts come from how
people use our products; two thirds of the greenhouse gas impacts across the
lifecycle and about half of our water footprint is associated with consumer
use. So inspiring consumers to adopt new sustainable products and behaviours is
fundamental to achieving the goals set out in the Unilever Sustainability
Living Plan,” added Polman.

‘Five Levers for Change’ is published in a booklet which
also contains a series of personal perspectives on sustainable living by
leading experts on sustainability and behaviour change from around the world,
including Forum for the Future Founder Jonathon Porritt, Akatu Institute for
Conscious Consumption President Helio Mattar, and behaviour change specialist
Val Curtis from the London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine.

Source: www.unilever.com

Global companies pledge support for new University of Exeter
One Planet MBA

A raft of major corporations have announced their support
for the new One Planet MBA programme, exclusively offered at the University of
Exeter Business School in collaboration with WWF.

Companies including Canon, Coca Cola, the Cooperative Group,
IBM, IKEA, Lafarge, Lloyds TSB, Nokia, Sony, Atos and Thomson Reuters are
backing scholarships for MBA students. They are also providing guest speakers
for the programme and offering students the opportunity to work with them on
projects as part of their MBA.

Professor Malcolm Kirkup, Director of the One Planet MBA
commented, ‘We’ve been overwhelmed by the level of interest and support
received from the corporate community. These particular companies are
demonstrating real leadership on sustainability and it is great to have them on
board. We are delighted they have already recognised the value of the programme
and the quality of our students. These scholarships will ensure that we
continue to attract high quality cohorts of students from a diverse range of
backgrounds.

The One Planet MBA has recently been highlighted as ‘good
practice’ at the 2011 Principles of Management Education Summit in Brussels.
More details can be found on the PRME Summit website.

Source: www.business-school.exeter.ac.uk

Sainsbury’s also unveiled a £1billion plan to bring the
agenda to the foreground of their business practice, creating 50,000 jobs in
the process.

The planet is under strain and the choices we make about the
products we buy have never been more important. The global population is rising
at a time when natural resources are decreasing. As such, there is increasing
pressure on the global food system. The earth’s capacity to provide food is
threatened by climate change, water scarcity and unsustainable farming
practices. We need to find ways to make land more productive and to protect the
biodiversity on which all food production ultimately depends. That means
building resilient supply chains to ensure long term security of sustainable
supply.

The 20 by 20 Sustainability Plan comes at exactly the right
time for Sainsbury’s. One only has to pick up the daily newspapers to see the
challenges facing our society, economy and planet to understand why.

Following consultation with NGOs and other stakeholders,
we’ve set ourselves 20 ambitious goals, which will help our customers make more
nutritious, sustainable and ethical purchasing decisions week in, week out, on
a journey to 2020. We want to transform the marketplace for greener, fairer and
healthier products. We want to help shift our customers’ everyday behaviour in
favour of sustainability but still provide the value and quality that they have
come to expect.

20 by 20 is our roadmap towards making this vision a
reality, and through our scale and these commitments, we can make a positive
difference throughout the value chain.

For example, Deforestation is responsible for around 20 per
cent of global greenhouse gas emissions (UNEP).

It causes irreversible damage to the natural habitat of many
species vital for sustaining life on earth. Unsustainable logging practices and
the destruction of forests for farming threaten to remove the earth’s natural
breathing system. The challenge is not only to stop this damage but also help
to restore forest cover.

By 2020, our own brand products won’t contribute to global
deforestation.

Source: www.j-sainsbury.co.uk
and www.thegrapevinemagazine.com