Strategic CSR - Trees

The article in the url below reports on an encouraging application of science by a U.S.-based nonprofit (World Forest ID) to solve a specific supply chain challenge:

"Scientists are embarking on an effort to keep sanctioned Russian timber out of Europe by mapping the unique chemical fingerprints of trees, a process that could be used to vet corporate supply chains for other banned commodities."

In this case, the technology was used to enforce economic sanctions, but it is a small step to imagine how it could be used to verify the source of other rare and/or protected raw materials:

"The project aims to bring science to bear in a fight by companies and governments to stop illegal wood from seeping into timber supply chains—complex, difficult-to-police networks of logging companies, sawmills, wood manufacturers and traders."

It is encouraging to see that some companies see the potential application:

"Although work on the database is ongoing, furniture giant IKEA has already used it to vet suppliers for sanctioned timber after the war forced it to revamp its supply chain. Belgian authorities have also employed it to seize more than 260 tons of illegally shipped Russian timber."

And, the potential seems clear:

"If scaled up, the project could have broad implications for how companies source a range of other agricultural commodities, such as cotton and cacao, which have been linked to environmental and human rights abuses."

The science, with the aid of artificial intelligence, is logical in its approach:

"World Forest ID currently uses two tests to identify the chemical composition of wood samples. One measures the ratios of stable isotopes, which vary based on factors such as rainfall or temperature. The other test measures trace elements such as magnesium and copper, which vary based on the soils in which trees grow."

The results are encouraging:

"World Forest ID's model identified false origin claims in 40% to 60% of cases. … [Victor Deklerck, World Forest ID's head of science] said the test was designed to be conservative to minimize the chance of incorrectly identifying shipments as illegal."

Take care

David

David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation (6e)

© Sage Publications, 2023

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler6e 

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

Science Used to Police Banned Russia Timber

By Dylan Tokar

June 11, 2024

The Wall Street Journal

Late Edition – Final

B1, B4

https://www.wsj.com/articles/keeping-sanctioned-russian-timber-out-of-the-eu-is-tricky-this-nonprofit-has-a-solution-1bf366b0

 

Strategic CSR - Gender bias

The article in the url makes the case that gender association with firms affects consumer perceptions of those organizations:

"The study, recently published in the Journal of Marketing, finds feminine-sounding brands may be more appealing, because they are often perceived as warmer and thereby associated with traits like trustworthiness, sincerity, friendliness, tolerance and good nature."

The researchers were able to isolate specific variables that predict whether a consumer perceives a brand to be either more masculine or more feminine:

"Women's names, for instance, are longer, and are more likely to end in a vowel sound. In one part of the paper researchers studied how participants reacted to two fictitious brand names—one with feminine linguistic characters and the other with male linguistic characteristics—and found participants often preferred feminine brand names."

The benefit for firms is that the researchers found consumers are more likely to select products associated with feminine brands:

"Participants were 34% more likely to choose a female-named Nimilia YouTube channel than a masculine-named Nimeld YouTube channel. Participants were also three times as likely to choose a Nimilia hand sanitizer than a Nimeld hand sanitizer."

In addition to those made-up names, the researchers applied the same approach to ask consumer perceptions about existing brands:

"The researchers … looked at an index created by the marketing and consulting firm Interbrand, and found 55% of its top brands, including Coca-Cola, Honda and IKEA, had feminine names, 36% of the brands had masculine-sounding names, and 9% of the brands had gender-neutral names."

Take care

David

David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Sustainable Value Creation (5e)

© Sage Publications, 2020

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: https://study.sagepub.com/chandler5e 

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: https://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

When a Brand Sounds Feminine, Consumers Get a Warm Feeling

By Lisa Ward

May 24, 2021

The Wall Street Journal

Late Edition – Final

R9

https://www.wsj.com/articles/how-to-make-a-brand-more-appealing-give-it-a-feminine-name-11621620001

 

Strategic CSR - Unilever

The headline and opening sentence in the article in the url below suggests that we have discovered how to measure CSR, comprehensively:

 

"Unilever and Patagonia have cemented their position as the world's most sustainable brands, topping the list of sustainability leaders in a new report released Thursday."

 

In fact, the text should read that these companies are "perceived to be the world's most sustainable brands." The reason comes down to the question asked in the survey that generated the data on which the headline was based:

 

"The 2015 Sustainability Leaders Report, produced by think tank SustainAbility and research consultancy GlobeScan, asked 816 sustainability experts in 82 countries which company they thought best integrated sustainability into its business strategy."

 

When you are asking people "which company they thought best integrated sustainability into its business strategy," you are going to generate opinions rather than facts. This would be OK if the opinions were based on knowledge of what is actually going on inside these companies; instead, they are based on what people think is going on. The dangers of relying on perception-based understandings of reality are that, once a perception is formed, it (a) becomes susceptible to group think (i.e., I need to say what others are saying) and (b) becomes particularly difficult to dislodge (i.e., these companies are the best because they were the best last year). As a result, there is a great deal of inertia in lists like this:

 

"Unilever drew top honors for the fifth year in a row, while Patagonia ranked second, the same position it occupied last year. The two companies were followed, in order, by Interface, Marks and Spencer, Natura, Ikea and Nestle. … BASF is the only new company to make the top 11, while two companies – Walmart and Puma – fell off from last year's top 10 list."

 

The sorts of biases that infuse these kind of survey data become particularly apparent when you look at the regional breakdown of perceptions described in the article:

 

"In Asia, for example, India's Tata group is the fourth-highest regarded company, and Shell and Proctor and Gamble both make the top 10. In Africa and the Middle East, 5% of experts identified SABMiller as a top leader. Meanwhile, in Oceania, Westpac came in third, Tesla came in fourth, and HP, Siemens and Novo Nordisk all made the top 10. Unilever and Patagonia, in fact, were the only two companies to make the leader list in every region."

 

Until we are able to create a meaningful measure of CSR that allows us to capture all aspects of operations and compare across industries and cultures, this (no doubt profitable) industry of creating CSR/sustainability lists is going to be driven by anecdotes and perceptions (which is why companies like Enron and BP won so many CSR/ethics awards for so many years).

 

Take care

David

 

David Chandler & Bill Werther

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders, Globalization, and Sustainable Value Creation (3e)

© Sage Publications, 2014

 

Instructor Teaching and Student Study Site: http://www.sagepub.com/chandler3e/

Strategic CSR Simulation: http://www.strategiccsrsim.com/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

 

 

Unilever, Patagonia cement their positions as the world's most sustainable brands, says new report

By Bruce Watson

May 28, 2015

The Guardian Sustainable Business

http://www.theguardian.com/sustainable-business/2015/may/28/sustainability-leaders-report-unilever-patagonia-ikea-nestle

 

Strategic CSR - Ikea

The article in the url below reports on Ikea’s recent announcement that it intends its operations to be “forest positive” by 2020. This means that:

 

“… despite its continuing high demand for timber, it intends its business to have an overall positive effect on the world's forests. Integral to this approach is the commitment that it will be growing at least as many trees as it uses to make products by 2020.”

 

This commitment is part of a broader strategy, titled People and Planet Positive, that the firm announced in 2012:

 

“Not content with becoming one of our most ubiquitous brands, the company has announced its intention to become one of the world's most sustainable businesses as well. [In 2012] the company announced an ambitious new strategy … ; effectively a global sustainability roadmap, it sets out how the company will conduct its future business using a wide range of targets concerning renewable energy, recycling, waste management and ‘green’ product sourcing.”

 

This is important for no other reason than Ikea is now a very large, global company:

 

“Launched in 1943, the Swedish business has grown to become the world's biggest furniture company. In the last financial year, 655 million people flocked to its stores, of which it currently owns 298 in 26 countries.”

 

As the article’s headline indicates, however, there are a number of challenges that lay ahead and suggest that Ikea’s claim is aspirational as much as it is realistic. These challenges revolve around two key issues. The first issue is how the firm intends to become forest positive. The scale of this challenge is indicated by the amount of wood Ikea uses in a given year and the gap between this amount and the amount of certified wood currently available for any firm to use:

 

“Ikea is deeply indebted to wood. This year it used 13.56 million cubic metres of solid wood and wood-based board materials, not including paper and packaging, meaning Ikea alone uses almost 1% of all wood used commercially around the world. … However the company actually failed to meet is 2012 targets of 35% of all solid wood to be sourced from "preferred sources". Ikea says this was because of a significant shortage of [Forest Stewardship Council, FSC]-certified wood on the global markets.”

 

The second issue relates to the rest of the People and Planet Positive slogan. Although wood is a huge part of their business, even if they are able to meet their ambitious goals in this respect, there are many other aspects to becoming a socially responsible (positive impact) company than sourcing key raw materials sustainably. And, given the criticism the firm is facing for its operations in the Karelia forest in Russia by the activist group Protect the Forest, it is not clear that the little it is doing today reflects industry best-practices:

 

“Ikea has received public endorsements by groups such as WWF for its scaling up of its commitments to sustainable forestry practices. However, it has also been receiving less welcome attention from other environmental groups who are claiming that Ikea is willfully deceiving its customers and hiding behind a "flawed" certification system. … The company's claims that it is operating a responsible forestry management programme in Karelia are denied by Protect the Forest, who have launched a campaign to stop Ikea's operations in this part of north-western Russia.”

 

Given the controversy Ikea generated last Fall with its Saudi Arabia catalog, it needs to be careful that it isn’t accused of greenwashing instead of being heralded for the ambitious and progressive goals to which it is now committed.

 

Take care

David

 

Bill Werther & David Chandler

Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility: Stakeholders in a Global Environment (2e)

© Sage Publications, 2011

http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr2e/

 

Instructor Teaching Site: http://www.sagepub.com/strategiccsr/

The library of CSR Newsletters are archived at: http://strategiccsr-sage.blogspot.com/

 

 

Ikea to go ‘forest positive’ – but serious challenges lie ahead

By Annie Kelly

December 14, 2012

The Guardian

Late Edition – Final

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sustainable-business/ikea-sustainability-forest-positive-karelia

 

Strategic CSR - IKEA

The press release in the url link below complements a recent Newsletter that highlighted the steps taken in Ireland to reduce the consumption of plastic bags. By implementing a tax on plastic bags, the Irish government was able to reduce plastic bag use by over 90%. In this press release, IKEA announces the results of the first year of its plan to minimize the number of plastic bags used by its customers and, again, reports a huge reduction:

“With the introduction of its leadership 'bag the plastic bag' program in March 2007, IKEA set a goal of reducing its US stores' plastic bag consumption by 50%; from 70 million to 35 million plastic bags in the first year. The call was to go reusable with the iconic IKEA blue bag for $.59 or use an alternative reusable bag. … Now it is one year since the program began and IKEA is overwhelmed with the stunning results; more than 92% of their customers said no more plastic bags!”

As a result of these initial results, the firm is extending its policy to remove all paper and plastic bags from its stores:

“This landmark program has now resulted in IKEA taking another step forward; as of October 1, 2008, IKEA will no longer offer plastic bags, and paper bags are not available in IKEA stores either. IKEA's consumer call-to-action is to use only reusable bags.”

The environmental impact of these policies has the potential to be very significant:

“According to the Environmental Protection Agency, the U.S. consumes over 380 billion plastic bags, sacks and wraps each year. Each year, Americans throw away some 100 billion polyethylene plastic bags, and less than one percent of them are recycled. … And it takes 14 billion trees to produce 10 billion grocery bags.”

While I am no fan of knee-jerk government intervention, the example of Ireland, combined with the IKEA results, indicates the potential for social policy to shift public behavior radically in positive ways. The pros and cons of pursuing such policies are discussed in the article in the second url below:

“… "choice architecture" - like the architecture of a well-designed public space - can coax (or herd) people in desirable directions at little or no cost to their autonomy and freedom. … By "specifying the kinds of situations in which people are least likely to make good choices" (eg, school cafeterias where they choose desserts over fruit) and structuring choices so as to counteract biases (eg, placing fruit more prominently than desserts), government and business can entice people to choose things that are better for them.”

The author argues against the tendency to try and overly-control, however, bringing up broad and important issues concerning the ability of government to limit individual freedom to choose:

“When you postulate a gap between people's wishes and their "real" requirements, you delegitimise the former. But you do not invalidate Lord Acton's adage about power corrupting.”

Take care
Dave

Bill Werther & David Chandler
Strategic Corporate Social Responsibility
© Sage Publications, 2006
http://www.sagepub.com/Werther


CSRwire Press Release
4.02.2008 - 09:04am ET
Press release from: IKEA
The Results are in...Over 92% of IKEA Customers Bagged the Plastic Bag!  As of October 2008, IKEA will no longer offer plastic or paper bags.
http://www.csrwire.com/News/11588.html

The perils of shaping choice.
By CHRISTOPHER CALDWELL
975 words
5 April 2008
Financial Times
Asia Ed1
Page 7
http://us.ft.com/ftgateway/superpage.ft?news_id=fto040420081442397238