When it comes to discussing the roles of governments and businesses in the fight against environmental degradation and global warming it is a requirement to discuss the responsibilities of corporations and the latest trends in corporate responsibilities.
What is Corporate Sustainability?
According to Wikipedia: “Corporate sustainability is an evolution on more traditional phrases describing ethical corporate practice. Phrases such as corporate social responsibility (CSR) or corporate citizenship continue to be used but are increasingly superseded by the broader term, corporate sustainability. Unlike the other phrases that focus on “added-on” policies, corporate sustainability describes business practices built around social and environmental considerations.”
A sustainable corporation is one that ensures its business practices are giving back to the environment just as much as they are taking from it. The following link gives a list of Corporations rated as most sustainable around the world: http://www.global100.org/
Importance of Corporate Sustainability
The significance of corporate sustainability can be seen now more clearly than ever before. With rising concerns over the environment all over the world there is, unfortunately, a global effort that is lacking in force to counter the environmental degradation. Why the lethargy when it comes to action against environmental harm can be explained with several reasons: economics, politics, ignorance, corruption etc.
At such a time it is heartening to see some corporations take up the responsibility upon themselves and not wait for a global order or master plan to take shape, and given the way things are moving this might be the best solution we have as of now.
Hence, the study of measures taken by various corporations around the world to be sustainable is an important step in the study of current environmental issues and its long term effects. The need of the hour is to come up with ways on how to encourage businesses to drive themselves into becoming sustainable and how to bring about awareness among the general public. In the ideal situation every business would “look after itself” by being environmentally sustainable and that would ensure the overall sustainability of the planet.
