Corporate branding, sustainability and social responsibility are mutually dependant and inseparable!

It is virtually impossible to separate the connections and dependencies that exist in sustainability, social responsibility, social sustainability and ethical business practices. Some accept it readily whereas others reluctantly but corporation’s social and environmental obligations have moved to the centre stage as we call it these days ‘good business practices’. In response it has put enormous pressure on how businesses should operate, hence helped to establish a sense that healthy business and healthy society are mutually dependant. With the increasing concern about global environment, as well as corporate social responsibility, companies are forced to integrate environmental good practices and social obligations within their overall corporate strategy. Harmony with the environment, harmony with the society and respect for the people have now become new business mantra.

However, a corporate brand is the visual, verbal and the behavioural expression of an organisation's unique business model (Knox and Bickerton, 2003). Other says it is a valuable financial asset (Aaker, 1996; Balmer, Greyser, and Urde, 2006; Leitch and Richardson, 2003), which acts as an interface facilitating the interaction of multiple stakeholders with the corporation (Harris and de Chernatony, 2001).  As a public, as well as a customer, my understanding of corporate brand is familiarity, clarity, reliability, understanding brand's personality, brand values and higher reputation. If a company is well known in the community, having a good ethical business practices then we are all happy to be their customers. The company can further strengthen their brand reputation by engaging more on social and environmental obligations and the effect would be even stronger if the customers are already familiar with the company products and services.

The importance of underlying brand values are immense, for example the values that your company stands for, how these values could be achieved, how you are going to be different than other companies who are already operating in the same sector. In my view, brand values simply cannot exist without considering any sustainability and social responsibility issues as businesses fundamentally depend on environment and society where they operate. Customers usually find the company name first, then pricing before they chose to buy any products.

Till now, scant attention may have been given in linking branding and sustainability issues in general; however companies are very keen to integrate sustainability within their core business practices because companies have realised that it brings added values. It provides not only financial benefits, but it also enhances product innovation, strengthen company’s reputation, mitigating the risks, increased employee and customer satisfaction. Integrating sustainability into corporate branding will attract customers who have been looking for products that have least environmental impacts, high quality and durability, more over it will fulfil customer’s immediate demands with reasonable costs.

Car companies like Honda and Toyota have heavily invested on fuel efficiency cars, which provided their customers with 'more miles from less fuel' in the face of ever-increasing fuel prices, effectively it also creates less pollution - a win-win situation for all the parties that are involved. Companies must continue their sustainability mission on a long-term basis; all of a sudden they cannot abandon their brand values saying 'it was a short term venture to capture the market and we will again go back to the old ways of doing business'. This would be the most damaging effects on brand images, which in no doubt will cascade down to customer’s level, who may choose to switch to buy alternative products from other companies. Therefore, company’s brand values are not only the present once being used perception of sustainability and social responsibility issues; rather it’s the company’s ability to stay in the market for the long time and keep generating revenue for them. Therefore, it is only possible if companies are committed to meaningful long-term contributions towards sustainability and social responsibility issues.

We are living in an era where social consciousness is evolving rapidly throughout the world. In the midst, companies are effectively pressurised to integrate social obligations into their underlying brand values, it's no longer acceptable if the companies simply define themselves who they are and what they make, instead it is very important to have environmental and social policies embedded in the company’s mission, vision and values. A company's bad motives on social responsibility will undermine their ability to promote the brand.

Although child labour is still common in many countries around the world but it has recently become a widely discussed topic. Companies have to make statement that they are fully compliant with prohibiting child labour in their domestic and overseas production sites, also make sure that entire supply chains are free from these contemptible practices. The Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC), which has been ratified by almost all states worldwide, obliges requires States to ‘recognise the right of the child to be protected from economic exploitation and from performing any work that is likely to be hazardous or to interfere with the child’s education or to be harmful to the child’s health or physical, mental, spiritual, moral or social development’ (Convention on the rights of the child, Article 32.1). In 2008, Chinese Government was embarrassed when some big cases of child labour were uncovered in the South West of the country where thousands of children were sold as slaves in booming coastal factory cities (Asia Pacific, April 30, 2008). Imagine the consequences if it is embedded in any company brand particularly on children toys which are made by children.

Finally, Sustainability and social responsibility are inter-linked by the brand values. Corporate branding is the bridge between these two. Companies who have synergies will continue to be benefited and enriched, successful companies in the future will be those who will recognise and incorporate sustainability and social responsibility issues within their business practices. Looking to the future, as the brand values grow, transparency and authenticity will be essential for stronger brand images.

Growing business interest and momentum towards Biodiversity Offsetting!

There are growing recognitions of importance of biodiversity conservation that have been observed particularly among the big business communities in recent years. We heard about carbon offsetting - making carbon history for last many years. Global carbon offset markets have tremendously grown over the last decade, which saw 3.6 billion tonnes (Gt) CO2e exchanged over the first six months of 2011, valued at some €50 billion (US$71bn), compared to €48bn in H1 2010 (Point Carbon, 20 July 2011).

Similar to carbon offsetting that puts a monetary value on carbon emissions, there is a growing desire on a market based approach to put a value on nature that would potentially stop the biodiversity loss and if possible reverse it. Named as 'Biodiversity Offsetting' that designed to replace the destroyed natural capital with measurable conservation outcomes and compensate for the significant residual impacts. The concept of Biodiversity offsetting is not new. In the US a wetland banking scheme where public or private developers restore, establish or enhance an aquatic resource to compensate for any unavoidable damage they cause has been in existence since the 1970s. More than 400 wetland banks have now been established in a market worth more than $3 billion a year (Levitt, 2010).

Biodiversity offsetting is measurable conservation outcomes resulting from actions designed to compensate for significant residual adverse biodiversity impacts arising from project development and persisting after appropriate prevention and mitigation measures have been implemented. The goal of biodiversity offsets is to achieve no net loss, or preferably a net gain of biodiversity on the ground with respect to species composition, habitat structure and ecosystem services, including livelihood aspects (Business and Biodiversity Offset Programme, 2008).

Natural loses, for example loss of forests and local eco systems, fisheries, wetlands, soils, species, oceans and corals have been so far invisible from the economic models. Market instrument such as 'biodiversity offsetting', in other word 'Bio-compensation' would certainly fill the gaps, where in essence particularly developers need to compensate or buy bio-credits to protect somewhere else if they have damaged the original development sites. However, there are still lots of questions needed to be answered with regard pros and cons on how the bio-offset markets will operate, as the complexity of eco-system's processes are immense, further more they are inter-linked, which raises the most important question about the 'common denominator' as we know CO2 in the case of carbon market.

Fundamental questions may be asked - why big businesses are so interested primarily to protect the biodiversity and reverse any eco-system loses? The answer is very simple and we can all envisage the grave consequences on humanity if the natural capital is systematically destroyed. Biodiversity offsetting can be a standard practice for business organisations that have got significant impacts on biodiversity from their business activities. This is an opportunity where business organisations can make a difference on their biodiversity footprint; reinforcing their license to operate in a particular area, more over become a trustworthy organisation to the local communities (particularly indigenous communities)  who may agree to provide the access (social license to operate) to the lands and oceans for commercial purposes.

Within the biodiversity impact mitigation hierarchy businesses must take efforts to prevent or avoid any negative impacts on biodiversity. Then efforts should be made to minimise and reduce, and then repair or restore any undesirable effects. After all these steps biodiversity offsetting could be implied to address the significant residual impacts that planned to achieve no net losses but if possible net gains of biodiversity. If the offsetting is not feasible then compensation can be offered. However, measuring the amount of compensation that would be suitable for significant residual impacts of any development could be complicated and difficult job. Department for Environment Food and Rural Affairs (DEFRA) developed a metric which is the ‘Guiding Principles’ of offsetting in England. Firstly, a development site should be divided into habitat parcels based on their distinctiveness (e.g. habitat category), which are called habitat type bands. These bands have numbers associated with them (e.g. High 24, Medium 16, and Low 8) and they are used to calculate the biodiversity units/hectare to compensate the loss of habitat.

Undeniable facts that there are array of many business benefits from biodiversity offsetting, yet it is not without any challenges, for example the notion of no net loss, ecological proximities and economic valuation. Challenges remain on how one should determine no net loss of biodiversity? How do you get a clear understanding of the land with regards its existing species and their habitats, interactions between them, measuring the impacts of land use on species and surrounding habitats and finally putting economic values on it, given the fact that every eco system is not equal? Among others, indirect impacts should also need to be considered, for example outside the boundary of any designated development site where further growth of human settlements will create undesirable negative impacts on biodiversity. Therefore, measuring the direct impacts on biodiversity of a selected development site may not be sufficient, indirect impacts need to be part of the equation.

Biodiversity offsetting should be like-for-like and that is why it is practically impossible to offset with one eco system with the other in a different part of the world; the reason being they are not equal. Unfortunately, this is why many business organisations cannot declare their reforestation activities as their biodiversity offsetting programme because impacts on biodiversity and land use from their business activities are taking place somewhere else. Therefore, it is recommended to offset biodiversity as close as possible to the development site, as a result making it more relevant to the local eco systems and gain more acceptances from the local communities. For sure there are needs for further work on methodologies particularly on economic valuation. Biodiversity offsetting is not a panacea to protect the eco system where development occurs but it has certainly made business case and many European observers believe that the biodiversity offsetting market will get bigger than carbon offsetting markets.       

Greening your business!

Demonstrating environmental performance has now become a well-accepted business model for the organisations and the businesses. Faced with increased legislation, green consciousness and fulfilling customer expectations, supply chain pressure, industry began to develop new management techniques to deal with the agenda. Many big businesses in the developed countries already have mature ISO14001 Environmental Management System (EMS) to assess and manage their environmental impacts of their business activities. However, in the developing countries like Bangladesh this process has been so far quite slow.

An EMS can be described as ‘a programme of continuous environmental improvement that follows a defined sequence of steps drawn from established project management practice and routinely applied in businesses management’ (World Bank Group, 1998). In 1997, the International Organisation for Standardisation (ISO) has produced an international standard for environmental Management System – ISO14001. The series of ISO14000 are the sets of standards and guidelines defines the core of Environmental Management System (ISO14001) itself and the auditing procedures necessary for verification.

Environmental impacts occur at every stage of business activities – from the type and amount of raw materials being used (material input), to the production process, creation of waste and to the means of distribution (material output) and resource recovery and recycling etc. It says ‘if you can’t measure it, you can’t manage it’. On the basis of this principle, a good environmental management has to start with the measurements, for example identify, quantify and assess of all environmental impacts and be in a position to manage them.

Within the EMS, there needs to be an Environmental Policy and that is the main instrument for communicating environmental priorities of the business organisation. Followed by environmental programme (procedures) which ensure how to achieve specific goals and objectives highlighted in the policy. It is essential to monitor the progress, review the current situation and feed into any improvement plan to a simple systematic management ‘plan-do-check-act’ cycle.

Following are the internal and external factors that would shape the take-up and influence of EMS:

Internal factors:

- Awareness raising campaign: environmental policy must be clearly communicated to all the member of the staff so that everyone knows about it, also raising awareness of the potential impacts their work might have on the environment.

- Implementation cost: obtaining EMS certification would involve costs, time, trained personnel and effort for the businesses. These are main reasons why Small and Medium Sized Enterprises (SMEs) are still reluctant to uptake EMS.

- New attitudes to accept the changes: changes will inevitably be there if a business tries to establish its environmental policy into their procedure. For example, reducing energy consumption may require changes to the manufacturing process or using different raw materials may result in modification of the design of the products.

- Leadership - commitment across the company: leadership is required at all levels and in all functions for meaningful change to occur e.g. manufacturing, distribution, retail sales have the most visible environmental footprint. And the manufacturers or the producers are often come close to environmentally cautious customers within these processes.

- Resources, Roles, Responsibility and Authority: administrating an EMS programme needs a clear line of command and responsibility from the highest to lowest level. Each employee in the company must know exactly who is responsible for which aspects of the programme. More over, each employee needs to know within the scope of their assigned activities in accordance with environmental procedures and work instructions, also report to their departmental managers in case of any environmental non-conformity.

- The fear of failure : it is very important that the fear of failure should be eliminated from the staff’s mind and staff need to be encouraged in areas, which are unfamiliar to them and staff must gain confidence and knowledge in those areas.

- Earlier registration of any management standards: any history of ISO9001 quality management standards would be helpful to adopt EMS quite easily and quickly. The revised ISO9001 and ISO14001 Environmental Management System are compatible particularly with regard to terminology and content.

- Employees: sometimes employees take initiatives on good environmental practices, within their own organisations, for example segregating papers to be recycled. Colleagues can be a positive influence to other colleagues and the good intention can reach up to the senior managers who would think harder to resolve the issue when he/she sees that enthusiastic new ideas came from his/her own working forces.

External factors:

- Regulations: legislative compliance is unavoidable by the business organisations. It is very important that they are compliant with the current environmental legislation to avoid fines and prosecution, as well as considering forthcoming legislative requirements so that any changes whether it is related to products or services would be easily accommodated. Sudden change could incur costs, time and unnecessary disruptions.

- Consumers and corporate image: consumers are increasingly concerned about the environmental characters (e.g. negative impacts on the environment and human health) of any product. Therefore, it’s an opportunity for business organisations to enhance business’ image by going green. However, any false green claims from the organisation about their products will be very quickly found out and it will be harder to rebuild the good reputation again.

- Supply chain: Businesses need to ensure that their whole operation relating to that product is green. Both up-stream and down-stream supply chains need to comply with the environmental requirements. This way business organisation can also influence or put pressure on their supply chains to motivate them to act as environmental responsible businesses.

- Economic motivation and competition: competition with other businesses is another factor, which drive businesses to take up the environmental management system. When customers will see that a business organisation has got an environmental sound policy then they will be more attracted towards them than those who do not have any.

- Stakeholders’ pressure: external stakeholders, for example customers, local communities, supply chains, regulators, governments, insurer and Environmental Non-Governmental Organisations (ENGOs) are increasingly pressuring businesses to show green credentials and disclose environmental performances.

- Relationship with regulatory bodies: good environmental management practices will assist to maintain a good relationship with the regulatory bodies. Management quality will determine the nature and frequency of site visits from the regulators.  

 

Finally, an environmental management system will provide a useful tool for a business or an organisation to identify, quantify, monitor and assess the environmental impacts and providing a basis for external recognition. At the same time environmental management standards are not ‘magic bullets’ that will achieve environmental improvements where regulation and enforcement are ineffective or that can open market where competition is strong. Environmental Management System provides a framework on which to build better performance, greater efficiency, a competitive image and above all help greening your businesses.   

Has the world gone mad on green consciousness?

There is an old saying - ‘too much of anything is not good’. Too much of sunshine dries the crops and too much of rain drowns it. We certainly acknowledge the existence of many similar symbolic examples like these which are explicitly relevant to many other aspects of our daily lives. In our daily affairs, one of such aspects has certainly drawn huge attention – ‘green consciousness’, which has become vogue for governments, businesses, civic societies and by and large normal public for last more than three decades. Is it fair to say ‘fashionable’ or ‘necessity’ the appropriate word to describe the green consciousness? There is often a dichotomy between what is popular at a particular time and something that you need in order to fulfil one’s basic life requirements. In due course, we will pick up this argument as we approach in this article.

The origin of green consciousness is not new. It grew during the early stages of Industrial revolution when 'smoking stacks' were considered as the pride and symbol of industrial activity, success and affluence. From the chemical industries, emissions of highly repulsive waste gases especially hydrochloric acid and hydrogen sulphide from the Leblanc soda process were so high that authorities in England had to introduce environmental legislation Alcali Act in 1864. Smoke and ash abatement in Great Britain was considered to be a health agency responsibility and was so confirmed by the first Public health Act of 1848 and the later ones of 1866 and 1875 (Stern, 1984).

During the last thirty years, green consciousness has grown even stronger than ever. Society is now more conscious of pollution prevention, resource conservation and recycling, reduced new extraction of fossil and raw materials, more use of biomass materials, using clean sources of energy and adaptation to the impacts of climate change. Not just widespread green consciousness among public but the green movement and green political ideology also played a very important role. But, what is the real driving force behind this? It may be quite opposite for many people, who would rather call it 'green hysteria' or 'scaremongering'.

Society always reacted towards the natural and anthropogenic disasters once it destroyed people's livelihood, immediate environment and killed many people on the way. Aftermath of an incident associated with BP oil disaster in the Gulf of Mexico 2010 (by far it has been the largest accidental marine oil spill in the history of petroleum industry) has showed how public outcry and political willingness can change the future environmental, health and safety policies and strategies on how petroleum industries should behave and take the responsibilities for their actions. Increasing customer expectation, supply chain pressure, pressure from the local community, ethical investment and plethora of environmental legislation will continue to underpin the green success and tackle environmental degradation.

Let us forget the impacts of global warming and climate change for a moment. Reducing the needs for new resources and make greater use of recovered resources ought to be the inherent culture, otherwise the risks of resource scarcity that may stall industrial progress to manufacture more goods and services that we all depend on. In this regard, green consciousness marches steadily uphill which is undoubtedly welcome for the future survival of the planet and the people. But any false or overstated green claims e.g. false Green PR or false Green Marketing will be not only damaging for the reputation of businesses, but also the gravity of the real cause for green agenda will probably be lost.

On the dichotomy of ‘fashionable’ and ‘necessity’ arguments in green consciousness where I believe that the necessity cannot be fashionable or fashionable cannot be necessity. In general, as a global citizen we all are entitled to be obligation-conscious of environmental conservation. Overwhelming evidences exist in environmental degradation driven by man-made pollution, consequently many experts are repeatedly calling and re-emphasising the importance to protect and improve the environment where ensuring both human beings and the environment can coexist. Environmental degradation is one of the ten threats to humanity identified by the High Level Threat Panel of the United Nations in 2004. Therefore, it is an urgent issue where something that we all need to fulfil for our planet’s basic life requirements.

Coming back to the maxim - ‘too much of anything is not good’! Too much emphasis is given on green consciousness without pointing out the measurable benefits, which is counterproductive and that is why it is not surprising when we see timid and inadequate public reaction towards green agenda. Sceptics have always capitalised on the opportunity by saying - ' the green agenda is about getting rid of as many humans as possible', 'green agenda has parallels with excesses of communism', 'green house effects have been falsified', we didn't have global warming during the Industrial Revolution', 'Al Gore's hockey stick is broken', 'record snowfall disproves global warming', 'mercury thermometers cannot measure within tenths of a degree' and the comments go on.

People from all strata of the society generally accept that mankind are to be blamed for exhausting many of planet’s precious resources for growth and development. We always read and hear the bad news. Particularly in the news media, it barely points out the benefits of humanity’s growth and development, for example availability and varieties of food, health, education, improvements to living standards and comfort, security, recreation and human mobility as a whole. Tremendous progresses have been made on biodiversity and environmental areas such as pollution prevention, resource recovery, recycling, finding alternative materials to avoid the exhaustion of raw materials, advancement in green technology, and the major technological changes in agriculture e.g. alternative farming methods, conservation on biodiversity and so on. Green consciousness is good and will be well accepted by the general public when they will see a balance in both sides of the debate – on one side ‘the causes of environmental degradation and destruction of the eco systems’, on the flip side ‘benefits of growth and development’ on society while maintaining the sustainability obligations.              

Climate change exodus in Bangladesh: The real battle lies ahead

The reality surrounding environmental or the climate-induced displacements of people are not unusual in Bangladesh as the country has always suffered from the catastrophic natural calamities and other disasters for centuries. Cyclones, heavy rainfalls, floods, droughts, river erosions, salt water intrusion are the usual scenario and they are all devastating in nature, which remain regular threats to the millions of Bangladeshi people. While having these ongoing natural calamities, impacts of climate change have imposed further disastrous phenomenon in Bangladesh. Ongoing climate events and experiences have shown that the intensity and severity of natural disasters have increased in recent years due to climate change.

The adverse effects of climate change undermine the economic development, human security, and people’s fundamental rights (UNDP 2007). According to Tanner et al. 2007, loss of coastal land to the sea, currently predicted to 3% by the 2030s and 6% in the 2050s, is likely to generate steady flow of displaced people. Also a report by Rabbani, 2009 shows over 35 millions of people will be displaced from 19 coastal districts of Bangladesh in case of 1 meter sea level rise in this century.

International Organisation for Migration (2009) indicated in a study report that many people have already migrated to the urban slums from the coastal zones of Bangladesh due to frequent cyclones, storm surges, river erosion, etc. In conjunction with ever increasing climate-induced impacts and exodus of people from their coastal homelands have subsequently put huge pressure on the big cities. Slums in the Dhaka city are expanding due to increased population and huge pressures are being felt on the infrastructure such as housing, transport, education, energy and water supply, sewerage system and recreational amenities. In 2009 around 12 million of people lived in the Dhaka city, around 3.4 million of them slum-dwellers. Dhaka is growing at 3 per cent per annum, one of the fastest rates in the world (Roy, 2009). Such unsustainable urban growths in turn step up the deterioration of local urban environment that contributes further to urban poverty.

However, the key questions are repeatedly being asked whether Bangladeshi government has appropriate policy in place, intuitional framework or even the capacity to deal with such monumental tasks. Many experts have provided useful advice to review issues related to human vulnerability against the impacts of climate change; displacements and identifying the important gaps with regard policies that are already in place.

It would be utterly unfair to suggest that Bangladesh does not have any existing national policies or the intuitional frameworks to deal with the consequences of any disaster. In fact it’s quiet opposite. There are different levels of agencies or working groups exit who are dealing with the disaster management, for example The National Disaster Management Council (NDMC), The Inter Ministerial Disaster Management Coordination Committee and The Ministry of Food and Disaster Management. They all coordinate and get involved under the Disaster Management Bureau (DMB). More over, The Department of Environment under The Ministry of Environment and Forest is the key group and focal point of most of the organisations that are engaged with national development activities.

Additionally, in this context there are few existing prominent policies that need to be noticed such as National Environmental Policy (1992), Coastal Zone Policy (2005), National Adaptation Programme of Action (2005) and Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan (2008).   These policies were designed to maintain ecological balance, protecting the country from natural disasters, environmental issues such as identifying and regulating activities which may degrade the environment, coastal zone development, identifying the priority activities to adapt to the impacts of climate change etc. But according to Aktar (2009) there are no clear indications how population displacement problems will be addressed in these policies, also there are no detailed action plans with a timeframe to tackle this problem.

Bangladeshi floods and disasters management experts are said to be the finest in the world. Even former US President Bill Clinton has said the world can learn from Bangladesh many things about disaster management (the Third International Conference on Early Warning System in Germany, 27 March, 2006). Sir David King, chief scientific advisor of the United Kingdom (UK), said Bangladesh is playing a role in facing natural disasters far advanced than other countries of the world.

In contrast, many experts have contradicted the claim that the scenarios on the ground are far from being commendable, and further stressed the fact that there are weaknesses and inefficiency in managing the natural disasters in Bangladesh. As experienced in cyclone Aila (Roy, 2009), the Government of Bangladesh could not repair the damage embankments even after more than one year in most affected areas. Other post-disaster problems such as displacement of people, improper and insufficient rehabilitation programme, issues related to transparency and accountability, negligence, corruption and favour people who support the same political party in power over others by the local disaster management authority regarding the relief operations were also reported.

Having a plethora of national policies and institutional frameworks are merely inadequate to response the consequences of any disaster. Appropriate, organised and corruption free actions on the ground are equally needed to fulfil the requirements. Government got to have policies and institutional frameworks vis-à-vis proper and sufficient rehabilitation programme and corruption free supports. Metaphorically speaking, if a building is built with an inadequate foundation, inevitably building wouldn’t stand for long even though the strictest building regulations were met to build the upper portion of the building. Therefore, fundamental question needed to be asked – how effectively and quickly Bangladeshi government can provide support and rehabilitation programme when it is needed on the ground, not on piecemeal basis but in an organised and coherent manner.

Undoubtedly, wealthy countries will not accept influx of millions of Bangladeshis as climate refugees. Even though at the December 2009 Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen, the Bangladesh government successfully highlighted its concern and anxieties with clarity and urged the wealthy nations to accept millions of Bangladeshi climate refugees (Paul, The Daily Star, 2010). Does Bangladesh have a moral case to justify that the richer countries must allow millions of people to enter as climate refugees? Arguably, may be, but it is simply not plausible for many richer countries to accept such scheme, in reality many of richer countries in Europe, North America and Australia will face similar climate refugee problem within their own territories.

Further more, ongoing dispute over the status of climate refugees have not yet been clarified by the international community, in addition the UN High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) is reluctant to revise refugee definition to integrate climate refugees on grounds that it would undermine the whole refugee status who have become refugees dejectedly non-climatic mean, for example flee from persecution, war or political reasons. Who knows how long it will take for international communities to come to a well accepted finale or if ever this subtle debate will see a happy ending? Should Bangladeshi government wait and see what the international community decide, leaving millions of climate refugees to their fate? Or the government of Bangladesh should urgently act now before the situation gets too frantic?

Whole debate is not to undermine extraordinary resilience and determination of Bangladeshi people. Affected communities have always bounced back and overly shown their strongest resilience against any natural calamities. In relation to the impacts of climate change, there are many ways the poorest communities are now developing practical and realistic means (Huq, The Guardian, 5^th April 2011) to adapt the impacts of climate change, for example capturing rain water, growing vegetables on floating meshes of bamboo filled with soil, using water hyacinth as the base of plant growing media, diversification of agriculture crops, revitalising the local plant varieties that can withstand extreme weather, homestead gardening, planting more trees close to river banks against river erosion etc.

As it stands, according to the International Red Cross (2008), environmental disasters attributed primarily to climate change are now a bigger cause of population displacement than war and persecution. Mother Nature will potentially be the cause of many conflicts in the future. Neighbouring country India recently stepped up their border security between Bangladesh and India. Indian Border Security Force (BSF) killed hundreds of Bangladeshi people in recent years in cross border trespassing and one can only imagine what the terrible consequences will be for those climate refugees who will prepare to cross the border to search for safer homes. In effect, the whole situation will create huge tension, which may push two countries to brink of wars.

Policy makers in Bangladesh must consider climate refugee situation with the utmost importance, make it as their primary concern and address climate-induced displacement within National Adaptation Programme of Action (NAPA). Government of Bangladesh as well as civic societies and the local communities must find the ways that best address the needs of climate refugees.

India's metastases: Farakka barrage to Tipaimukh dam! What next?

India's decision to build Tipaimukh dam 100 km off the Bangladesh border on the river Barak in Manipur state (in north-eastern India) has sparked public outrage, provoked controversy on both sides of the border and drawn huge international attention. Such arrogant and unilateral approach by India is certainly a reminder of the ghost from the past that still haunts Bangladesh. A perfect storm of water war had begun when Farakka barrage was completed in 1974 just 10 km off the Bangladesh border on the river Ganges in West Bengal. The environmental, subsequently human health and livelihood impacts of building Farakka barrage on downstream Bangladeshi side have been immense. Negative impacts have left legacy of environmental damage and human sufferings, which are considerably evident even today and undoubtedly further consequences will follow for many years to come. For those who live in downstream Bangladeshi side, every year it has become the usual event in water scarcity during the dry season, loss of agriculture and fisheries, increased salinity which result on deterioration of public health and  also affecting navigation etc –  and this list goes on and on.

In the past, around-the-world there had been many occasions where dams were unilaterally built however, experiences had shown that unilateralism always did not work. It pushed friendly neighbouring countries withdrawal of bi/multilateral trade relationships and even there had been some cases where countries were very close to go to war, for instance Egypt was ready to use force in 1991 to protect its access to the river Nile and South Africa had come few times very close to war with Namibia due to diversion of water from Okavango system from where Botswana gets its most water.

There are no existing UN laws that could legally prevent any country to build dams or reservoir within their own territories but there is a 'Convention on the Law of the Non-Navigational Uses of International Watercourses', which was adapted by The UN General Assembly In 1997. This convention explicitly expresses responsibilities of the international communities to manage water resources equitably, protection of the aquatic environment, obligation not to cause serious harm, general obligation to cooperate and regular exchange of data and information (Satter, 2009). The convention is still short on the number of countries that requires it to come into force and India abstained from voting in favour from day one, therefore this convention is not sufficient legally binding instrument to renounce India building more cross-border dams. Many experts in the International Water Law, Policy and Science have persistently called countries to ratify the convention and making it legally binding to avoid many future conflicts. Additionally, many water experts have also suggested that the scarcity of water will intensify and it is more likely that some countries will go for regional wars for their water rights.

India has its own long-standing problem with China. One possibility but currently denied by China on the issue of diverting water from the river Brahmaputra, which will certainly affect lower riparian countries like India and Bangladesh. While facing the similar demeanour from China, it will be worthwhile to follow how India will tackle this analogous situation, which India on the other hand is very keen to impose on Bangladesh. Besides UN legal framework which is yet to ratify, there are many other crucial issues which need to be address by India before building Tipaimukh dam. The issues related to impacts of climate change, associated environmental consequences of building a dam, geo-physical characteristics of the area and the uncertainties surround it, aspects of engineering plans and above all rights of the indigenous people.

At the heart of this debate it is fundamentally important to preserve human rights of the indigenous people, which were overwhelmingly backed by The UN General Assembly in 1997. The UN adopted a landmark declaration over the rights of native people to protect their lands and resources and to maintain their unique cultures and traditions (UN Department of Public Information, 13^th September, 2007). According to the declaration, indigenous people have the right to know, prior consent of how to use and develop their lands but for many years recommendations by Sinlung Indigenous People Human Rights Organisation (SIPHRO) of India and World Commission of Dams were ignored.

The world is living in the era of climate change and water scarcity, more specifically Bangladesh is the 'Ground Zero' (Huq, 2010) of the impact of climate change. India is not immune as well; they will also have to bear the consequences. Monsoons will be more unpredictable from one year to the next due to climate change and thereby it will hugely affect Indian agriculture sector and subsequently loss of associated livelihood. The rise of the sea level will affect the fishery industries, increase coastal erosion, intrusion of saline water and accelerate further flooding. However, these are just a few examples among many others. In the face of a common threat, instead of being bound up in inflexibility and antagonism, both countries will need to get together and develop a co-ordinated approach (action plan) to tackle those impacts. The impacts are far greater, which will overshadow all kind of other problems. In this regard, unilaterally building a cross border dam is certainly not a way forward. Questions still loom whether India has a comprehensive plan to escalate their long held aspiration to build more cross-border dams. Fararakka barrage has been India's metastatic tumour which is spreading to other parts of the body. First Farakka, then the Gozaldoba Barrage on the Teesta and now Tipaimukh dam - when will it end?

Even bigger concern is geo-physical characteristic of the area where Tipaimukh dam has proposed to be built. On 28 May 2009, Dr. Soibam Ibotombi from the Dept. of Earth Sciences, Manipur University stated ‘Tipaimukh dam is a geo-tectonic blunder of international dimensions’. Analysis of earthquake epicentres and magnitudes of 5M and above within 100-200km radii of Tipaimukh dam site reveals hundreds of earthquakes in the last 100-200 years. It is found that within 100km radius of Tipaimukh, 2 earthquakes of +7M magnitude have taken place in the last 150 years and the last one being in 1957 at an aerial distance of about 75km from the dam site in the ENE direction (Ibotombi, 2009). While facing such possible danger from the earthquakes, it’s not a matter of if – but it’s a matter of when, one can only imagine the scale of devastation that will bring if the dam splits.

Scientists/Experts can only find the facts & figures, but here we need an honest and constructive dialogue (within the realm of possibility) to reach an agreement with India along with the other International bodies to resolve most significantly the present crisis, and deny India’s deliberate infliction of similar policies in the future. Repeatedly, India’s policy on building dams has inflicted irreparable damage to the lives in Bangladesh particularly on those who share the common water course.

Politicians/policy makers of both countries need to shrug off their differences and accelerate the necessary (if there is any) coordinated adaptation process on climate change. Climate change is an imminent and ever-growing common threat for both countries and further escalation in man-made negative environmental impacts must be tackled at the Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) stage; ensure obvious departure from the detrimental policies, which in effect have potential to harm the environment, local livelihoods and economies. Climate-centric cooperation is urgently needed from both sides of the border; the sooner the better. Overwhelming compulsion of domestic politics in Bangladesh need to be transparent and there needs to be a unified voice and strong political will from all political spectrums to avoid another Farakka. Sincerely, we hope that ‘Tipaimukh dam’ issue will not be another local or regional environmental and political shamble.  

Corporate Environmentalism: Still in the shadow of suspicion & guilt

It is widely acknowledged that industrial and business activities have impacts on the environment and they are one of the major sources of environmental pollution. There are overwhelming empirical evidences which suggest that it is true. Traditionally, the corporate manifesto is making money & growth is good while ignoring to protect the nature poses the greatest danger and for many it is the greatest threat on humanity. Supplying natural raw materials and producing waste while maintaining the biodiversity and quality of life is being increasingly undermined since the Industrial revolution.

Industrial revolution in 18^th & 19^th century was a major turning point for human civilisation, which brought profound changes in agriculture, mining, transport and manufacturing sector, in turns it had effects on socio-economic & environmental conditions not only in Britain but also other modern capitalist economy. Consequences of the industrial revolution were using stream that provided power to pump water and machineries. Steam engines and steam turbines required steam boilers, which was one of the major sources of air pollution. In the manufacturing sectors hand worked replaced by machine works and production of goods increased rapidly. More goods had been produced by the industries than before for human consumption and it also created more pollution by burning coal and further utilisation of raw materials, which were significantly needed for the production processes.

Economic growth inspired by the new technologies, growth of capitalism, improved working condition and wellbeing for people had a price to pay by unsustainable growth that eventually resulted in pollution of water, air and soil. Significant pollution also released to environment by industrial accidents over centuries. There are countless examples; in our recent memories we still bare the scar of disaster of Chernobyl in Ukraine, 1979 Three Mile Island in the US, 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy in India, 1952 London smog disaster, Italian dioxin crisis in 1967, BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico 2010 and many more.

Above description is undoubtedly rather frightening, however my intention is not to enter into a detailed description on how industries have been major contributor to the damage to our environment. On the contrary, I would argue that there have been major changes in corporate attitude towards environmental responsibility and business sustainability as a whole for over a quarter of century. Yet public perceptions have not been changed even though industries have shown far better responsibilities towards environmental protection. Big businesses are still being demonised by their legacy and in many cases needs uphill struggle to win hearts and minds of their customers.

Lets go back to late 80’s when the United Nation’s Bruntland Report; also know as ‘Our Common Future’ was published. This report alerted the whole world that economic growth could be maintained without destroying the environment and provided a key statement on ‘Sustainable Development’ as ‘development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.’ Since this report, the role of industries in achieving a sustainable future had become more and more attractive to the policy makers through out the world. It was a turning point for industries who had realised that ‘business as usual’ was not an option any longer. They needed to change their business strategies aimed at moving companies towards sustainable development.

But in reality, why have there been huge changes of attitude? Where the business benefits and pressures come from?  Many businesses have been ‘doing the right thing’ in terms of reducing their environmental impacts primarily to minimise the costs e.g. through increased energy efficiency or waste minimisation. Businesses have realised that there are scopes to increase financial bottom-line, which eventually has triggered businesses to change their attitudes towards environment. Also, new market opportunities have been opened up whilst improving environmental performance of businesses, for example growth of recycling businesses in China and other countries. The United States exported $22 billion worth of recycled materials to 152 countries in 2007 (The New York Times, March 11, 2009). Furthermore, many customers feel and value environmental products and this kind of sales of environmental products can also increase company’s profits.

Businesses community have rightly understood that not only environmental protection to be handled but also wider issues of sustainable development need to be tackled to avoid problems such as liability claims, escalating insurance costs, prosecution, loss of markets and planning problems arising from lack of community goodwill (UK Round Table on Sustainable Development, 1999). Consumers are increasingly taking account of environmental character of products. Because of public concern about environmental issues, promoting environmental care can enhance a company’s image. When a company builds environmental benefit into products, it creates direct values to the consumers. Any false green claims from the company about their products, it will be very quickly found out and that will be a severe consequence upon the company in terms of their selling and rebuilding the reputation (Welford and Gouldson, 1993).

Companies need to make sure that their product manufacturing operations are green, simultaneously it is important to ensure that the suppliers they use who have green credentials such as having an ISO14001 Environmental Management System. Companies are worried about being held liable, environmental damage or found negligent for accidents as over the last two decades health and safety issues and safe working practices have become norm, also plethora of legislations were developed around it.  Employers and employees together have indicated the preferences to work for a good and safe environment and this has become as a major incentive for them to stay within the company (Groundwork, 1995).

Environmental regulations have also been an important driver towards business sustainability. Businesses are now complying with many environmental laws and regulations than they used to comply even a decade ago. Businesses have realised that the consequences of not complying with regulations would often be closure of their businesses (NetRegs, 2003). The European Union (EU) has been an important driver for the promotion of the sustainable development and the single European Act and the Fifth environmental Action Programme towards sustainability, required environmental consideration to be incorporated into all EU policy. Many initiatives from EU for example eco-taxes, the EU eco-labelling scheme and the Eco-management and Audit Scheme (EMAS) have complemented with more voluntary and industry-led approach (Hillary, 2000). European Union (EU) regulations will continue to underpin basic minimum requirements for more sustainable development both now and the future. Therefore, there would be a continuous pressure on the businesses to act responsibly and businesses will constantly monitor existing and likely future environmental and legislative trends, which might influence their business performances (Hillary, 2000).

Reducing costs from the environmental impacts from business activities not only save money but this can be the first step to overall environmental improvement which can later lead to adopt an environmental management system (Welford and Gouldson, 1993). Many experts have suggested that this could be run very efficiently alongside with health and safety (ISO18001) and Information Security (ISO27001) and quality system (ISO9001). All these system could be incorporated within one system which is called Integrated Management System. Big businesses have already started to upgrade their existing systems to Integrated Management System.

Finally, it is often discussed that corporations are locked into a destructive mode of corporate interests, politics and ideologies which could drive how they treat the environment.  More and more corporations are waking up with their moral responsibilities and self-awakening process to flush out so called the ‘old habits’, more specifically ideologies to ignore and many cases obliterate environmental issues. I’m not in any cases advocating that big businesses have suddenly become all green saints, but they should be praised and encouraged when necessary for their good environmental performances. Guilty should be brought to justice if they violate the human rights, health and environmental protection. It’s not helpful at all trying to shift the overall blame onto one section of society for environmental degradation. Society needs them to help to protect the environment, we should stay away from win/lose situation or we-versus-them.