Mr. Faulkner served as an MP for many years and the Secretary of State under Pierre Trudeau, was a senior executive at Alcan, a major aluminum refining company and was the co-founder of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development(WBCSD), a group of some of the world's largest corporations dedicated to sustainable business practices.
He offered several important insights into the world of business and the environment.
When asked how you form a group of businesses like the WBCSD, he said you must find the right businesses. According to Mr. Faulkner, there are three types of businesses you'll find when an issue like the environment is brought forward: leaders, followers and naysayers. Leaders, which make up 10% of all businesses, are those that are willing to take serious steps forward to deal with environmental issues. Followers (40%) are those that are willing to do something, just as long as someone else will lead. And naysayers (50%) are the group that won't budge and claim that the environment isn't their problem and they have to be accountable to their shareholders.
This is extremely important to realize. For most environmentalists -- especially left-leaners at Trent -- all corporations seem to get clumped into the naysayer category. My experience in several seminars at Trent has been that most if not all corporations are met with strong cynicism. But it is good to know -- especially from a reputable source -- that there companies out there willing to make a positive difference. The leaders, Faulkner said, are the ones you have to identify if you want to get anything done with the private sector. Moreover, it is especially important to have business leaders participate, as getting other businesses to listen seriously to politicians or NGOs is very difficult.
The second main theme he talked about is something that I have been advocating for several years, and that is to place an economic cost on environmental factors. Without this, companies just won't get it. As much as moral and ethical responsibilities are important to business -- and found within the problematic voluntary codes of conduct -- they usually come second to the company's balance sheet. By incorporating the cost of environmentally-impacting actions into the balance sheet, such as carbon emissions, solid waste generation or water pollution, a company can't help but notice and do something about it. This is difficult because coming up with a firm and accurate price level is next to impossible, but giving it some value is extremely important.
According to Mr. Faulkner, it should be governments that put in place firm regulations requiring companies to measure these impacts, rather than companies doing it voluntarily.
The third piece of advice he offered is that when dealing with a business, under no circumstance should one ever lose sight of the fact that it is a business. Businesses are founded on economic growth and financial generation. Trying to tell them that they shouldn't follow that initial goal is a non-starter. Furthermore, one has to remember that when dealing with a business, they might not be as familiar with the environmental issues as you might be. For example, when Mr. Faulkner formed the WBCSD, none of the business leaders were aware of what sustainable business meant. Expecting the CEO of a multibillion dollar company and likely trained in management to know everything about environmental issues is unreasonable.
But he did stress that businesses want to learn more about it. At least the 50% made up of leaders and followers are interested. So for people in the environmental field or being trained in it at a post-secondary level, as we are, the private sector is a relatively untapped and attractive market for people looking for work. It was especially refreshing to hear him say that they genuinely want to do more. Such genuinity in the private sector is often questioned by onlookers, including myself, as I have written about before.
The role of the private sector in shaping global environmental policy is one of the most important yet controversial topics. Many don't want to include it in talks, citing the 'naysayers' and feeling it would only stifle progress. You can't ignore it. But bringing businesses onboard could be one of the most effective and influential moves policymakers could pull off in environmental decision-making.
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