There is no doubt that the climate change issue becomes more and more urgent every day. 13 out of 14 hottest years ever have been noted in the 21st century.
Green activists often accuse big companies and corporations like P&G, PepsiCo or Unilever in being unfriendly to the environment and making a huge contribution to the global warming. Overuse of resources, growing production of plastic, uncontrolled emission and corporate exploitation are among the main problems beyond these and many other corporations. But are there any companies that help the environment?
Environmental corporate social responsibility (or environmental CSR) is a business model where companies are responsible for the influence they have on every aspect of social life, including environment. This approach means that the environment protection companies are eco-conscious and responsible for every decision it makes while producing, selling, packing and delivering the products.
Here are some examples of corporate environmental responsibility
Nike
Worldwide famous sports brand is an example of true environmental responsibility. They are helping the environment with the “If there is no planet, there is no sport” motion. And it sounds pretty fair, doesn’t it? Nike improves the manufacturing process to keep up with the latest eco-friendly technologies and forces the suppliers and distributors in more than 52 countries to do the same.
The company aggressively promotes environmental awareness during the successful marketing campaigns and launches a lot of collections made from the recyclable materials, especially recyclable polyester. Renewable energy is used in Nike plants and stores worldwide. There is no need to mention that most of the packaging for Nike products are made from recycled raw materials.
IKEA
When it comes to the environmental questions, IKEA follows the strategy of saving money for the customer and company and, as a result, saving the environment. The company pays a big attention to the ecological questions and implements eco-friendly decisions for every step of their production and selling process.
Environmental CSR can be seen even in the packaging IKEA uses: firstly, it is made of 100% recycled brown cardboard and, secondly, the company uses flat packs to optimize the delivery process and reduce the CO2 emission. IKEA doesn’t accept the illegal wood from intact forests and has a strict control system for the suppliers.
New Belgium Brewing Company
The third-largest brewery in the US, based in Colorado, makes a lot to improve the environmental standards of their manufacturing process. Brewing requires a lot of energy and creates much waste because the raw material isn’t used fully.
But New Belgium Brewing Company invests in solar panels and alternative energy, uses the wastewater to power the brewing process and offers their employees free bicycles to get around the plant. These efforts create a positive image of the company and are a part of their brand strategy and philosophy.
Disney
Although Disney is associated with film production, this entertainment giant is one of the leaders among the companies that help the world. Disney works to reduce the emission, energy and water usage in their studios and theme parks.
The company also has a very successful zero-waste policy and waste segregation campaign. Can you imagine an impact these actions have on the environment? If a company that big is doing well on reducing the waste and running the eco-positive policy, tons of water are saved and megawatts of renewable energy are used. It also serves as a great example for the whole industry.
Hewlett-Packard (HP)
HP, which holds almost 24% of the IT industry market, was one of the first companies to launch a campaign reducing greenhouse gas emissions. The plan is to cut global emission by 60% by 2025. The company spends money on promoting and sponsoring the green initiatives and invests in cutting back on the manufacturing wastes.
Hewlett-Packard follows a strict eco-policy which stimulates the improvement of the whole goods production: for example, HP lowers the number of toxic substances used in their cartridges and batteries. This corporation also plans to use 100% renewable electricity in the global operations by 2035, with an interim goal of 60% by 2025.
Eco-friendly solutions may seem unprofitable for business owners, but as it can be easily seen from the examples above, helping the environment may be very affordable, socially useful and even money-making because it influences the public image of a company in a very positive way.
Corporations and the environment make good friends, if the businesses are eco-conscious enough. Everyone should support the environmental initiatives of the corporations and promote the eco-friendly way of living and running a business. For the society, for the environment, for the future.
