If you think colonialism was something of the past, you will be surprised to see this documentary. It completely chocked and blew my mind that things like this is happening. Now, in modern time and ones again Africa is the victim.
Watch it on YouTube and please share it. This one must be seen by as many as possible.
It can be frustrating to hear all the talk about reduced carbon emissions while the statistics shows something different. It’s easy to loose hope when listening to today’s news about disaster after disaster. However, there’s still hope. And there’s a plan too.
Read the Exponential Road Map launched this autumn by the Exponential Road Map initiative bringing together NGOs, companies, technology and science.
It explores the actions needed by each industry and suggest essential policy making that needs to happen. Only two countries today are carbon negative and with current policies we will increase temperatur with 2 degrees Celsius with 97%. The road map is essential and should be shared, communicated and companies and politicians should be hold accountable.
Read, learn and share!
The 21-24 of January the world leaders meet in Davos under the theme Stakeholders for a Cohesive and Sustainable World. Climate Change is becoming higher and higher on the agenda of these international high-level forum meetings. However, is there enough words shared to create the road map leading to actions that are necessary? I don’t know and who lives will see.
Time flies by and suddenly Christmas is here and 2019 is about to end. Every year I reflect upon what I’ve done the last year, what has left my life, what has enter and who I have become? Everything is in constant change and some of it are our responsibility.
This year I’m doing something new. I’m summarising my professional life and I thought, why not sharing it with you?
At Swedish Red Cross
A sustainable annual conference! I was very happy to be a part of lowering our CO2 emissions, using renewable materials and a sustainable food meny.
New second hand camping materials. This year we have accelerated our communication in sustainability.
New guide for sustainable consumption and production at second hand for volunteers.
Acceleration of sustainable ambassadors project. First year we are using Volontärbyrån to recrute new volunteers for sustainability and, the interest and people, entering the project is absolutely amazing.
Visiting Wargön Innovation, Retuna Återbruksgalleria and the new second hand in Gothenburg. Digging into challenges in the textile industry.
Campaign days for second sand such as the fashion show in Umeå and White Monday camping in Nacka by the local branches.
Updated policy for sustainable development.
New action plan in sustainability for 2019-2023.
New strategy and working group to lowering our CO2 emissions (and It’s been working!!!)
Education in digital meetings for staff.
Participated in Climate Strike in September.
Fairtrade campaign at our head office.
Continually training in sustainability for volunteers and employed.
Progress in sustainable IT.
Updated material in sustainability for local branches.
Not to mention all the processes started and the international interest of the Red Cross movement of what we’re doing. It’s been a teamwork and I’m so proud of what we’re doing. Red Cross Sweden website will soon be updated about the details of our sustainability work.
Digital platforms
Updated my website (totally my own work and design so happy to know how to build one).
New blog - Take Action - finally a platform where I can share knowledge for anyone who likes to dig into facts and learn about how you can create change.
New blog - A Sustainable Closet - I lacked inspirational blogs in fashion from a sustainability perspective. I’m so glad I’ve launched it and I feel very grateful for all the people I have interviewed.
Instagram - this one hasn’t grown or prospered, I have rather chosen to spend less time on it and I like the change. However, I feel very grateful everytime someone approach me and say they find my page inspriring. It means a lot to me. Not to mention all the friends I’ve got to know this year through Instagram.
Network
The blogs and podcasts I’ve been visiting. I’m so happy for being a part of Steg for Steg, Hållbar Profil, Power Women Wednesday Interview by Residus, Tillväxtparadigmet, Evolution Show and Reform Travel. All created by people I inspire and admire.
Sustainable Influencers - even though I’m not officially a part of the network and I’m so glad to meet so many people for the first time in Real Life. All these beautiful souls wanting to make the world a better place.
Young Sustainability Professionals - thanks again to the board providing conference and afterwork where you can share your dilemmas and get inspired by others.
Conferences, panels and seminars - this one could be long but every time I meet someone else who really want to make a difference, I feel empowered. No one mentioned, no one forgotten.
Travels
Visiting Israel and Jordan (again) for leisure and a friend working with the conflict there.
Train visits to Copenhagen (one of my favourite cities).
Train ride to Switzerland from Sweden and back home.
Train ride to Hong Kong from Sweden, exploring Russia and China (it was such an awesome trip).
Trip to Egypt for kite surfing, pyramids and holiday
I’m happy about the train rides that has been lowering my CO2 footprint and I’m hoping for a future with fossil free travels, more time to travel by land and more people who go traveling. That’s how you learn about the world.
Yoga and spiritual development
This year I have rebuilt my strength and health and has finally been able to get back to more physical yoga. However, my attitude has change completely and I have surrendered for what is without any wishes for my body to be this way or that way. I feel healthy and strong and my depression feels so far away. I’ve done two meditation retreats and have continued my practice in the beginning of the year. Now I spend more time sleeping but still feel mentally strong and happy. I’ve set myself free from dependence.
I also feel very grateful for my teaching at Elit Solvik. The best gym in town.
Person of inspiration
Jay Shetty - thank you for entering my life. Thanks for the tools to eradicate suffering and entering bliss and harmony. I have finally come to peace at being in Stockholm. Developed better relationships and get rid of my anxiety. I’m very very grateful!
Looking for 2020
Finishing my book
Yoga teaching as you never seen it
Upgrading my fashion blog
Learning Spanish
Total bliss and harmony
Re-visiting my Instagram and change of profile
Growth in consulting for smaller companies in other industries in sustainability
Hiking and camping - more time in nature
Develop Red Cross sustainability and change in the whole movement
I’m very very happy and very very grateful and I know we’re creating so much change other!
Time for a break!
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year!
Photo: WWF
Something I believe in is to know the facts and figures to make proper decisions. Any company or organisation claiming to be climate friendly, neutral or positive should be transparent about how they measure, what they measure and trends over time not to confuse consumers or members.
On an individual basis I don’t find measures as important since the ones provided are not so accurate and I prefer individuals to focus on areas they can impact. From an individual perspective I find it more important to increase the mass of people making sustainable choices than to focus on details over individual choices. Sustainability also tend to be equalised with CO2 footprint. I believe a lower CO2 footprint than the average is a part of a sustainable living but I would also say it’s not crucial neither does it have to come first for someone changing their lifestyle. A sustainable living for me incorporate other aspects such as physical and mental health, inclusion and non-discrimination, choices towards increased biodiversity and so on. But for those who are worried about the climate crisis and for those who want’s to change their lifestyle towards one with lower carbon footprint, they can measure their footprint! If you want to make climate friendly actions it makes perfectly sense to know the data.
Sometimes we end up in discussions on how to fly or not, to be vegan or not, be self-sustained on the country side or not and these extremes often don’t lead to profound choices based on facts. For example, the emissions from one flight between Stockholm and Gothenburg is approximately the same as changing from normal meat diet to a vegan diet for 100 days. That calculation is based on a study in the USA and the carbon flight footprint by My Climate, so should be taken with a capital A on approximately.
For some of us there are areas in our life that might be more easy to change; housing, transport, diet, consumption are all areas we have different relationships to. By calculating the total CO2 footprint you know which areas has the highest impact and where you have the lowest impact. For some, just exchanging a few flights to a train ride can make a huge difference, while minor actions such as exchanging meat for veggies might not result in such a high difference if you just do it ones a week, but if you do it more often and keep on measuring your footprint, you'll see a change.
I would encourage everyone to measure their individual CO2 footprint and see if there’s some low-hanging fruits to pick from. Are there areas easily changeable? Every action counts, large or small.
Personally, my footprint has been more or less the same the last few years. Except my private flight travels I’m down at 500 kilos. With my travels my 2019 footprint will be 5 tons CO2. My work footprint I haven’t measured but my food consumption is my private and I only travel by train. However, even if you score 20 tons CO2 per year, don't feel hopeless. It’s easy to go from high to lower, it get’s harder when you start to go down to 3-5 ton.
How much CO2 we have as individuals has been stated to be around 1 ton per year to meet the Paris Agreement. However, I find it a little bit misleading because what we need to do is to come out of fossil dependence and it should be zero. A good mark is the average carbon footprint per year in Sweden which is 9 ton per person. If you can get lower than 9 ton, that’s a good start!
Don’t try to lower you CO2 more than you can handle, if you end up at 3 or 4, maybe it makes better sense for you to help others or a company/organisation to start measuring and lowering their CO2 instead of you fighting for your own? I believe we need to look beyond ourselves as individuals and put more efforts at an organisational level, however, by measuring your footprint you have a more accurate view on your living and a better sense on what to focus on.
Here are some platforms you can use to measure your own CO2 footprint. If you want to be professional and more accurate I would advise you to use all of them and then make an average based on several measures.
Good Luck!
Deedster - an app for your lifestyle
My Climate - transportation, housing and events
Carbon Footprint calculator - housing, transportation and consumption
Carbon Footprint Calculator, Nature - housing, consumption, transportation and food
Klimatkalkylatorn WWF - housing, transportation, food and consumption
Klimatkontot - housing, transportation, food and consumption
Klimatbalans - heat and transportation
Utsläppsrätt - heat and transportation
Climate hero - housing, transportation and consumption
Klimatmål ICA - food
Transportstyrelsen - flights
Zero Mission - flights
A few readings I’ve done lately! If there’s anything particular you would like me to share, please let me know. My list is long and this is just an example of few.
One of the first name you will encounter if you study sustainability is Rachel Carson. A zoologist and writer who’s book Silent Spring led to the creation of the Environmental Protection Agency. Some people claim that her book was the start of the environmental activism of modern time. Get to know her by reading the article this by Brain Pickings.
Ever heard about Contract for the Web? Ever heard about Tim Berners-Lee? Well, the founder of the Web has an idea on how to fix it. Not many details given in this article but I believe we’re on the horizon to reinvent the purpose with the World Wide Web.
Latin America and COP25. In what ways do the continent relate to the climate crisis? From Chile to Madrid, COP25 has been moved. A short introduction for anyone who’s been following the turbulens at the continent. In reality a very complex issue not satisfied in this article.
Menstrual poverty. Yes, there’s such thing since many women globally can’t afford feminine napkins, don’t have access to sanitation, can’t change their napkin privately and are living under sigma. That’s why it’s important to change culture and norms but also provide women with practical solutions that lowers the costs and makes it easier for women to have fulfilling lives while bleeding. This innovation, a reusable feminine napkin is currently being tested.
Emission Gap Report. If we want to keep global warming under 1.5 degrees globally we need to cut emissions by 7.6% annually between 2020 and 2030. This report shows the scenarios, the challenges and possibilities to keep global warming under worse-case scenario.
Återbruksbarometern (A report about the climate benefits of reusing textiles). You have to buy 197 second hand jeans to come up to the same CO2 emissions as one pair of jeans. A study done in Sweden by the second hand chain Björk&Frihet.
Photo: Flight Aware
Photo: Flightradar24 AB
Photo: Number of flights in million from 2014 to 2019.
Introduction
Except when someone is attacking Greta Thunberg, there’s probably nothing that evokes more feelings among the environmental movement in Sweden than flying. In Sweden we have even developed a shame around the subject. To fly has become shameful but how you experience the shame probably has to do with your surrounding. For someone working with sustainability this is very evident. If you fly, you almost loose your credibility, even if you are called Al Gore and travel around the world to educate people about climate change. On the other side, there’s people, business leaders, politicians and public figures that doesn’t want to change their behaviour at all and see the climate crisis as something that should be solved by someone else.
What is it about flying that evokes so strong feelings? I believe debates like this needs to be presented with facts and moral dilemmas have to be dissected. Because just like any other issue in the field of sustainability - it is not that simple.
To make it easy for myself and readers all the references are links instead of being listed in the end of the article.
How flying (aviation) effects the climate?
Globally, the transportation sector was responsible for 20% of the global CO2 emissions in 2014, according to the World Bank. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), transportation stood for 14% in 2010. The figures here are different, because either the share of CO2 emissions has decreased a lot from transportation or the methods of calculating is different. Regarding how much of this that comes from aviation depends on the source. According to an article from International Council on Clean Transportation (ICCT), commercial aviation stands for 2.4% of the global CO2 emissions in 2018. According to the European Union the global share of emissions from aviation is 2% and within EU it stands for 3% of direct CO2 emissions. I believe we can call these figures approximately, if you look at the global picture of CO2, it doesn’t sound very high, but if you take a look at what flying is and the change over time, you will get another picture.
Trends in flying
The trend is that globally we travel more and more by aircraft. So far 2019, there has been global increase with 5% for passengers since 1990 this means a 300% increase in totalt passengers (from 2016 to 2017 it was a 7.3% increase). It is a exponential increase and in 2019 it is expected to reach 39.4 million flights. On one of the busiest days of the year, 200 000 flights were recorded on the same day. Several countries are now facing dilemmas. The director of Independent UK of national traffic even claim that this can be a peak of what the industry can handle without delays. In 2030 delays might increase with 50% if airspace remains the same according to a strategy by Department of Transport in UK.
“In 2000, the average citizen flew just once every 43 months. In 2017, the figure was once every 22 months. Flying has never been more accessible.” said Alexandre de Juniac, IATA’s Director General and CEO.
In carbon emissions this means a huge increase. According to ICCT the CO2 emissions from aviation has increased with 32% over the five past years (article from 2018). This growth rate is 70% higher than previously estimated. This shows that aviation as transportation is increasing rapidly. Of these flights 2/3 were domestic (not the same as percentage in CO2, the longer flight, the higher CO2)! Where IPCC says about 30–35% of total air transport is domestic.
By 2020, global international aviation emissions are projected to be around 70% higher than in 2005 and the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) forecasts that by 2050 they could grow by a further 300-700%.
According to Oxford Business Group the growth and estimated growth depends on four factors: lower air fare, increased numer of people in middle class, increased demand for global connectivity in an global economic world and a booming tourism industry. Of course there factors and intervened and connected and not separate factors.
Differences between countries
The country with most aircrafts in the air positioned by satellite are USA. Sweden is number 19 on the list. I would guess the data shows flights this year until current date but this is not clearly written. You could compare the average daily flight for USA (410,543,327), the day I visited, compared to Sweden (83,281).
Based on the same ICCT study several countries were overrepresented when it came to percentage of flights being domestic flights. Brazil (92%), USA (91%), China (91%), Indonesia (89%) and Australia (86%), all countries with huge land area. Still, since the land do belong the same country, it would be interesting to see how these countries could cut emissions with investment in fast trains, or other more environmental friendly transportation moods, between major travel routes. That study also conclude that the top tens countries with highest carbon emissions passenger per departure are USA, China, United Kingdom, Japan, Germany, United Arabs Emirates, India, France, Australia and Spain.
International Air Transport Association also publish figures based on the global distribution in terms of passengers and market share. Directly taken from their website:
Airlines in the Asia-Pacific region once again carried the largest number of passengers.
1. Asia-Pacific 36.3% market share (1.5 billion passengers, an increase of 10.6% compared to the region’s passengers in 2016)
2. Europe 26.3% market share (1.1 billion passengers, up 8.2% over 2016)
3. North America 23% market share (941.8 million, up 3.2% over 2016)
4. Latin America 7% market share (286.1 million, up 4.1% over 2016)
5. Middle East 5.3% market share (216.1 million, an increase of 4.6% over 2016)
6. Africa 2.2% market share (88.5 million, up 6.6% over 2016).
The top five airlines ranked by total scheduled passenger kilometers flown, were:
1. American Airlines (324 billion)
2. Delta Air Lines (316.3 billion)
3. United Airlines (311 billion)
4. Emirates Airline (289 billion)
5. Southwest Airlines (207.7 billion)
The top five international/regional passenger airport-pairs** were all within the Asia-Pacific region, again this year:
1. Hong Kong-Taipei Taoyuan (5.4 million, up 1.8% from 2016)
2. Jakarta Soekarno-Hatta-Singapore (3.3 million, up 0.8% from 2016)
3. Bangkok Suvarnabhumi-Hong Kong (3.1 million, increase of 3.5% from 2016)
4. Kuala Lumpur–Singapore (2.8 million, down. 0.3% from 2016)
5. Hong Kong-Seoul Incheon (2.7 million, down 2.2% from 2016)
The top five domestic passenger airport-pairs** were also all in the Asia-Pacific region:
1. Jeju-Seoul Gimpo (13.5 million, up 14.8% over 2016)
2. Melbourne Tullamarine-Sydney (7.8 million, up 0.4% from 2016)
3. Fukuoka-Tokyo Haneda (7.6 million, an increase of 6.1% from 2016)
4. Sapporo-Tokyo Haneda (7.4 million, up 4.6% from 2016)
5. Beijing Capital-Shanghai Hongqiao (6.4 million, up 1.9% from 2016)
So let’s not confuse the data here. Asia is high on the top when it comes to numer of passengers. When you compare number of flights being domestic and international flights, big land area countries are overrepresented. When you compare routes between cities, Japan, Australia and China is more frequent. When you compare CO2 emissions on passengers departure, then you get the list of 10 countries. But to make the statistic fair you have to put in relation to per capita per country and income level.
Which the ICCT study did. “High-income countries were responsible for 62% of CO2 emitted from passenger aircraft in 2018, followed by upper middle (28%), lower middle income (9%), and low income (1%). This means that overall, less developed countries that contain half of the world’s population accounted for only 10% of all passenger transport-related aviation CO2”, says the report.
What about Sweden?
Just as the rest of the world, our travels by airline are increasing. Since 1990 our international trips has doubled, which is a larger increase than the increase in population. The CO2 emissions from flying in Sweden has increased with 43% since then compared to 2017. This means from 7 million tons CO2 to today’s 10 million ton in CO2. If you calculate per person this menas 1 ton per person and year. However, a large proportion of the population cannot travel with airline due to age or sickness (even if some travel with their babies it’s still not their choice). A more reasonable figure would be people between 18-65 (or a higher age since a lot of people travel when they have retired), still that would be maximum 2 tons per person and year since 57% of the population is within that age gap.
If you compare to the global average, Swedes fly five times as much. So not among the worse citizens compared to all countries, but we do belong to an elite of high income countries who has a higher carbon footprint due to aviation.
What about efficiency?
Aviation has become more energy efficient but not as fast as one should expect. In 1950s the rate of fuel consumption reduction were 3-6%, but are now as low as 1-2%. Probably because better technology takes even more time. Some airlines have made a larger effort to become more efficient than others, however since the number of passengers are growing the efficiency doesn’t resulted in any total reduction of CO2 emissions.
Many more questions remain such as if there are better airlines, what about new techniques? How can we cut carbon from traveling? What about traveling for work? And what should you do as an individual?
This is the first part where I present data and then deal with these questions.
While writing my upcoming post about carbon footprint from flying I started to dig into alternatives instead of fossil fuel. How far away are we from sustainable aviation? The best source of information regarding clean energy is of course Johan Landgren - so watch Evolution Show if you want to learn more. In these three episodes he’s interviewing Anders Forslund, CEO of Heart Aerospace.
One of their planes are planned to be operating by 2025, capacity for 90 passengers and with a range of 400 km. It’s 100% electric. The plane would be able to operate 200 persons per day. 1/3 of the domestic flights in Sweden are under 400 km and could therefore theoretically be replaced. However, the aim is to be able to create direct flight routes between smaller Swedish cities instead of flights going through Stockholm.
According to Anders, the range could be doubled and that has to do with energy density. He doesn’t believe cross-Atlantic any time soon. However, 85% of departures world wide and 40% of emissions are from short-haul flights, 2000 km. It would in other ways be possible with one stop over to cover most of Europe.
Aviation has an exponential growth curve, 80& of the population has never set a foot on the plane says Anders.
This is very informative, scientific and morally guide conversation. High quality. We need more of these conversation.
The facts here, presented in this way, is something that everybody should see. It tells us how urgent the situation is and shows perfectly how the distribution look like regarding time, country, production, consumption. inequality and so on. Visit Our World In Data! Facts from the World Bank.
Photo: Ian Allen
I’ve actually been on one week holiday! It’s not until you have worked full-time for more than a year you understand why people need holiday. I seperate holidays with travels, those are two different things for me. But this post is not about my personal life - it’s about what you should read. What I wanted to say is that I’ve been catching up with plenty of readings since I got back, one week without it is a lot for me. Many things are happening in the field of sustainability, everything from COP25 not happening in Chile to the different articles about climate compensation.
Here’s a short list:
Future Earth’s annual report “Late last year the United Nations’ 1.5°C Special Report warned that climate inaction could lead to irreversible impacts on ecosystems, biodiversity, food security, and more. Most recently, the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES) IPBES Global Assessment found that nature is declining at rates unprecedented in human history with grave impacts for economies, livelihoods, health, and quality of life worldwide. We need fundamental, large-scale reorganization across all technological, economic, and social paradigms, and we need it now.” - Introduction by the Executive director of Future Earth! This platform for trans-disciplinary research, govern by UN bodies and the International Science Council is a must for anyone interested in global sustainable development.
Exclusive interview with Patagonia’s founder Yvon Chouinard. “Everything man does creates more harm than good. We have to accept that fact and not delude ourselves into thinking something is sustainable.” - This 81 year old man’s perspective on capitalism and eagerness to save the planet. This is a must! Read it.
Demonstrations around the world. In Chile, Iraq, Bolivia, Hong Kong.. in several countries people are demonstrating for different reasons. Some of the common reasons are climate change, corruption and inequality. I’ll hope these protests is a sign of a new world order soon taking place. Their outcome (especially Hong Kong) will tell us if it’s a desired outcome or not.
Nobel Peace Prize to prime minister Abiy Ahmed Ali. We will se if the peace lasts between Ethiopia and Eritrea, however good for Africa and hopefully more leaders will follow his example.
96 cities meet to discuss how they can become more climate friendly. The meeting was hold in Copenhagen for cities leading the transition. Innovations and strategies were discussed.
Global Investors for Sustainable Development, GISD. “UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres announced a CEO alliance to support SDG financing, telling private sector leaders that investing in sustainable development is “not a matter of goodwill” but the root of long-term global prosperity. The alliance was developed by the UN Department of Economic and Social Affairs (DESA) in close collaboration with the Swedish International Development Cooperation Agency (SIDA), based on the design of the Swedish Investors for Sustainable Development.” - Yepp, let’s see how this network can help to redirect investments, without them it will be hard to reach the global goals.
Emotional intelligence and why employers seeks it. A nice article written by Harvey Deutschendor. I also like to read about personal and individual development.
Just a few things, enjoy.
In this video I’m sharing my experience of pushing and blaming individuals to live sustainable lives. I share several dilemmas with this approach and have personal bad experience of anxiety.
My main message is that it’s good that individuals as consumers start to care about how their behaviour is affecting the planet, however no one else can tell them what’s sustainable or not since we all have different priorities of issues that we are interested in and possibilities to make individual change. Further, it requires too much information of a single individual to make a sustainable choice and therefore the responsibility to change the society can not be put on individuals. We also need to be more people who are engaged in the state of our planet and who are contributing to sustainability and therefore we need to allow a diversity of approaches since very few people can live up to such high standards of sustainable living.
In other words not everyone has to be vegan, fly-free or child-free to be able to talk about climate change.
I want a world with happiness and prosperity, that’s why I’m working with sustainability. And I don’t believe in shaming or feelings of guilt for change making. I believe that change starts with oneself and that means to be a happy person and doing what you can do with more focus on the collective level.
You’re welcome to discuss with me but I only answer reflections if you have watch the whole video. Be a part of the movement for a sustainable world but it has to be sustainable for yourself and only you know what that means.
This morning I had the opportunity to participate in a seminar related to the global goals. I wrote my master thesis about how the global goals are related to different ways of measuring welfare. I spent about six months digging into the Agenda 2030 and have from a distance followed it’s process.
My expertise has also been used at my current working place where we did a proper mapping towards our activities. There’s a few things I think it’s very important to remember for any organisation or company using the global goals and these are:
Stay true to your purpose and strategic work. Way to often I see business uses sustainability, claiming it to be a part of their DNA, where I would say that its definitely not the case if its not in the organisational chart of strategic guidelines. The aim of most business is to make profit - not to create a more sustainable world.
Look at the targets. It’s not the 17 themes you would mapp to - the goals are rather 169 and they are way more specific. What’s happening is that people claim to work with goal 13 since they’re reducing their carbon emissions but if you look at goal 13 there is no target saying that emissions should be reduced.
Contribute to them or let them guide your work. There are two different approaches, you can either mapp your current work to the goals and see if there’s a overlap, this means you are contributing to the goals, or you can use the goals to create your own goals within your organisation to contribute. Some businesses are using the goals to create their own action plans in sustainability. If the global goals are helping more companies to be more sustainable, then that’s really good but the indicators you’re using will probably be very different from the one set at UN level. For example goal 6, to provide safe drinking water to everyone globally is not the same thing as reducing water use in your production line.
Communicate fair. If you are contributing, explain it, if you measure say how, if you set target and goals, be transparent. Unfortunately the goals has become the new green washing. If you just see a goal without any explanation of how, then you should be critical. Do the proper work and explain in details how you’ve done your mapping.
The agenda as the new CRS for partnership. This one might not always be a good thing since I believe civil society needs to stay true to it’s purpose and I believe the business sector have to realise that you can’t just pick one goal, they are all intervened and can’t be separated. Sustainable development can only happen when environmental issues and social issues are being adressed as a common issue where the solution need to result in synergies.
I hope my reflections have given you something to think about and ask yourself how your current working place are using Agenda 2030 and the global goals.
The last week I’ve been busy with traveling and haven’t had the same opportunity to read as much as I normally do. But here are a few things I came across the last week:
Texas daily - an article about the climate scientist and christian Katharine Hayhoe. Famous for her communications skills and probably one of the most experienced when it comes to climate change denial. The article of her interesting profil gives you new perspectives on science, climate change and arguments for those who don’t believe in climate science.
Health benefits of forest bathing. Just as much as I read about sustainable development I read about human health. Because my passion is really about how can human beings and other living things av a good and prosperous life? I’m glad research tells us what’s actually good with spending time in nature. We need the evidence for serious forest protection. Healthy ecosystems leads to healthy immune systems.
Hunger in Zambia and children out of school in Mali. It’s important to stay in tuned with what’s happening in the world. When discussing sustainable development, let us never forget the people and children who’s primary needs are not being met. It’s a very sad story that hunger, terror and lack of education is still happening and even though more and more people are being lift out from poverty, it doesn’t mean that development is always progressing on all places.
New Year for United Nations. Many people might have seen Greta Thunbergs speech but not everyone know during what meeting she was participating. The general secretary of United Nations opened its 74th meeting and climate change was high on the agenda but not the only topic being discussed. Actually less then half of the members states participated in the climate top meeting and countries efforts are still not in line with the Paris Agreement. For a week all member states are having a speech and out of 192 of them, only 16 were women (!). Current conflicts were also discussed and other political statement was made from Donal Trump and Jair Bolsonaro among others. United Nations can never be better then it member states, something I concluded already in high school while writing a paper on United Nations.
Good News! Recently me and a friend disagreed upon if the world gets better and not. I say no, he says yes. Maybe for the majority of human beings, life is improving in terms of basic needs and material standard. But what about quality of life? And what about the environmental costs of climate change and biodiversity loss? I’m not sure if we can say things are improving. However, child mortality is decreasing, stores in Thailand will stop giving plastic bags to consumers and investment in renewables from 2010 to 2019, four doubled. Always something to be happy about.
Sweden and Agenda 2030. There are a few areas where we are doing good and in others we are not. Carbon based consumption emissions are not decreasing, deadly violence has increased the last few years, there’s still gender gap in some area even though our aid policies are being cherished. Good and bad, still not enough. Will we reach the goals?
Then two inspiring videos - Abba Björn about Greta Thunberg and this wonderful fictional narrative by Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez presented by The Intercept and Naomi Klein.
Photo: GIVA
For those of you who are reading my blog - now you know where to get proper information to educate yourself. I will continue to post about where you can educate yourself and learn more about sustainable development.
One thing that most people can do but is seldom discussed is private donation to charity. Unfortunately to give away money has become a little bit out of fashion. At the second hand market this is obvious, people donate gifts for the sake of the environment instead of funding humanitarian projects. I believe this is a shift that has happened the last few years.
Donations has also been associated with “paying off” your debt. To donate is the same thing as not trying to change yourself or your business, instead of taking your responsibility you chose to pay to clear your consciousness. This used to be the principle of CSR - corporate social responsibility - where businesses are funding social projects they believe in. Now it has changed and CSR is more about the business own sustainability.
However, just to focus on the power of consumers, your political voice and your eagerness to share sustainability on social media, you’re missing a fundamental important aspect of where change is taking place; at the civil society! Civil society consist of associations/organisations without any interest in profit making, rather they’re representing an idea or value based on their members interests. It might be related to culture, the environment, social issues and so on, but the purpose with different organisations in civil society is to gather people around a common cause.
Most of these organisations gets funding from their local municipality or the government. The ones who doesn’t accept these funding, like Amnesty, do so to be impartial and free of political influence. Some of the organisations might get funding from other funds, established in the past to save culture heritage or empowering women who wants to educate themselves. Other’s get funding from corporations or businesses and in many cases this can be the primary source of funding and fundamental for some activities existence. Postkodlotteriet and H&M are two of these companies with their own funds that some organisations in the civil society relay on.
What happens when the public stop donating money? A lot of the funding goes away and less activities are happening. And more dangerous; it becomes harder and harder for the civil society to be independent. The government has their agenda and so does the corporations! Private donations are essential to keep the core value of an organisation. It’s about establishing trust where the public sector are represented by the civil society. Because what do the organisations consists of? Members from the public sectors who votes for the strategy and agenda!
What do you get:
Professionals writing reports
Professionals educating the public
Campaigns to push policy makers
Activities that gathers other change makers
Materials you can use as a consumer, voter or at your profession
Professionals creating long-term change
Global development
Organisations addressing issues that regardless of how ethical you consumption behaviour becomes they’re the only ones that truly can help a desperate person or a river in a foreign country
Empowerment of other people that doesn’t live in free democarcy’s
Sometimes we are so narrow minded in the debate about sustainability and forget to help to fund local sustainability in other areas where funding is desperately needed.
Some people complain about that the money mainly going to administration costs, but do you ask yourself the same question when buying a shirt? Because at the moment the money goes to the business and not the workers. Do you ask yourself the same question when buying vegetables, how much of the money that goes to the farmers? To donate money is the same thing as buying an idea so then you should follow the principle in all cases.
Further, the administration costs are very low, between 12-25%. In Sweden you can look at, what we call IKS - this number says how much the organisation but on administration. But this figure is not very relevant anyway because it doesn’t say anything about quality. It doesn’t say anything about what have the rest of the money contributed to.
As for someone working in the civil society - I personally know the benefits of keeping a high quality with well paid jobs compared on being cheap and looking for short term solutions. Because they might be cheap in the short run but doesn’t really contribute to the long term sustainability and cost efficiency of the organisation.
Here are some statistics of the Swedes will to donate:
8.8 billion SEK was donated to charity in 2018
2 of 3 Swedes donate money
8 of 10 are positive about donating money
6 of 10 have donated the last 6 months
100 SEK per month is the most common donation sum (figures from 2015 says 700 SEK per person and year)
The amount of donated money have increased the last few years
It seems like we’re pretty good at helping out financially but the sum of money is very little. And why don’t everybody contribute? The poorest should of course look after themselves first but why don’t we donate more money per person? I don’t want to refer to any religion but the magic 10% (what you should give away of your income) makes a lot of sense and is mentioning in various traditions.
The more we give, the more we are contributing to a better world. And in my case I see nothing wrong with a lot of people working in the civil society since the fundamental reason for it’s existence is to serve the interest of the public.
If we want a more sustainable world - civil society has an important role to play.
I’ve done my homework and it’s been a week and I’m going to share with you what I’ve been reading about this week.
Salaries among professionals in Sustainability by Aktuellt Hållbarhet (more than 2000 respondents)- this is a really important one since the profession is quite new. And when I say new it doesn’t mean that people haven’t been calculating carbon footprint or doing risk assessment on their businesses before, CSR, Corporate Social Responsibility, have been with us for some time now. What is new is; 1. the urgent and serious aspect of sustainable development (we’re in a climate crisis), 2. the new university degrees and high skilled labour (a lot of programmes at universities didn’t exist 10 years ago, now you can educate yourself to became a Head of Sustainability), 3. the profession is dominated by females (new or not, but the trend is that more women care about our planet and it’s people and they’re also more well-educated to do so). The results are interesting for several reasons, 1. the sectors with high salaries represent the rest of the market (financial etc.), 2. to what extent salaries matters (not that much)and 3. there’s gender discrimination among people working with sustainability (Why didn’t this one reached the headlines?). Read it and get our own opinion.
A paper published by Ellen MacArthur Foundation tells us that renewable energy isn’t enough to tackle climate change. Greenhouse gas emissions are not falling quickly enough to achieve climate targets and switching to renewable energy can only cut them by 55%. The remaining 45% of emissions come from how we make and use products, and how we produce food. Nothing new maybe but we need papers like this to get the figures right. The paper tells us how a circular economy can achieve a reduction totalling 9.3 billion tones of greenhouse gases in 2050. This is equivalent to eliminating current emissions from all forms of transport globally. Read: Completing the Picture: How the Circular Economy Tackles Climate Change.
Global Climate Strike the 27th of September of 2019. If you have found my blog, you are have probably heard about the global climate strikes that took place this Friday. What you should know is that 6000 strikes took place in 170 countries and millions of people joined. 170 000 in New Zeeland, over 300 000 in Montreal and 60 000 people in Stockholm. More and more people start to raise their voice for the climate.
The latest IPCC report, special report on the ocean and cryosphere in a changing climate. These are sad news but we have to listen to science. With a 2 degree up-warming (with current policies we won’t be able to reach this target rather an average of 3-4 degree up-warming of global temperature), 99% av the coral reefs will vanish! At Iceland, 400 of their glacier will be gone within 200 years. The sea level is rising more than expected, in 2100 we’re talking about one meter which is devastating for many low coastal lands. Spices are dying at a rapid rate, about 200 per day where a changing climate is one of the factors.
We’re in deep shit. Have a lovely weekend.
Photo: Tess Waltenburg
I’m feeling very grateful and happy to be able to share my perspective on a sustainable lifestyle in Steg For Steg - a podcast founded by the sustainable influencer Tess Waltenburg. This episode is about how I became interested in sustainability, why I decided to change my lifestyle but it’s also about my weaknesses and my anxiety - and areas which I’m not making a change.
Thanks again for having me, it’s such a beautiful, but also scary thing to be vulnerable.
I have to be honest - my weekly read series haven’t been on a weekly basis even if I read articles on a weekly basis. So from now one I will number them to make is easier for readers. I find it very important to read articles about politics, economics, aid, climate change and so on for people into these topics to have some kind of idea of what kind of world they’re operating in. To often we spend to much time on reading headlines on social media and way to often we don’t read the whole story. Further News on traditional media might not cover the most important news, so here are my tips on what you should read this week:
Omvärlden - (a Swedish magasin about global issues) on Greenpeace view on the current negotiations about the “Paris Agreement” for oceans. I found this one very important since so little has been written about the global UN negotiations regarding how to conserve and protect marine life beyond national borders.
Omvärlden - about the Goalkeepers report “Examining Inequality 2019” from Bill Gates Foundation. The report is about human capital and differences when it, for example, comes to child mortality between countries but also within countries. It also highlighes areas where global goals such a eradicating poverty and provide primary health services won’t be met by 2030. Further, it includes the existing gender inequality. A report anyone into global development should read.
Omvärlden - Peoples’s Summit on Climate, Rights and Human Survival initiated by Greenpeace and Amnesty took place 18-19 of September. 200 people gathered to discuss the relationship between human rights and the climate crisis. The outcome is a declaration with the purpose to push governments to act.
10 most censured countries - a summery of censorship in different countries by Committee to Protect Journalists. “In the top three countries; Eritrea, North Korea, and Turkmenistan, the media serves as a mouthpiece of the state, and any independent journalism is conducted from exile. The few foreign journalists permitted to enter are closely monitored. Repressive governments use sophisticated digital censorship and surveillance alongside more traditional methods to silence independent media.” Says the report. A very important topic!
Measure your water footprint - most of us have heard about carbon footprint and ecological footprint - but how does our consumption behaviour affect the worlds supply of water? Did you know that 1 kg of avocado requires 10 bathtubs? 1 kg of meat 15 000 liters of water? Make sure you measure your water footprint!
Women and inventions! I’m tired of hearing story’s of men and their role in history. Let’s talk about the women because you can probably list a few life changing inventions by men but what about the ones invented by women?
How to tackle climate change? A lot of people have opinions about the most effective way to take action on climate change, well there’s research on the field. Project Drawdown has the answers. Do the quiz and see how well informed your are about the actions that will reduce the carbon the most.
And of course, this has to be mentioned, the global strike initiated by Fridays For Future has now started and the 27th of September is going to be the largest strike ever hold! I’ll see you there right?
Photo: Private
For any organisation, business or local, regional or central authority (actors), there are a few things that should be in place if they want to claim they’re working with sustainability. Way to often I meet businesses or other actors that tell me they do work with sustainability, but they mostly refer to their CRS work (Corporate social responsibility) where they donate money to civil society or they do operational work, such as certain activities for trash-picking and so on, but that’s not a business striving to become sustainable.
Serious sustainable development can only happen in a society where actors first look at themselves and how they create harm but also how they can contribute to good. Sustainability is not only a WHAT it’s mostly a HOW. How do we operate? How to we provide our costumers with goods and services? In what way’s do our service contribute to the global goals? The last one is a WHAT, different from the other two that is a HOW.
How to become a successful sustainable business? These are the 5 musts:
Policy for Sustainable Development
Sustainability aspects in the Code of Conduct/Organisational Chart
Action plan for Sustainable Development
Sustainability report
Climate action plan according to the Paris Agreement
Policy is essential to define what sustainability means in your context. This is the umbrella to relay on so we all can agree upon what sustainability means for our business.
Principles such as anticorruption, inclusion, climate awareness and so on should be a part of the code of conduct and organisational chart. This is the backbone of the business/organisation and tells us our values. To strive for sustainability can not only be a question of profit or market opportunities, it must be a part of the business values.
Action plan, what are the goals? What needs to change? Just to define and set the framework is not enough, you need a plan with proper goals, indicators, a strategy and a budget (especially the budget part, though to change your business into a sustainable one is an investment because your investing in your brand, probably reducing cost in different areas and so on. I’ll explain more in a future post).
Sustainability reporting is important for transparency and to be trustworthy. This is where you show your results. The indicators will tell the reader about your performance and the storytelling how.
Climate action according to the Paris Agreement is something I believe most businesses lack. Most actors want to set it according to their size and capacity to reduce their carbon emissions. With this state of mind, a light version of “business as usual”, the target set at the Paris Agreement won’t be met. Everyone needs to half their carbon footprint within a decade. This is commonly called the Carbon Law.
Do you know any business that lives up to all these 5 criteria’s? Has your business implemented a proper sustainability work? If not, you should hurry because otherwise you’ll be out of business pretty soon..
I’m sharing my story of climate anxiety and how you can transform your anxiety to climate action. Remember you don’t have to Feel Bad to Do Good!
Summery coming soon!
Photo: Private
This weekend I had the opportunity to meet other young inspiring people who want’s to make a difference in the world through the network Young Sustainability Professionals. As a part of our workshops and discussions we, of course, reflected upon how to make an impact.
In my current job and throughout my life as a coordinator, consultant and project leader in sustainability I have never really reflected upon if I have changed anything. Did I really contribute to a difference or did I not? I personally believe the answer to the question is hard to quantify since so much about sustainability has to do with norms and values. However, what I do know is that I have developed a strategy to do my work which I think can be useful for other people who wants to make a difference.
First of all, for me it’s been clear on what I want to achieve; I want other people to be educated and empowered to make better choices and to get involved. I can’t control how people change their lifestyles or if a certain project really contributes to long-term changes in a specific corporation. However, I can engage others in ways where I believe the change and the fight will go on even if I leave the business or the project.
How do you do that?
Research the business. This means to educate yourself about the circumstances of where you are regardless if it’s a business, an organisation, a municipality and so on. Questions to ask is:
What’s the purpose of the business?
What do their code of conduct, policies and strategies say?
What do they want to achieve?
Set your goals. What do you want to achieve? If you want to make something more sustainable you need to pick your goals. Preferably you’ll do this together with the leading group/project group/boss, but if you think they’re not that open to sustainability, you set the vision and you keep it for yourself.
Choose your prioritise. This should be based on three things; what creates an impact in the world (CO2 cut, better diversity etc.), what can you impact from your current position and what’s the topic that is most likely to be attractive to the business? When you get to start, you have to set a framework with likely areas to change not necessarily your most passionated issue.
Create an attractive scenario and case. Now you map their strategies with your vision and topics to identify where you want to see a change. You might not present “Hi everybody, let’s go vegan” at a restaurant, but you could say “let’s cut food waste, get the media attentions, lower our costs and collaborate with a famous chief from TV - good for the planet, for our business and it’s employees”. The shift to a more plant based menu will come with time when the rest of the company starts to get involved and understands the benefits.
Do tasks beyond your normal working tasks. What you have to realise is that if you want to create change, you will be the person doing most of the work. Changing a company from zero sustainability work to some kind of sustainability work can be done within three years. Changing a minor project from zero sustainability work to some basic can take a few weeks. Be bold and write weekly-emails and letters even if it’s beyond your mandate to do so.
Find your allies. You can’t do everything by yourself and don’t be shy to ask people what they think and see if you have similar ideas or interest to change things. Share your burden and passion outside the business and project to re-fill your energy and to stay inspired.
Be patient and repeat. Keep on talking to colleagues, leaders and other people involved about sustainability and the importance of being a conscious company. Don’t assume people are educated about climate change, don’t judge people for not being aware or engaged and keep on sharing your aspiration and energy.
Make sure the action plan is inclusive. As soon as you have the mandate or someone with a mandate gives you space to really establish a systematic sustainability group it’s all about defining sustainability in policies and guidelines, incorporate it in strategies and make sure it’s a part of the annual planning and budgeting. This is the point you want to reach. You want to create an action plan for sustainability with your colleges that translates your vision into the vision of the company.
Congratulations. You have just made an impact. If you stay you might see/hear/feel diversity next time you say hallo to a new college, you might read a report with CO2 emissions being cut or you might enjoy a vegan meal at the next conference. Or maybe your company will win the prize of the best sustainability report, effort or change makers within their industry. The sky has no limit of what you can do to create impact you just have to start! Good luck!
