杏吧原创

GREENWASH is everywhere. In 2018, almost anything, it seems, can be painted 鈥渟ustainable鈥�.

Take snow-covered ski slopes in the deserts of the Persian Gulf. You might think they were a hard sell as a contribution to the greening of the planet. Just ask Ibrahim Al-Zu鈥檅i, head of sustainability at Dubai-based shopping mall and leisure company Majid Al Futtaim, who delivered the keynote address at a conference on green development goals in Spain last month. He had to argue that the masterminds behind a ski run and 22,500 square-metre area of real snow, built in a country with one of the largest per-capita carbon footprints in the world, were helping to save the planet.

To be fair, Al-Zu鈥檅i assured students at the conference, organised by IESE Business School in Barcelona, that the company intends to make its activities 鈥渘et positive for carbon and water鈥� by 2040. Even so, those slopes might not be such a good example of the conference鈥檚 theme: that the juggernauts of 21st-century global business are part of the environmental solution.

For sure, corporations need to be encouraged to go green 鈥� and the less green they are the greater the need to encourage them. But this looks like a case of the tail wagging the dog. It certainly is at one with Peter Dauvergne鈥檚 caustic and highly readable critique of ethical corporate behaviour in Will Big Business Destroy our Planet?

鈥淲e have no choice, reasons Dauvergne, but to challenge the paradigm of unending growth鈥�

A professor of international relations at the University of British Columbia, Canada, Dauvergne concedes there is a case to be made for ethical business, in that it is less bad than unethical business. Yes, some of these titans of commerce are improving the efficiency with which they use and recycle resources; yes, they sometimes take the lead on renewable energy where politicians refuse to tread; and, yes, sometimes they even show some awareness of the social fallout of their activities.

But that still doesn鈥檛 make them part of the solution. Too often they are 鈥渨asting less to produce more鈥�, he writes, finding efficiency savings 鈥渢o invest in more factories and stores, and to sell more product鈥�. We have no choice, he reasons, but to challenge the paradigm of unending growth.

Even genuinely green-minded consumer giants like Unilever are slave to it. Although the company promises that this decade it will have helped a billion people improve their health and well-being, while halving the environmental impact of its products, it also promises to double turnover while doing so.

Dauvergne鈥檚 book is especially strong on how corporations are taking over debates on the environment and sustainability, writing the rules and bending the targets to suit their commercial aims. Their grand plan, he says, is to create 鈥渁 regulatory setting amenable to maximising production, profits and sales鈥�.

Thus targets for delivering clean drinking water are turned into targets for laying pipes and sinking wells. A global demand to end deforestation morphs into a target for ending 鈥渘et deforestation鈥� 鈥� code for 鈥測ou can keep chopping as long as you plant, too鈥�. No need to guess who will do both the chopping and the planting, profiting all the way.

Likewise, corporate pressure has helped ensure that big carbon dioxide emitters such as the aviation industry can keep polluting, so long as they offset those emissions by planting trees to soak up CO₂.

Viewed this way, green certification systems such as the forest and marine stewardship councils turn into something altogether different. They become a method of grabbing competitive advantage, not least by squeezing out small suppliers who simply can鈥檛 afford to pay consultants鈥� fees to demonstrate their green credentials.

Many environmental groups have been persuaded to buy into a vision of big business policing itself through such bodies. They now seek out partnerships with corporations, rather than challenging their wealth, power and greenwash. The World Wildlife Fund and Unilever were behind both the forest and marine stewardship councils.

UN agencies are also taking the corporate shilling. The Barcelona conference heard from Marcos Neto, director of the UN鈥檚 Istanbul International Center for Private Sector in Development: 鈥淭here is a lot of money to be made by the Sustainable Development Goals [SDGs],鈥� he told his student audience. 鈥淭his is about making profits. Profits are good. It鈥檚 not about charity.鈥�

It sounded callous, but he was right in the sense that, 鈥渨e need the private sector. It is the engine of the world. If we don鈥檛 have business, we don鈥檛 have SDGs. Get used to it.鈥� If you want to change the world, he advised students, 鈥渄on鈥檛 come and work for the UN. Go to [investment managers] BlackRock鈥�.

The meeting was studded with corporations telling stories of how well profit-making could be aligned with their preferred environmental targets. The world鈥檚 largest brewer AB InBev (think Stella, Corona and the American version of Budweiser) boasted of having halved the water needed to brew a litre of beer, while glossing over the far bigger water footprint in the fields of barley feeding the fermentation tanks.

Power and money

Pepsi proudly outlined how 27 per cent of its turnover is now in 鈥渘utritious鈥� food and beverages that are helping meet the SDGs. 鈥淚n sub-Saharan Africa, we provide nutritious food to undernourished people,鈥� said a spokesperson. That left the rather uncomfortable impression that 73 per cent of its products, sold in Africa and elsewhere, are not nutritious.

The great thing about Dauvergne鈥檚 120-page polemic is that it recognises where the power and money are in the world today. The turnover of corporate giants now dwarfs that of many national governments, he notes. 鈥淥f the world鈥檚 top 100 revenue generators in 2015, 69 were companies and 31 were states.鈥�

It is a breath of fresh air compared with the earnest and well-informed but ultimately ill-conceived Earth at Risk, by Claude Henry and Laurence Tubiana. From their vantage point in the world of sustainability think tanks, they show how the abstruse idea of sustainable development rose up the political agenda, culminating in the Paris climate change agreement and the UN SDGs, both signed off in 2015.

It is a story worth telling. But the elephant in the room 鈥� big business and the consumption it feeds 鈥� is barely mentioned. A section on 鈥渦nlocking private finance鈥� to find 鈥渢he new financial ecosystem needed to deploy the SDGs and sound climate policies鈥� gets less than two pages.

Dauvergne picks up where Henry and Tubiana leave off. Ultimately, he does not say who is to blame, whether it is big business or us, the consumers. But he skewers the idea that big business is an innocent player simply doing consumers鈥� bidding. And his conclusion is surely right that 鈥渦nless states and civil societies do far more to rein in the rising power of big business over world politics and consumer cultures,鈥� then our planet will soon become a much less green, fertile and hospitable place.

鈥淥f the world鈥檚 top 100 revenue generators in 2015, 69 were companies and 31 were states鈥�

Ethical big business is pitching to have it all ways. The guys with all the money want to buy that most elusive thing, a sense of virtue. As Al-Zu鈥檅i put it, without a hint of irony, the greatest thing he could do for his bosses in Dubai was to 鈥渕ake them feel good鈥�.

Maybe that is how we save the world in the 21st century. But when the money in the global economy slushes around in milliseconds according to algorithms of profitability, and when the vast 鈥渞emuneration packages鈥� of corporate CEOs are dependent on quarterly returns, it is hard to see where big business gets the traction for genuine change.

This article appeared in print under the headline 鈥淩eal colour of money鈥�