Sustainability? – No, Let’s push our luck a little bit further!
It seems major businesses are still not realizing in which direction we are heading and how available resources are misused. Is this because of lack of information? Hardly!
One very important corporate shift is spearheaded by Unilever, one of the world’s global food giants. Now under the stewardship of its Chairman Michael Treschow, no stone is left unturned when it comes to identifying and dealing with existing unethical business behaviour, remaining from an old business culture. People are fired and fines are paid! New measures for business growth are set, gradually shifting focus towards a more sustainable production.
A paradigm shift is created as corporate giants decides that a change is necessary for business in general, thereby demonstrating wrong, the common anticipation that big business, by definition, is evil.
This is not happening because of the kindness of Mr. Treschow. He is a very nice person but a tough business man, who scrutinizes the bottom line at least as hard as any other businessmen. He delivers shareholder value. But he has always had a good sense for where the future is.
With the size of Unilever, Mr. Treschow, his Board and his management have the opportunity to make history by continuing to turn this food giant into a model of a more responsible and ethical business, increasing the focus on better and healthier consumer products.
They are gradually implementing not only a responsible business model, which a number of entrepreneur driven small companies are already doing, but the impact, if done right, will be phenomenal. Their validation of the business model will put those others in the big corp. league behind, unless they change their business model from STG (short term greed) model to a SWE (sustainable within the ecosystem) model.
When I founded The Real Stevia Company 11 years ago, one big reason was to demonstrate a new business model based on multilevel sustainability with reference to the three P:s; People, Planet and Profit. Profits are not based on short term greed; they are based on Real Sustainability. Real Sustainability is business within the ecosystem of the Planet and cannot exist unless there is respect for People.
Real Stevia™ – Good. Good for you. Good for the world!