How to write a meaningful sustainability statement

Hello friend,

I normally spend my spare time during the week writing this newsletter.

But when you're planning a 7-year-old's birthday party and realise five days before that you forgot to order the cake, and when a parent messages you the night before saying, "Sorry, I forgot to RSVP, but so-and-so will be at the party, and her little sister will be tagging along. Hope that's ok. See you tomorrow", everything descends into a shit-show because NO, IT'S NOT OK, because I don't have enough party packs, I've already confirmed the numbers with the venue, and I have to drive two hours to fetch the cake because my geography is shit and I didn't realise the place was so far away.

So, with no spare time to, erm, spare, this newsletter is a bit late, and there's no clever intro, but there is a strategy for writing your sustainability statement, news worth noting, and a T-rex-walking pangolin with a freakishly long tongue.

I'm off to find more party packs.

— Tarryn ✌️

P.S. Did someone forward this to you? You can subscribe here, if you want.

How to write a sustainability statement

/ aka / Impact statement / Green statement / Purpose statement

What is a sustainability statement?

It’s your public pledge to sustainability.

It communicates your impact to stakeholders and your intention to become more sustainable.

Your statement does 3 key things:

1. Tells people what’s important to you and what sustainability means to your business.

2. Sets out your vision and how you’ll work towards it.

3. Describes what your company and community will look like once you’re successful.

It should be:

CONVINCING

People need to know that your work is important.

Like The Body Shop:

MEMORABLE

Use powerful, inspiring language that gets people to feel, think, or do something.

Like Patagonia:

MEANINGFUL

How does it positively impact your community?

Like CERO Bikes:

SPECIFIC

Include goals that you can be measured on. They keep you accountable. Use numbers when talking about your impact – How many people have you helped? How many do you want to help? By when?

Like Arnott’s:

BELIEVABLE

No jargon, vague statements, or “nothing” words, like:

“We are committed to recycling more to get to zero waste”, or

“We will eliminate waste and pollution to protect the planet,” or

“We are a global organisation that is socially and environmentally responsible, that embraces creativity and diversity and is financially rewarding for our employees and shareholders.”

That last one is an actual line from a company mission statement, but it could be anyone’s, right? What a waste of words.

SHORT AND SIMPLE

Get to the point and write for the average Joe. It’s a lot to communicate in a few words. But it forces you to get hyper-focused on your sustainability initiatives – and that’s what we’re aiming for because everything else flows from there.

Like Thrift+:

The three-part sustainability statement

Think of your sustainability statement as a three-act story, and plot it along the story arc, like Zero Co:

Act 1 – The Beginning: Describe the problem or issue you care about.

Act 2 – The Middle: What will you do about it?

Act 3 – The End: What’s the impact? Who benefits and why?

Before you write your sustainability statement, you need to have clear goals for what you want to achieve and why.

So, if you haven't clarified your purpose yet, do that first.

This week's climate and sustainability news worth noting

🛑 Researchers and conservationists at Oxford University have launched Operation Pangolin, a new initiative to save the world's most trafficked wild animal from extinction. Pangolins are hunted for their meat and scales, which are used in traditional Chinese practices. Over the past decade, enough pangolin scales have been seized to account for at least 1 million animals, and at least 250,000 are estimated to be taken from African and Asian forests every year.

🦟 Warming temperatures have caused mosquitoes that transmit malaria in sub-Saharan Africa to move to higher elevations and further away from the Equator. This "dramatic" increase in range could have serious implications for countries that are unprepared to cope with the disease.

🩺 On that note, India will include the health effects of climate change, including the impact of rising temperatures, poor air quality, and the spread of diseases, in all medical courses. The impact of the health sector on global emissions will also be included to encourage greener solutions in healthcare (Sidebar: Did you know? Anaesthesia gases are more carbon-intensive than greenhouse gases like methane and carbon?)

👥 The International Conference on Climate Change and Human Rights kicked off in Doha this week to emphasise the importance of rights-based climate action. Climate change poses a major threat to the right to life, water, food, health, adequate housing, movement, development, and work, especially for women, children, migrants, and people with disabilities.

🇦🇪 The UAE has declared 2023 the "Year of Sustainability". As part of the nationwide campaign, citizens will be encouraged to make sustainable lifestyle changes, including adopting plant-based diets, reducing food waste, avoiding fast fashion, and using less water.

🇨🇦 The Canadian government has released a plan to create sustainable jobs to transition workers away from the fossil fuel industry and toward clean energy. The plan includes a new training centre for sustainable jobs and a new government advisory body.

🍽️ In food news, a group of 286 NGOs have sent an open letter to the European Union, calling for a plan to transition to a more sustainable food system. And 28 stakeholders representing South Korea‘s cultivated meat industry, including manufacturers, universities and some city and provincial governments, have agreed to advance cellular agriculture.

🤝 Africa and the United States will “promote equitable, sustainable, and inclusive trade, boost competitiveness, and attract investment to Africa". Part of the $55 billion that the US intends to invest in Africa will go towards partnerships that advance key priorities, including sustainable energy, health systems, agribusiness, digital connectivity, infrastructure, and finance.

🌀 Wild weather: Flooding and landslides in Brazil. Floods in Sydney. The first blizzard warning for Los Angeles in decades.

I'll leave you on this happy note...

Pangolins... with their adorable T-rex walks and freakishly long tongues.

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