FT loves Room to Read - so do I

Reading the Financial Times in Vienna this morning, I was delighted to see the ‘Life & Arts’ section covering Room to Read in a major way. Googling, I then found that the FT, my favourite paper by far, has selected Room to Read, a social enterprise that helps millions of children gain access to education in developing countries, as its partner for its 2009-2010 seasonal appeal to readers.

The seasonal appeal, taking place from November to mid-January 2010, has raised over £2.3m in the past three years for organisations including Camfed and WaterAid. Chosen in a vote by 1600 Financial Times staff around the world, Room to Read aims to provide over 11,000 communities access to their first library by the end of 2010 and has a long-term goal of reaching 10 million children in the developing world by 2020.

Room to Read was launched in Nepal in 2000 and is now a global organisation with fund-raising operations in San Francisco, London, Tokyo and Hong Kong and program offices in Bangladesh, Cambodia, India, Laos, Nepal, South Africa, Sri Lanka, Vietnam and Zambia. Partnering with local communities throughout the developing world, the organisation provides quality educational opportunities to children with the least access.

It is estimated that over 300 million children around the world do not have access to education and most likely will never learn to read or write. Room to Read seeks to intervene early in the lives of children in the belief that education empowers people to improve socio-economic conditions for their families and communities – breaking the cycle of poverty.

Room to Read has developed four programmes to promote and enable global education:

• Reading Room Programme – establishes bilingual libraries filled with local language and children’s books, posters, maps and games that engage children in reading.
• Local Language Publishing Programme – works with local writers and illustrators to create and publish high-quality local language children’s books for Room to Read libraries.
• Girls’ Education Programme – funds long-term, holistic scholarships for underprivileged girls to ensure their ability to complete secondary school.
• School Room Programme – partners with villages to build new schools, replace dilapidated structures, or expand schools to alleviate overcrowded classrooms.

For more information about the FT’s seasonal appeal partnership with Room to Read, please visit: www.ft.com/appeal and www.roomtoread.org/FT.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/ft-loves-room-to-read-so-do-i/.

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Charity begins at Work

Wall Street Journal article that describes a growing trend among professionals to pursue volunteer stints in the development sector.  Some companies provide support for their employees to do this, and our Volans Talent initiative connects this trend with what is strategically important to the company, through talent development or training programs.  An example being the partnership formed between PricewaterhouseCoopers and Hagar International.

For professionals  seeking to invest in a future career within the social impact realm, we have put together Volans Year - a one-year program that includes a secondment to an organization in the social impact realm, accompanied by executive education, transformational leadership coaching, and structured peer learning. 

Volans Year is particular well suited for individuals with at least 4 years of private sector experience, seeking to attain high-quality training, experience and networks in the social impact sector.  After Volans Year, these individuals could potentially pursue a further degree, launch their own social enterprise or take on senior positions within recognized social enterprises. 

The founding cohort for Volans Year will launch in the first week of February 2010.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/charity-begins-at-work/.

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Humanity Demanding 1.4 Planets

Global Footprint Network is releasing data today that reveals a growing gap between human demand on ecological services and the rate at which nature can supply those services. It would now take nearly one and a half Earths to generate all the resources humanity consumes and absorb all our CO2 emissions, according to the latest Ecological Footprint and biocapacity calculations. These figures are based upon source data from 2006, the most recent year for which such data are available.

The data show that humanity’s demand on the biosphere for providing natural resources and absorbing carbon dioxide emissions is 44 percent more than what nature can provide. This ecological overshoot means it now takes approximately 18 months for the Earth to regenerate what we use in one year. The urgent threats we are facing today - most notably climate change, but also biodiversity loss, shrinking forests, declining fisheries and freshwater stress - are symptoms of this trend.

“The future will be shaped by these resource limitations, so, it’s clearly in the self-interest of every country to transition quickly from carbon and resource-intensive economies to the economies of the future.” Global Footprint Network President Mathis Wackernagel said.  “While international agreements are critical, many nations are not taking a ‘wait-and-see’ approach, rather they are investing now to take advantage of the world’s demand for renewable energy and clean technology.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/humanity-demanding-14-planets/.

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GoodGuide launches ‘Green Consumer’ ap

Over 20 years ago, we launched The Green Consumer Guide, which sold around a million copies, went into foreign language editions in around 20 countries, and helped consumers worldwide put pressure on business to clean up on the environmental front. Books, however, are old technology. So when I was on the Advisory Board of Physic Ventures for several years and first came across GoodGuide, my excitement was palpable - and I have since used the story in many public presentations to underscore how the global economy will move to radically different levels of transparency.

GoodGuide is an independent ‘B Corporation‘, a new type of company which uses the power of business to solve social and environmental problems. And it has announced the first iPhone application that scans barcodes to provide impartial health, environment and social responsibility ratings of products and companies.  The newest version of GoodGuide’s iPhone application, now available for free from Apple’s iTunes App Store, will make it easier and faster for consumers to find healthy and environmentally friendly products from socially responsible companies while standing in the aisle of a store.  GoodGuide licensed Occipital’s state-of-the-art RedLaser barcode scanning technology for its new application.

GoodGuide’s new iPhone application can help consumers in the store with many common purchase decisions.  For example, the application enables consumers to choose the healthier of two moisturizers, determine what’s in various all-purpose cleaners and learn whether organic product manufacturers have good social practices to go along with their healthy manufacturing processes.   and it’s simple to do: simply scan a barcode in the supermarket aisle and immediately see detailed and independently researched ratings for health, environment and social responsibility for over 50,000 products and companies right on the phone.

In addition, by using the new version of GoodGuide’s iPhone application, consumers will be able to participate in picking the products to be rated next.  GoodGuide will aggregate information about which products are scanned most frequently and use that information to prioritize the products that are rated by GoodGuide.

Dara O’Rourke, founder and CEO of GoodGuide, emphasized that the new iPhone application is another step in the initial stages of the company’s vision to make information about consumer products more transparent.  “The iPhone application illustrates how we can provide consumers with critical product information when they need it the most - in the store,” he said.  “The service will only get stronger over time as we add more and more product information based on our community’s input.”

The launch of GoodGuide’s new iPhone application follows GoodGuide’s closing in June of this year of $5.5 million in Series B financing.  GoodGuide’s Series B financing was led by Physic Ventures, with the additional participation by New Island Capital and existing investors New Enterprise Associates and Draper Fisher Jurvetson.  In connection with GoodGuide’s Series B financing, William Rosenzweig, Managing Director of Physic Ventures, has joined GoodGuide’s Board of Directors.

In the last year, GoodGuide has won numerous awards including being named the “Startup Most Likely to Make The World a Better Place” at the 2008 Crunchies, Top 100 Web Sites of 2009 by PC Magazine, and CNET’s Editor’s Choice for “Best Newcomer” in CNET 2009 Webware 100.

Sam adds: The future is bright, the future is Good.  And watch this space for a review of GoodGuide user experience from Volans team members currently scampering around the London office scanning packets of cookies and, indeed, moisturinzing cream …

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/goodguide-launches-green-consumer-ap/.

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Beyond Carbon: Markets for Water and Biodiversity in Latin America

The Katoomba Group has launched the Mercados Ambientales, a platform that seeks to catalyze markets for ecosystem services in Latin America. Earlier this year, their flagship report: ‘Beyond Carbon: Biodiversity and Water Markets‘ provided a practical overview of the type of cases that can advance this new field in the region. The report argues, for example, that Brazil will have to look beyond carbon markets to include water and biodiversity market mechanisms if it is to guarantee a halt to deforestation in the Amazon.

Watch the space: The group is finalizing two reports: The ‘State of the Global Water Quality Marketplace”, which will quantify market transactions, with insight into both nutrient trading programs and voluntary schemes that operate outside of the regulatory framework; and “State of Biodiversity Markets”, both due in January 2010.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/beyond-carbon-markets-for-water-and-biodiversity-in-latin-america/.

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National Geographic Backs Ecological Footprint

EarthPulse: State of the Earth 2010, which opens with a full page of Global Footprint Network data, offers the clearest endorsement yet by a mainstream publication of the idea of sustainability as living within the means of one planet. This reinforces the vision of Mathis Wackernagel–the pioneering founder of GFN–of the strategic ‘pathways to scale’ for the ecological footprint model, by leveraging connections to mainstream institutions–a topic I explored earlier this year in an interview with Mathis.

EarthPulse: State of the Earth 2010 explores how the trends driving human society such as our growing numbers, our rising consumption, urban migration and global trade are interacting with the resources upon which life depends.  It is a story told in stark statistics and even more startling images. Women in Bangladesh wade through neck-high waters as melting Himalayan glaciers cause rivers to swell. Farmland is swallowed by China’s Gobi dessert, advancing 3,900 miles a year due to over-plowing and overgrazing. In Borneo, a scarred stretch of barren earth is all that remains of an old-growth forest.

“On a planet defined by unprecedented change, perhaps our most precious resource has become knowledge,” issue sponsor Allianz writes in the introduction. “Only with access to accurate, unbiased facts can a world brimming with possibilities and perils begin to make sense.”

It is Global Footprint Network’s mission to provide the data that can quantify the scope of the challenge and identify those solutions that will provide meaningful change. With resource accounting tools that enable us to measure and understand our ecological demand, we can begin to weigh our options and chart our course toward a sustainable human future.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/national-geographic-backs-ecological-footprint/.

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More Ashes Before Phoenix Can Rise?

In our 2009 report The Phoenix Economy, we argued that the ‘recession’ could well go much deeper - and last much longer - than most people believed. Not a popular line of thinking, but I was interested to see the following from D.K Matai of ATCA a few days back:

They will say, “Nobody saw it coming”.  Who could have predicted it…  It is worth noting that the 1932 stock market crash is deemed to be the worst in the 20th century and not the one in 1929.  By mid-1930, the market was up 30% from the trough of the 1929 crash.  However, by the summer of 1932, the Dow reached a low of just 11% of its high in 1929, or a loss of roughly 89%, trading more than 50% below the low it had reached on October 29th, 1929.

If one had $1000 on September 3rd 1929, it would have gone down to $108 by July 8th, 1932 — end of the worst crash — or an 89.2% loss.  To recover from such a loss, one would have to watch one’s portfolio go up by 825%! All this happened despite assurances from prominent government and business leaders of-the-time that the worst was behind.

Here is a news headline that may sound familiar:

• September 1929: “There is no cause to worry. The high tide of prosperity will continue.” - Andrew W Mellon, US Secretary of the Treasury

After the stock market crash in October 1929, the Dow Jones Industrial Average (DJIA) partially recovered in November-December 1929 and early 1930.

Reassuring headlines such as the following became increasingly common:

• May 1, 1930:  “I am convinced we have now passed the worst and with continued unity of effort we shall rapidly recover. There is one certainty of the future of a people of the resources, intelligence and character of the people of the United States – that is, prosperity!” – US President Hoover
  

• August 29, 1930: “American labour may now look to the future with confidence.” – James J Davis, US Secretary of Labour
  

• October 16, 1930:  “Looking to the future I see in the further acceleration of science continuous jobs for our workers. Science will cure unemployment.” – Charles M Schwab.

On July 8th, 1932 the Dow reached its lowest level of the 20th century and did not return to pre-1929 levels until 23rd November, 1954.  The full impact was not felt until the next year.  By 1933, the Great Depression was very real and it would take more than 22 years before the market would regain what had been lost.

So severe was the impact of the 1929-1932 crash, that by spring of 1933, when President Roosevelt (FDR) took the oath of office, unemployment in the US had risen from 8 to 15 million — roughly 1/3rd of the non-farm workforce — and the GDP had decreased by more than 45% from $103.8 billion to $55.7 billion.

Although the depression was worldwide, no other country except Germany reached so high a percentage of unemployment as the US. The poor were hit the hardest. By 1932, New York’s Harlem district had an unemployment rate of 50% and property owned or managed by African Americans fell from 30% to 5% in 1935. Farmers in the Midwest were doubly hit by economic downturns and the Dust Bowl. Schools, with budgets shrinking, shortened both the school day and the school year.  The breadth and depth of the crisis made it the Great Depression.

FDR, after assuming the presidency, promoted a wide variety of federally funded programs aimed at restoring the American economy, helping relieve the suffering of the unemployed, and reforming the system so that such a severe crisis could never happen again.  After the crash in 1932:

1. The Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) was established;

3. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) was established to insure individual bank accounts for up to $100,000; and

4. The Works Projects Administration (WPA), the largest New Deal agency, was set up employing millions to carry out public works projects.

However, while FDR’s New Deal did help restore the GDP to its 1929 level and did introduce basic banking and welfare reforms, FDR refused to run up the government deficits that ending the depression required. Only when the federal government imposed rationing, recruited 6 million defence workers (including women and African Americans), drafted 6 million soldiers, and ran massive deficits to fight World War II did the Great Depression finally end.

The extent of the economic devastation of the 1930s went far beyond the imagination of anyone in the financial markets or governments across the world.

Having studied a fair amount of history over the years, I am aware that it rarely repeats itself - but, as someone once put it, by God it rhymes! So anyone who thinks that we are now free of the downturn would be well advised to take a look at what happened last time around - and keep a very close eye on the market runes.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/more-ashes-before-phoenix-can-rise/.

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WEF Calls for Revolution

The world has reached a tipping point in the fight against climate change, but leaders are optimistic that incremental victories will ensure the battle is ultimately won. Countries, internal states and companies are increasingly implementing low-carbon initiatives with measurable impact as talks to agree on a global climate framework in Copenhagen continue.

According to leaders at the World Economic Forum’s Summit on the Global Agenda in Dubai, public-private partnerships and financing are key to expanding the number of low-carbon projects that are making use of the enabling technologies and policies already in place. Over 80 business leaders and 40 environmental and scientific experts from around the world outlined a plan for stimulating a “clean revolution” in the private sector within the next few years even as governments continue negotiations on a climate policy framework in the United Nation

Despite the many climate initiatives out there, “not much is happening to reward them but we hope that through the World Economic Forum and its Global Agenda Councils, there will be a new voice in favour of action and providing rewards for action, as well as an agreement in Copenhagen,” said Pavan Sukhdev, Study Leader, TEEB and Project Leader, Green Economy, United Nations Environment Programme - World Conservation Monitoring Centre (UNEP-WCMC), Cambridge, and Chair of the Forum’s Global Agenda Council on Ecosystems & Biodiversity Loss.

“We are losing this living fabric at a rate that is alarming,” Sukhdev warned.

Japan, India and China have moved dramatically to reduce emissions, according to Steve Howard, Chief Executive Officer, Climate Group, United Kingdom, and Chair of the Global Agenda Council on Climate Change. “In four months, China put in as much wind power capacity as the UK did in the past 20 years,” he said, adding that “the Prime Minister of India wants the country to fight for a global deal.”

“We have cut deforestation from 27,000 square kilometres to 7,000 square kilometres, which is the lowest reduction achieved in Brazil,” said Carlos Eduardo de Souza Braga, Governor of Amazonas, Brazil. While he remains optimistic about the Copenhagen process, a deal with any chance of success must focus on empowering communities. “If you’re going to create a new mechanism, we must create a mechanism to get funding to communities like those in the Amazon, and create policies to give them health, education and knowledge for sustainable products,” he said.

Caio Koch-Weser, Vice-Chairman, Deutsche Bank Group, Deutsche Bank, United Kingdom, a Member of the Global Agenda Council on Climate Change, raised his concern that despite being a few weeks away from global climate talks in Copenhagen, “we don’t see a framework coming into place.” He said the role of the World Economic Forum is critical “because it tasks all of us to urge action but also to lend momentum by coming up with public-private partnerships that are implementable and scalable once an agreement is in place.” Koch-Weser agreed that low-carbon projects should continue to be unveiled and expanded, and called for leaders due to gather in Copenhagen to create a 100 billion euro fund to finance the low-carbon economy of the future.

Note: The World Economic Forum’s Global Agenda Councils were created to further the Forum’s mission and strategic vision. They are multistakeholder groups of the world’s most innovative and relevant experts, established to advance knowledge and collaboratively explore actions on the most important issues in the global arena. For further information on the councils, please visit Network of Global Agenda Councils. Their work also contributes to the Global Redesign Initiative.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/wef-calls-for-revolution/.

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Shifting Paradigms

Perhaps the biggest single task facing our species is to shift our prevailing paradigms, something that happens rarely, that typically triggers social, political and economic convulsions over protracted periods, and that reorders our mental landscapes in ways that were far from obvious to the change agents who started the process.

As the concept of sustainability increasingly goes mainstream, we face multiple new challenges.  The first, though, is simply a scaling of what feels like an age-old challenge - that many new entrants to the discussion will seek to define sustainability in ways that suit their own priorities and vested interests. Second, we have the problem that the climate agenda is tending to drown out many other elements of the agenda. Third, as the centre of gravity of the global economy shifts east, it is very clear indeed that countries like India, Indonesia and China will have a different take on all of this. Fourth, and by no means finally, there is the fundamental problem that no amount of tinkering is going to produce change at the scale and pace we need unless we also change the overarching paradigm within which governments, capitalism, economics, accounting and investment operate.

So how do we shift paradigms?

Few books, if any, have had quite the impact on my own thinking as The Structure of Scientific Revolutions, written by Thomas Kuhn. I first read the book in 1968 - and it literally changed the way I saw the world. But it wasn’t a cookbook, offering recipes on how to change prevailing paradigms. We are going to have to work out how to do this experimentally.

My own view is that what I have called the ‘Cornucopian’ Paradigm began to shift in the 1960s, first with the work of people like Rachel Carson and the emergence of the global environmental movement, and second with the publication of the first images of Earth and of Earthrise, seen from space. That’s one reason why I was so thrilled that we managed to attract astronaut and cosmonaut Jerry Linenger to the Volans Advisory Board.

Meanwhile, we can debate what the new Paradigm might be called, but for the sake of argument I have talked about the ‘Gaian’ Paradigm. Part of my personal mission over the next five years or so is to talk to some of the people worldwide who are putting in place some of the key building blocks of the new order, both to learn from them and to work out how we at Volans and SustainAbility best support them.

At Volans, we signed a contract this week with a fascinating new foundation that will now support our ‘Pathways to Scale’ work in the field of ecosystem services, with more on that shortly.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/shifting-paradigms/.

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New Report on Economics of Water Scarcity

On 23 November 2009, the 2030 Water Resources Group is launching a new report that shows that, by 2030, one-third of the world’s population could have access to only half the water they need. For the first time, it will show how future demand for water can be met through cost-effective measures using existing technologies. The report provides greater clarity on the scale of the water challenge and the cost of the solutions, and offers a fact-based tool to help all stakeholders make informed investment decisions and guide policy discussions.

The 2030 Water Resources Group was formed in 2008 to contribute new insights to the critical issue of water scarcity. Members include McKinsey & Company, the IFC, part of the World Bank Group, and a consortium of business partners: The Barilla Group, The Coca Cola Company, Nestlé SA, New Holland Agriculture, SABMiller plc, Standard Chartered and Syngenta AG. Follow the live webcast here and visit the linked events page here.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/new-report-on-economics-of-water-scarcity/.

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Catalyzing Social Investment in India

I’ve just come back from Delhi, India, where we brought together 120 leaders to catalyze investment for entrepreneurial solutions. The meeting is a key milestone in the work we are doing with the Tallberg Foundation, in the run up to the Rework the World Summit in Sweden in 2010.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/catalyzing-social-investment-in-india/.

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Brilliant Ideas - ColaLife

This is the first instalment of a regular blog series I’m launching tonight called ‘Brilliant Ideas’.   In my role at Volans, the BEST part of my job is getting to know outstanding entrepreneurs around the world.  These include some of my favourite models – Eako (transforming fire hose into high-end handbags), Red Redemption (video games that teach kids about climate change), Red Button Designs (and their innovative water transport and purification device), MyBnk (financial literacy programs for youth) - all ‘brilliant ideas’.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/brilliant-ideas-colalife/.

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Resource Peaks: Which Will Run Out First?

The global economy is in ‘planetary overshoot’ mode; economic and business models not accounting properly for the use of the planet’s resources. Earlier this year, Mathis Wackernagel of the Global Footprint Network argued that we are entering a world of ‘peak everything’.

Whether we’ve already hit ‘peak oil’, Greenbang writes, there are no shortage of other peaks that could be looming in the not-too-distant future. A recent Greenbang blog goes like this:

“…Which do you think will strike us first? Will it be peak oil or …

• Peak water: As with peak oil, the concern here isn’t that we completely run out of water, but can no longer access the good stuff easily (and economically). While it might seem an odd worry for a planet with a surface that’s 70 per cent water, remember that most of that’s not drinkable. Much of the stuff that is, we’re draining from underground aquifers in many places faster than nature can replenish it.

• Peak credit: Last year’s global financial meltdown saw more than a few market-watchers speculate that we have now hit the limits of credit and debt.
• Peak food: With the global population set to climb to 9 billion by mid-century and climate change expected to make agriculture even more difficult, some experts are sounding the alarm on the ability of food production to keep up with demand. Last month, Megan Clark, head of Australia’s Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), warned that, over the next 50 years, we’ll have to grow as much food as we have throughout the entire history of civilisation.
• Peak uranium, silver or indium: Researchers at the University of Augsburg and Yale University recently analysed our consumption of a number of critical minerals. Their conclusion? If the rest of the world catches up to just half of today’s consumption levels in the US, we’ll be left with just 19 years’ worth of uranium, nine years’ worth of silver and four years’ worth of indium.”

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/resource-peaks-which-will-run-out-first/.

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Carbon Scenario Tool from London Accord

In the lead up to COP15, The London Accord has launched a series of innovative scenario tools which allows users to chart models for their carbon reduction strategy. Check them out HERE.

The tools are designed to help a user calculate potential future CO2 prices under different policy scenarios and estimate the possible impacts on business. They include:
1. Price Impact Calculator
2. Carbon Footprint Calculator
3. Investment Return Calculator

I’m a big fan of the London Accord’s mission to take the sustainability reports from finance institutions and open them up to policy makers and NGOs to use in their decision making. These reports cover a range of topics - from renewable energy to carbon pricing.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/carbon-scenario-tool-from-london-accord/.

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GODAVARI COMPLEX

Guest blog by Sanjiev Johal, Freelance TV Producer and Journalist

There’s always an attendant confusion when I visit India. It’s a liberation and revulsion unique to the subcontinent. I was there last month in the western state of Maharashtra, polluting the skies to scatter my mother’s ashes in the waters of the river Godavari. Second in size only to the Ganges with its banks freckled by sacred sites for both Hindus and Sikhs, the Godavari is sometimes referred to as ‘Old Ganga’ or ‘South Ganga’. Just like the dangerously putrid Ganges, the waters of the Godavari are ever more hazardous than holy.

Dams restrict the free flow of the river, allowing mosquitoes to breed and disease to fester. Domestic and industrial pollution has contaminated agricultural land and groundwater leading to significant increases among local populations in diseases such as cancer and Hepatitis A and B. Sustained activism from a people’s movement a quarter of a century old claimed a ‘triumph’ when a pipeline of drinkable water was built to supply some river-basin towns, but still, after numerous court rulings, petitions and state governmental orders, industrial effluent, unfiltered by treatment plants, continues to be discharged into the Godavari.

I’ve never liked the term ‘disconnect’ when used in noun form. It sounds abortive, lazy. But I understand how it works, where it works. The will of the people whose lives are entwined with the fate of the Godavari demands that the river’s pollution be controlled, monitored and reduced. This will is, on the surface, substantiated by the judiciary and the legislature, and yet, the companies responsible for discharging untreated effluent into the Godavari continue to do so with crass impunity – I sense something of a disconnect.

In India, the fate of rivers and that of the so-called largest democracy in the world are inseparable. The troubled displacement of some fifty million people, the unaccountable bodies extolling the dubious virtues of dams and the cold face of government turned away from the plain sight of a co-ordinated, national resistance movement, point to an endemic democratic deficit. The largest democracy in the world may just be the greatest fallacy in the world.

Last year the Indian government released its National Action Plan on Climate Change as well setting up the National Water Mission. Sounds great. Just what the people wanted, a government that understands the concerns of the population and openly serves a common interest. However, the NAPCC and the NWM continue to serve the same tired and misguided agenda that seeks to build more dams, more hydro projects and interlink more rivers. Flawed policies that fail the people, the economy and the environment. What’s more, there is nothing even remotely transparent or participatory in the formulation of the NAPCC or its specific mission plans. Indian democracy, to paraphrase the Mahatma, would seem like a very good idea.

The Godavari River Pollution Control Scheme that promised fully functioning effluent treatment plants by 2008, is yet to be completed. Various levels of government have intervened, had their say and delivered laudable sentiments of intent. The courts too have issued bits of paper requiring industrial polluters to mend their ways but the Godavari continues to be a toxic lifeline for the people of the river-basin.

Those fighting for a pollution-free Godavari do so without violence. Their struggle is no proxy ideological war; the battleground is the river itself. Without a clean river they and their way of life cannot be sustained. If democracy is the tool by which the sustainable development of the Godavari river basin can be secured, then there’s a lot of sharpening yet to be done. Allowed to remain the self-serving play-thing of the ruling elite, Indian democracy’s blunt edge will be used to bludgeon the will of the people instead of implementing it.

The will of the Indian people…

It was, we are told, the will of the Hindu majority of the Indian people to raze entire towns populated by Muslims in Gujarat in 2002, slaughtering innocents with blood-curdling inhumanity. However, the collusion of the state and its apparatus, principally the Governor and the police, knowingly stoked the fires of religious intolerance whilst fanning the flames of an ancient rage. In fact the police, with orders to turn a blind eye to the carnage, actively participated in the rape of young girls, the burning of babies and the mutilation of citizens they were honour-bound to protect. The will of the people can be systematically manipulated and discontent is easily manufactured when the scapegoat is a sitting duck. It’s all so sickeningly unoriginal.

In a country riven by caste, divided by over a thousand spoken languages and beholden to myriad religious identities, ‘the will of the people’ becomes the private intellectual property of those who are able to control access to information. In India, power is knowledge. You believe what you are told because you don’t know any better. If you do know better, then, well, what you know is wrong. If you are not signed-up to the now defunct ‘India Shining’ movement or Indian ‘progress’ as the project for interminable economic growth is couched, then you are anti-prosperity, anti-democratic, antediluvial.

So if you point to the evident fact that more dams for example will not lead to more and cheaper electricity, they will not lead to rural development but will lead to social and ecological disaster, then you are an idiot, unpatriotic or even a terrorist. Name-calling is the first line of defence but then sticks and stones quickly turn into batons and bullets. India has one of the highest rates of deaths in police custody anywhere on the planet. Taking a stand to stop a dam being built or to demand a cleaner river can cost you your life.

But there is simply no substitute for ground-level, blood, sweat and tears mobilisation. The organised people’s movements when constructively allied with counterparts in the rich nations of the ‘developed world’, can achieve notable success.

A nexus of international organisations from countries such as Germany, Switzerland and the US did just that when they supported the Indian resistance group Narmada Bachao Andolan in its fight against India’s first private dam project. By making a singular local cause a common global concern, the combined pressure from these groups led to a number of multinational corporations and international banks withdrawing from the project. It was a small victory, but a template for resistance had been established, one built on grass-roots activism and bolstered by a vocal overseas network.

Our indignation at the human and environmental impact of spurious hydro-electric dam projects must also extend to the sponsors and profiteers of such ‘development’. The British Government’s Department for International Development is one such backer of Indian dams. The democratically elected government of one nation in cahoots with the democratically elected government of another in its devastation of its people and its ecology. The sham of DfID’s benevolence, dishing out conditional aid and expertise to the less developed, is the sham of democracy itself. With one hand it giveth…

If Indians stand in the way of ‘progress’ by standing up to the authorities and the big companies that want to hijack India’s resources for their own gain, then it is incumbent on those of us in the countries that support such ‘progress’ to actively demand that this support be abrogated. Democracy isn’t just putting an ‘x’ on a piece of paper once in a while, it is about putting your neck on the line to demand justice. The act of voting can change a government but sometimes little else. Acts of resistance, of civil disobedience, if India’s fight for independence is anything to go by, can change the fate of a nation, maybe even the course of a river.

What happens to the Godavari will offer a portent into India’s engagement with the ideas of democracy and sustainable development. I know I’ll be paying close attention – those waters contain a little something of me.

sanjiev.johal@gmail.com

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/godavari-complex/.

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MISSION MOST-POSSIBLE: CLEAN & COOL

Volans is working in partnership with Polecat in pulling together a “mission” to San Francisco in February 2010 (Polecat last year took the top 20 ‘Web 2.0’ companies out there).  In brief the Clean & Cool Mission is a competition to identify the top 20 fast growing Clean & Cool companies in the UK.  Those companies selected will travel to San Francisco from 20 Feb to 26 Feb to meet peers, investors, media and potential partners from all around the world; they will also engage with experts on the financial and public policy agendas relevant to ‘Cool Economy’ businesses operating in the US.

It’s exciting to think of the game-changing ideas and partnerships that could arise from bringing these players together, a framework akin to our Pathways to Scale program at Volans.

Polecat will be using their very cool (read ‘funky’) MeaningMine product to map the key trends, influencers and discussion around the event, which will then help build key market intelligence in this field – no spreadsheets or boring bar-charts here, we are talking gorgeous graphics, heatmaps, article carousels and the like to get you close to critical quantitative data about your business, such as where conversations about you or your field are occurring: hear more here

Mission is set for take off on Tuesday, November 17^th at the London Stock Exchange,  sponsored by the Technology Strategy Board, UKTI and Enterprise UK and supported by Polecat and Volans, with our own trailblazer John Elkington very much at play in the cock-pit. See Clean & Cool website here

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/mission-most-possible-clean-cool/.

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Former Chinese Google CEO’s innovative cluster attracts 40,000 applicants

Dr. Lee Kai-Fu has left Google China, with the ambition of launching an innovation incubator –Innovation Works (创新工厂)– with the backing of top IT executives and investors, including the CEO of Youtube China, and the President of Lenovo. Dr. Lee said he has already received over 40,000 job applications.

‘Innovation clusters’ come to mind. In a recent conversation with Tim Bunch, Investment Director of Omidyar Network in the US, clusters, like Silicon Valley, which create a development pole for certain industries, play a central role in accelerating the emergence of experimental cultures and innovation support.

No doubt, if there is something to be learned about innovation clusters, China will learn it fast. But key to this development is whether and how China will use innovation clusters to tackle some of the most complex challenges it faces in areas such as energy and climate, food and population growth, and cities.

Dr. Lee’s ambition with Innovative Works is to “empower world-changing innovation”. A connection to clean energy entrepreneurs in China might be just what’s needed to accelerate the type of ecosystems that we talk about in our Pathways to Scale Program.

– by Jieying Zheng and Alejandro Litovsky

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/former-chinese-google-ceo%e2%80%99s-innovative-cluster-attracts-40000-applicants/.

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Philippines Social Entrepreneur of the Year 2009

The Social Entrepreneur of the Year for the Philippines was announced at Makati Shangrila during Ernst & Young’s national Entrepreneur of the Year celebration. Social Entrepreneur Gemma Boulos, Founder and Executive Director of A Single Drop for Safe Water (ASDSW), received her award in the presence of over 500 business, political, and media leaders. This is the third year of collaboration in the country
between Schwab Foundation and Ernst & Young in recognizing outstanding social entrepreneurs. The independent panel of judges this year include Cesar VIRATA, Zorayda Amelia ALONZO, Senen BACANI, Krishnendu DATTA, Zenaida MAGLAYA, Oscar REYES, and Vivian GEE.

Gemma Bulos, a Filipino-American, was a former musician and preschool teacher who was meant to be in the World Trade Center on the morning of 9/11. She responded to the tragedy by devoting her life to a cause she believed would promote peace and equality among people – access to safe water. The United Nations Division for Sustainable Development estimates that 1.2 billion people in the world lack access to fresh water, and between 3-5 million people per year die of water related diseases. Since its establishment in year 2006, ASDSW has been seeking to address this problem – first in Bulos’ home country, the Philippines. The organization offers services such as education and training as well as building fresh water access systems to empower poor communities. These projects provide safe water to Filipinos in dire need of it. Bulos envisions ASDSW to be the clearing house for safe water projects globally, and that the Philippines will be the testing ground for water technologies. Plans are currently underway to replicate the ASDSW model in Uganda next year.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/philippines-social-entrepreneur-of-the-year-2009/.

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India’s Competitiveness Stunted By Gender Gap

The World Economic Forum’s India Gender Gap Review released at the India Economic Summit examines inequalities between women and men. Leaders at the meeting are discussing the factors responsible for the size of India’s gender gap, which, according the Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2009, sees it ranked 114th out of 134 countries measured.

“Girls and women make up one half of the world’s population and without their engagement, empowerment and contribution, we cannot hope to achieve a rapid economic recovery nor effectively tackle global challenges such as climate change, food security and conflict,” said Klaus Schwab, Founder and Executive Chairman, World Economic Forum. “The Forum works year-round with leaders on ways to close gender gaps through its Women Leaders and Gender Parity Programme.”

The India Gender Gap Review presents the results of a comprehensive survey assessing the current state of gender-related corporate policies and practices in India.

Only 14% of the companies questioned have 40% or more women among their employees. These women employees are mainly present at the entry and middle levels of management, while very few women attain senior management level. Most companies do not track salary gaps, despite the clear wage gaps between women and men – only 4% of the companies surveyed are attempting to monitor salary gaps.

“Women, as half of the human capital of India, will need to be more efficiently integrated into the economy in order to boost India’s long-term competitive potential. The World Economic Forum’s survey of some of the biggest companies in India shows that, to achieve this integration, Indian companies will need to set targets, improve policies to close salary gaps and promote work-life balance,” said Saadia Zahidi, Co-author of the Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2009 and Head of the Forum’s Women Leaders and Gender Parity Programme.

India has closed 93% of its health gender gap, 84% of its education gap, 41% of its economic participation gap and 27% of the political empowerment gender gap according to The Global Gender Gap Report 2009.

India holds last place among the BRIC countries on the Index, behind Russia (51), China (60) and Brazil (82). In South Asia, the sub-continent is in second-to-last place behind Sri Lanka and Bangladesh and ahead of Pakistan. Sri Lanka leads in the rankings by far, holding 16th position, followed by Bangladesh (94), Maldives (100), Nepal (110), India (114) and Pakistan (132).

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/indias-competitiveness-stunted-by-gender-gap/.

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Cleantech Sector Concludes COP15 Doesn’t Matter

The outcome of the 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference (UNFCCC COP15) next month in Copenhagen isn’t expected to be meaningful for the cleantech sector in the near term, according to a new report.  ”The most meaningful climate initiatives of late driving cleantech innovation have been driven at the level of the G20, the U.S.-led MEF and the G2 (China and America). The center of gravity is not the bureaucratic UNFCCC,” said Cleantech Group executive editor Dallas Kachan.

The report includes an analysis of leading countries’ negotiating positions and recommendations on what needs to happen to make a climate accord truly meaningful. It asserts that private funds will flow in 2010 regardless of whether an agreement is reached and that, in the short term, government stimulus funds are expected to continue to shape the markets in positive and negative ways. It also suggests an agreement at Copenhagen will be thwarted by America’s lack of ability to make meaningful climate change progress domestically thus far, and possibly by brinksmanship by China.

The authors conclude that industry leaders shouldn’t be watching COP15 for an agreement to accelerate demand for cleantech products and services, predicting that history will show it as yet another milestone on the road to an agreement. Instead, the conference will help to drive global awareness, which is expected to drive broader demand.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/cleantech-sector-concludes-cop15-doesnt-matter/.

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Indian Social Entrepreneurs Spotlighted

The Schwab Foundation for Social Entrepreneurship, in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP), has selected three social enterprises with significant impact in India as winners of the India Social Entrepreneurs Award for 2009: Rajendra Joshi, Managing Trustee, Saath; Brij Kothari, Director, PlanetRead; and Padmanabha and Rama Rao, Co-Directors, RIVER.

This is the fifth edition of the award, which has been given annually since 2005 to individuals that have founded organizations or companies that do not maximize profits, but benefit society or the environment. Previous winners, which have been included in the Schwab Foundation’s global network of the world’s 150 leading social entrepreneurs, include Vikram Akula, SKS Microfinance (2006), Harish Hande, SELCO (2007) and Arbind Singh (2008). For the first time since the beginning of the competition in 2005, the Foundation Board has decided not to pick just one winner in a country, but three. The Board thus acknowledged that India is home to a significant number of the world’s leading social entrepreneurs.

The three winners are:

Rajendra Joshi, Saath, Ahmedabad
Today, more than 60 million people live in slums across India, lacking access to healthcare, education, employment and housing. In 1989, Rajendra Joshi developed Saath, which uses public-private partnerships to improve the lives of over 40,000 people per year. In 2009, Saath’s employment programmes with the Ahmedabad Municipal Corporation placed 8,000 slum residents in jobs at firms like Tata Indicom and Kotak Mahindra. Its Slum Networking Program has improved the physical infrastructure of 6,000 households while its four Urban Resource Centers in Ahmedabad have given 22,000 slum households access to microfinance accounts, insurance packages, preventive and natal healthcare, and pre-school education.

Brij Kothari, PlanetRead, Mumbai
Two hundred million Indians remain functionally illiterate despite having completed Class V education. Brij Kothari’s organization, PlanetRead, uses Same Language Subtitling, or SLS, to improve Indians’ reading abilities. Subtitles are inserted for popular Bollywood songs, and broadcasted in eight major languages on Doordarshan’s network. Reading practice thus becomes a by-product of entertainment already consumed by audiences. Research by IIM (Ahmedabad) has shown that regular exposure to SLS increases the percentage of children who become good readers after having received five years of primary schooling from 25% to 56%.

Padmanabha and Rama Rao, RIVER, Andhra Pradesh
Teachers in India’s 1.1 million single-teacher schools lack the appropriate methodologies, curricula and support systems to educate their students. RIVER’s education model helps teachers adapt to these challenges. Government curricula are adapted for local context, and divided into smaller modules so learning is aligned with each student’s ability. Local accountability chains are established between teachers, parents and government. RIVER’s success in improving the quality of primary education has led to its replication in over 75,000 schools as part of the Sarva Shiksha Abhiyan, reaching eight million children across India per year

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/indian-social-entrepreneurs-spotlighted/.

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First Movers Program

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/first-movers-program/.

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Lester Brown’s Three Models of Social Change

One of the most thoughtful people in various of the fields Volans engages is Lester Brown of the Earth Policy Institute. They are circulating byte-sized extracts from his latest book, Plan B 4.0: Mobilizing to Save Civilization (W.W. Norton & Company, 2009). One struck me as particularly interesting in relation to our work. He speaks of three models of social change: the Pearl Harbor model; the Berlin Wall model; and the sandwich model.

Extract begins: Can we change fast enough? When thinking about the enormous need for social change as we attempt to move the world economy onto a sustainable path, I find it useful to look at various models of change. Three stand out. One is the catastrophic event model, which I call the Pearl Harbor model, where a dramatic event fundamentally changes how we think and behave. The second model is one where a society reaches a tipping point on a particular issue often after an extended period of gradual change in thinking and attitudes. This I call the Berlin Wall model. The third is the sandwich model of social change, where there is a strong grassroots movement pushing for change on a particular issue that is fully supported by strong political leadership at the top.

The surprise Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1941, was a dramatic wakeup call. It totally changed how Americans thought about the war. If the American people had been asked on December 6th whether the country should enter World War II, probably 95 percent would have said no. By Monday morning, December 8th, perhaps 95 percent would have said yes.

The weakness of the Pearl Harbor model is that if we have to wait for a catastrophic event to change our behavior, it might be too late. It could lead to stresses that would themselves lead to social collapse. When scientists are asked to identify a possible “Pearl Harbor” scenario on the climate front, they frequently point to the possible breakup of the West Antarctic ice sheet. Relatively small blocks of it have been breaking off for more than a decade now, but huge parts of the sheet could break off, sliding into the ocean.

It is conceivable that this breakup could raise sea level a frightening two or three feet within a matter of years. Unfortunately, if we reach this point it may be too late to cut carbon emissions fast enough to save the remainder of the West Antarctic ice sheet or the Greenland ice sheet, whose melting is also accelerating. This is not the model we want to follow for social change on climate.

The Berlin Wall model is of interest because the wall’s dismantling 20 years ago, in November 1989, was a visual manifestation of a much more fundamental social change. At some point, the people living in Eastern Europe, buoyed by changes in Moscow, had rejected the great “socialist experiment” with its one-party political system and centrally planned economy. Although it was not anticipated, Eastern Europe experienced a political revolution, an essentially bloodless revolution, that changed the form of government in every country in the region. It had reached a tipping point, but it was not expected. You can search the political science journals of the 1980s in vain for an article warning that Eastern Europe was on the verge of a political revolution. In Washington the Central Intelligence Agency (CIA) “had no idea in January 1989 that a tidal wave of history was about to break upon us,” reflected Robert Gates, formerly with the CIA and now U.S. Secretary of Defense, in a 1996 interview.

Many social changes occur when societies reach tipping points or cross key thresholds. Once that happens, change comes rapidly and often unpredictably. One of the best known U.S. tipping points is the growing opposition to smoking that took place during the last half of the twentieth century. This anti-smoking movement was fueled by a steady flow of information on the health-damaging effects of smoking, a process that began with the Surgeon General’s first report in 1964 on smoking and health. The tipping point came when this information flow finally overcame the heavily funded disinformation campaign funded by the tobacco industry.

Published almost every year, the Surgeon General’s report both drew attention to what was being learned about the effect of smoking on health and spawned countless new research projects on this relationship. There were times in the 1980s and 1990s when it seemed every few weeks another study was being released that had analyzed and documented one health effect or another associated with smoking. Eventually smoking was linked to more than 15 forms of cancer and to heart disease and strokes. As public awareness of the damaging effects of smoking on health accumulated, various measures were adopted that banned smoking on planes and in offices, restaurants, and other public places. As a result of these collective changes, cigarette smoking per person peaked around 1970 and began a long-term decline that continues today.

One of the defining events in this social shift came when the tobacco industry agreed to compensate state governments for past Medicare costs of treating smoking victims. More recently, in June 2009 Congress passed by an overwhelming margin and President Obama signed a bill that gave the Food and Drug Administration the authority to regulate tobacco products, including advertising. It opened a new chapter in the effort to reduce the health toll from smoking.

The sandwich model of social change is in many ways the most attractive one, partly because it brings a potential for rapid change. As of late 2009, the strong grassroots interest in cutting carbon emissions and developing renewable sources of energy is merging with the interests of President Obama and his administration. One result is a near de facto moratorium on building new coal plants.

There are many signs that the United States may be moving toward a tipping point on climate, much as it did on civil rights in the 1960s. Though some of the indicators also reflect the economic downturn, it now seems likely that carbon emissions in the United States peaked in 2007 and have begun what will be a long-term decline. The burning of coal and oil, the principal sources of carbon emissions, may be declining. And with the cars to be scrapped in 2009 likely to exceed sales, the U.S. automobile fleet size may have peaked and begun to shrink.

The shift to more fuel-efficient cars over the last two years, spurred in part by higher gasoline prices, was strongly reinforced by the new automobile fuel efficiency standards and by rescue package pressures on the automobile companies to improve fuel efficiency. The combination of much more demanding automobile efficiency standards, a dramatic restoration of funding for public transit, and an encouraging shift not only to more fuel-efficient gas-electric hybrid cars but also to both plug-in hybrids and electric cars could dramatically reduce gasoline sales. The U.S. Department of Energy in past years had projected substantial growth in U.S. oil consumption, but it has recently revised this downward. The question now is not will oil use decline, but how fast will it do so.

Shifts within the energy sector, with rapid growth in wind and solar energy while coal and oil are declining, also signal a basic shift in values, one that could eventually alter every sector of the economy. If so, this, combined with a national leadership that shares these emerging values, could lead to social and economic change on a scale and at a pace we cannot now easily imagine.

Of the three models of social change, relying on the Pearl Harbor model is by far the riskiest, because by the time a society-changing catastrophic event occurs, it may be too late. The Berlin Wall model works, despite the lack of government support, but it does take time. Some 40 years elapsed after the communist takeover of the governments of Eastern Europe before the spreading opposition became strong enough to overcome repressive regimes and switch to democratically elected governments. The ideal situation for rapid, historic progress occurs when mounting grassroots pressure for change merges with a national leadership committed to the same change. This may help explain why the world has such high hopes for the new U.S. leadership. Extract ends.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/lester-browns-three-models-of-social-change/.

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Think ‘macro-insurance’. Scaling North Africa’s Energy Vision

Munich Re, the insurance company, is demonstrating an extraordinary vision and leadership as it gears to solve some of the barriers to scale of large renewable energy plants — demonstrating what investors can do in other areas to unleash the Pathways to Scale of more sustainable markets.

Munich Re has developed an innovative insurance offerings to help provide planning certainty to investors in new power-plant technologies. Even investing in an industrial-scale solar energy plant in the deserts of North Africa can be considered a possibility, according to the firm and the news by Greenbang.

“This is no longer a distant vision but technologically fascinating and also achievable,” said Torsten Jeworrek, a Munich Re board member. “DESERTEC is clearly banking on the right incentives in the long term, namely climate protection and a low-carbon energy sector. We are therefore commencing a dialogue with visionary thinkers and companies that, like us, are convinced of DESERTEC’S enormous economic, ecological and social potential.”

The initiative resonates with earlier posts I made on the need for the EU to develop these future markets by thinking like a pioneer, but Munich Re shows that business can move quicker than large public bureaucracies if and when new market opportunities become apparent.

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/insurers-can-materialize-north-africas-energy-vision/.

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“The Power of Unreasonable People” reaches global Chinese speaking (中文繁体) community

Harvard Business School Press, the publisher of “The Power of Unreasonable People”, published on its Taiwanese website a Chinese (traditional) transcript of John Elkington’s interview on the key traits of social entrepreneurs.  It was the only book outside school that I managed to read from cover to cover in the first half of the year 2009 due to class schedule , and it served as a catalyst on my journey to Volans.  Now it is uplifting to see the global Chinese-speaking community being embraced.

Brief transcript:

http://www.hbrtaiwan.com/event/video/trans003.pdf

Video:

http://www.hbrtaiwan.com/event/video/index.htm

Also, for those who are interested, here are some Chinese terms to google for related literature in the language:

“The Power of Unreasonable People +社会企业家” (The Power of Unreasonable People+ social entrepreneurship”

 “三重底线” (Triple bottom line)

 “Elkington +可持续”   (Elkington + sustainability)

The address for this blog entry is: http://www.volans.com/2009/11/%e2%80%9cthe-power-of-unreasonable-people%e2%80%9d-reaches-global-chinese-speaking-%e4%b8%ad%e6%96%87%e7%b9%81%e4%bd%93-community/.

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