Sustainable Development and socio-efficiency

5 Jul

GI LogoIn his introduction to the July issue of Quality Times the editor draws attention to the definition of eco-efficiency by the World Business Council for Sustainable Development – “eco- efficiency is achieved by the delivery of competitively priced goods and services that satisfy human needs and bring quality of life, while progressively reducing ecological impact and resource intensity throughout the life-death cycle, to a level at least in line with the earth’s carrying capacity.”

The editor, Pradeep Chaturvedi,  adds that ‘similar to the concept of eco- efficiency but so far less explored in corporate sustainability is the concept of socio-efficiency, i.e., the relation between a company’s value added and its social impact.  While it can be assumed that corporate impact on environment is usually negative, this may not be true for the social impact. . . .  Both eco-efficiency and socio-efficiency promote economic sustainability of businesses in the long run’.

This neatly introduces a paper by Prof. Colin Coulson-Thomas that addresses Environmental Management Challenges and Opportunities for the World Congress in Dehli on 19th/20th of July.  In the context of a world-wide digitalisation of economies, empowerment of citizens, and the disappointments of Rio+20 last year this paper aimed at corporate boardrooms could not be better timed.

The Groupe Intellex summary of Colin’s paper is available here.

 

 

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