Environmentalism

Read this section to gain an understanding of the environmental impacts of businesses and the importance of sustainability.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

  • Companies bear a responsibility to produce products without compromising the right of future generations to meet their needs.
  • Customers demand that companies respect the environment. Our land, air, and water all face environmental threats.
  • Land is polluted by the dumping of waste and an increasing reliance on agricultural chemicals. It’s pockmarked by landfills, shredded by strip mining, and laid bare by deforestation.
  • Urban sprawl has squeezed out wetlands and farmlands and destroyed wildlife habitats.
  • To protect the land from further damage, we must dispose of waste in responsible ways, control strip mining and logging, and save open spaces and wetlands.
  • Emissions of toxic gases and particles from factories, power plants, office buildings, cars, trucks, and even farms pollute the air, which is also harmed by the burning associated with deforestation.
  • Many experts believe that the heavy emission of carbon dioxide by factories and vehicles is altering the earth’s climate: carbon dioxide and other gases, they argue, act as a "greenhouse" over the earth, producing global warming – a heating of the earth that could have dire consequences. Many companies have taken actions to reduce air pollution.
  • Water is polluted by such substances as oil and chemicals. Most of the contaminants come from agricultural fertilizers, pesticides, wastewater, raw sewage, and silt.
  • Also of concern is the dwindling supply of water in some parts of the world brought about by diminishing rainfall and increased consumption.
  • The Environmental Protection Agency has been a major force in cleaning up U.S. waters.
  • Many companies have joined with governmental and nongovernmental agencies alike in efforts to help people protect and conserve water.
  • Sustainability can be defined as the principle of providing products today that don’t compromise the ability of future generations to meet their needs.
  • Companies that undertake sustainability initiatives believe that meeting business needs and protecting the environment are not mutually exclusive. They must do both.
  • Those who support a "triple bottom line" approach to corporate performance evaluation believe that the current reporting model of one bottom line – profit – does not capture all the dimensions of performance. They argue instead that companies should measure performance using three separate bottom lines: profit, people, and planet (or the 3Ps).