Malaysian bourse emphasises sustainable business practices

Bursa Malaysia Bhd recently organised a dialogue with industry captains to highlight sustainable business practices. Other aims of the dialogue, ran in collaboration with Conservation International, were to improve corporate social responsibility (CSR) and environmental issues in Malaysia, according to a Bursa Malaysia statement. Read more

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P&G announces plan to use innovative sustainable packaging

The Procter & Gamble Company today announced plans to use renewable, sustainable, sugarcane-derived plastic on selected packaging on its Pantene Pro-V®, COVERGIRL® and Max Factor® brands. Read more

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Indonesian Palm Oil Giant partially cleared on green claim

A recent audit on PT SMART Tbk, revealed the Indonesian palm oil gian had not destroyed primary forest but had planted on carbon-rich deep peatlands. This partially clears the company of accusations by Greenpeace. SMART was reported to have said that the independent report showed a campaign by Greenpeace was exaggerated or wrong, but the audit found that the planting on deep peatlands, which trap greenhouse gases, contravenes Indonesian and SMART’s own regulations. Read more

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Micro donations for charities with Beanstalk Giving

Speaking to a CSR Consultant recently, the CSR Digest confirmed that personal donations amounted to the majority of funding for charities. And even more money could be available if only micro donations could be leveraged. Beanstalk Giving (BG) saw this need and designed an API which helps E-Tailers round off purchases, allocating the balance to a charity of the purchaser-cum-donor’s choice. Read more

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Call For Entries – Asian CSR Awards 2010

Entries for the eighth Annual Asian CSR Awards are now being accepted, with the submission deadline being 31 August 2010. The Asian CSR Awards Programme is presented by the Asian Institute of Management Ramon V. del Rosario, Sr. Center for Corporate Social Responsibility (AIM-RVR) and hosted by Intel. Read more

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Greenwash – It’s all hogwash

By Dilaila Mohd Yunus

As more and more consumers are getting increasingly concerned with the dangers of global warming, the need for environmentally-friendly products and services have increased.  As a result, some corporations are turning to greenwashing to position themselves as green corporations in order to get a big chunk of the market share.

What is Greenwashing?

Greenwashing refers to any form of marketing or public relations of a political, religious or non-profit organisation that mislead consumers regarding the environmental practices of the company; or the environmental benefits of a product or service.

In short, greenwashing is when a corporation positions itself or its products as ‘green’ when they are not.

What is wrong with greenwashing?

Misleading

Greenwashing is morally and ethically wrong. The degree of deceit range from omission of fact to absurd claims and outright lies.

Living a lie

If one company gets away with greenwashing, it gives other companies the permission and incentive to follow suit. This in effect would create an industry-wide illusion of environmental sustainability. As a result, consumers will be tricked into using environmentally-degrading products, while Earth continues to suffer.

Stunt growth

As more products with fake environmental claims penetrate the marketplace, the stiff competition will stunt the growth of genuine green products. Unethical manufacturers will just take a shortcut to reap the benefits now rather than investing in the time and effort to produce authentic green products.

Disappoint consumers

Once a consumer starts to mistrust an organisation, he or she won’t be coming back. You’ll lose substantial business in the long run from consumers who are genuinely looking for environmentally-friendly products.

Death of a potentially lucrative market share

Recurring bad experience will lead to cynicism and doubt on all environmental claims. This will be the death of the green product market. Manufacturers will suffer.

How not to greenwash

Don’t just highlight one attribute of the product

Some companies highlight a particular attribute that is environment-friendly while omitting to mention others which are clearly not.

The supposedly green doll is a case in point. They are made of plastic and wrapped in more plastic, even if the accessories are made from re-purposed excess fabrics and trimmings from other dolls.

Don’t claim without proof

Anyone can claim their products are environmentally-friendly. It’s the substantiated proof that matters.

Don’t make vague claims

Take the so-called pure and natural line of diapers. The only difference between regular diapers and this version is just a small piece of organic cotton.

Don’t make irrelevant claims

For example, what’s the point of saying your product is CFC-free when CFC has already been banned anyway?

Don’t make claims that are outright lies

An oil and gas company, for instance, falsely advertised that the air we breathe is getting better, not worse.

Clear the hogwash from Greenwashing

At the end of the day, the main way to eliminate the practice of greenwashing is to really believe in the preservation of the earth. When a manufacturer or organisation adopts this approach, genuine efforts will be made to produce green products right from inception stage.

Then and only then can we see transparency, honesty and patience in the production of genuine environmentally-friendly products.

The writer is an international award-winning KL-based creative consultant with more than a decade’s experience in some of Malaysia’s most prominent advertising agencies and now runs In Other Words.

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Raja Nazrin: CSR not just for Corp Comm

Corporate social responsibility (CSR) should be entrenched as a company-wide culture from the top down, according to Raja Muda of Perak Raja Dr Nazrin Shah. Bernama reports that the Perak Prince said because there appears to be evidence that  CSR in Malaysia was relegated to corporate communications departments. CSR evidently has not reached a stage where CSR cuts across the board. Read more

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