New Zealand's cleantech change agents
Their Big Hairy Audacious Goal is to transform the New Zealand economy. Who are they and what do they want?
Monday, June 21 2010 || Features || BY Mark Revington
Air New Zealand’s Fyfe has encountered plenty of naysayers. “It is not the only mechanism and personally I am not sure the ETS is the right mechanism, but that is not the point. We can debate what is right and wrong and do that for another 10 years. Ultimately you have to put a marker in the sand and move forward. Accept it isn’t perfect but it does allow us some certainty in business to make investment decisions and make choices.
“When you are living in a void of uncertainty you make very inefficient and ineffectual decisions, because you are always hedging your bets. If you spend all your time hedging your bets, you’re not harnessing and focusing your resources and efforts on the way forward. That is unproductive and dissipates that leadership opportunity.”
Business New Zealand, which is the largest grouping of business interests in the country, supports the ETS — though chief executive Phil O’Reilly also says it isn’t perfect. He has talked to Phillip Mills and his organisation supports in principle the idea that New Zealand should take advantage of a low-carbon economy as quickly as possible.
“It seems to me that execution is the key. We need to make sure we pursue an economically and socially rational path,” O’Reilly says. In other words, jump on the cleantech train, but make sure no Kiwi company is disadvantaged. A lot of mainstream companies, particularly SMEs, don’t recognise the opportunities and feel threatened or powerless, says O’Reilly. Business New Zealand is working to overcome those fears through programmes like its Sustainable Business Forum.
Mills has form when it comes to awareness around climate change. His book, Fighting Global Obesity, written with wife Jackie and published in 2007, was both a practical guide to personal health and global sustainability. The personal health angle was understandable, while the sustainability angle grew along with Mills’ increasing awareness of the problem of global warming when writing the book. He tried to get some action by sending copies of his book to Government ministers and mayors and received a few replies while also learning some lessons on how to go about raising awareness on a sensitive public issue.
Just before Christmas, Mills sent out copies of a book called The Clean Industrial Revolution by Australian Ben McNeil to those who had previously received his book. McNeil convincingly lays out a case for Australia to pursue a low-carbon economy and much of what he writes about is applicable to New Zealand.
Mills figured the Christmas break was the only time his targets would get to at least look the book over. To make the message even simpler to take in, he got a band of volunteers to highlight passages in each book and sent the copies to central and local politicians with a hard-hitting cover letter.
“I said, ‘I know you are busy but just read the last chapter if you don’t have any more time’. I got 65 replies from MPs alone.”
I agree with the sentiments of the article - a recent Harvard Business Review identified that the green economy is the motherlode of innovation.
This is a laudable initiative, but where is the action? Is the only strategy to raise awareness and ask the government to have a task force?
Probably the biggest obstacle to progress towards more cleantech is the way many associate of "green" with tree-hugging/anti-business/anti-growth. Incremental change won't do it - we have to reconceptualise our businesses and lifestyles - and if we get it right, we can be both prosperous and sustainable.
Posted by Peter Bruce at 09:29 on June 24, 2010
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