Press Release
For Immediate Release
12 June 2007
An interview with Murray Hogarth
-- Murray Hogarth, Strategy Project Leader, ECOS Corporation is an international authority on climate change and an expert on its effects on business. With the entire world facing the prospects of severe weather changes ACTE has moved to shed more light on this subject. Murray will deliver his keynote speech, Climate Control – Reduce CO2 Emissions Now, at the ACTE Asia-Pacific Education Conference in Singapore on 23 August, addressing its effects and how the business travel industry can work to make positive changes. Kenneth Phua, Regional Director, Asia-Pacific, ACTE talked to Murray in this recent interview.
KP: Everyone has heard about CO2 emissions and its link to rising temperatures but what part of this subject has been most underplayed?
MH: Having spent over a decade working on the climate challenge, as both a senior journalist and as an adviser to business, I think what’s underplayed is how huge this issue really is. It’s huge as a looming crisis not only for the natural environment, but for the whole of human civilization. It’s also huge as the catalyst for reinventing how we live our lives so people everywhere can pursue a better quality of life without exhausting the Earth’s ability to support its large population of people. We need to totally re-engineer the energy economy of the world, within four or five decades at most, and that will mean dramatic changes in how we live, work and play. So it’s huge in terms of peril, and it’s huge in terms of opportunity as well.
KP: In your book The Third Degree you talk about the role of businesses in stemming rising temperatures but do these initiatives interfere with their short term financial goals and where does the need for reporting positive quarterly earnings fit in?
MH: Acting to address climate change will impact on the short-term financial goals of many companies, though it won’t all be negative. Of course not acting may have major consequences for the bottom line as well; in my country of Australia, for example, weather-related disasters such as droughts and floods – which climate scientists predict will become more frequent and more intense – can impact heavily on financial goals. For example, water supply crises in Australia are threatening to close down power stations and lack of irrigation water threatens to devastate orchards and vineyards. With climate change, we are talking about a period of discontinuous change for the global economy, which means the old order is going to be shaken up and a new order will emerge. Such periods of economic and societal transformation always create winners and losers. The flip-side of focusing too much on short-term financial goals is that you can lose sight of maintaining the long-term sustainable value of your business. Get that wrong and you’ll be wiped out. Increasingly business analysts are becoming aware of carbon risk for companies and will be looking beyond regular profit reports to understand how a company’s future growth and value will be impacted.
KP: Is there truth in the opinion that organizations in the public or government sector are quicker in adopting sustainable business practices than those in private sectors?
MH: In many ways I think the reverse may be true. I think many of the most inspiring global examples of major action on climate change come from the corporate sector. Think companies like BP and Dupont, which moved decisively over a decade ago, and more recently General Electric with its vast research and development capabilities across many energy technologies and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation with its global media influence. The world’s biggest banking group, Citi, is spending $US50 billion on clean energy investments over the next decade. In terms of governments, the stand outs for me are the UK under Tony Blair and the US state of California under Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger.
KP: Do you think that world governments and global corporations will stay the course when the focus of the world media is attracted to something else happening in our world?
MH: I know there will be many distractions as the 21st Century unfolds – wars and terrorism, disease threats like bird ‘flu, economic challenges like peak oil, and big natural disasters – yet I can’t imagine that the climate challenge will somehow fade from view. To quote Winston Churchill from before World War II, as the threat from Nazi Germany was becoming all too clear, we are now entering a ‘period of consequences’. At best we will be immensely challenged and a great deal of the world’s resources – including financial capital and our best brains – will be focused on solutions. I am essentially an optimist on this. I think our society will respond faster and at greater scale than most of can imagine now. The shift is coming as we move from argument to action. In particular I believe we will see an explosion of innovation and entrepreneurial activity from business.
About Murray
As Strategy Project Leader of ECOS, Murray Hogarth has worked extensively with clients in Australia, the U.S. and Asia to help them assess how big social and environmental issues put value at stake for their businesses, and how to plan and implement strategic business responses. In addition to his role at ECOS, Murray is a Business Associate of social enterprise Easy Being Green, board member of the Environmental Defenders Office of NSW and author of the recently published book on sustainable business, The Third Degree.
For more information, contact:
Kenneth Phua
ACTE Regional Director, Asia-Pacific
t/f: +65-6440-9169
e: [email protected]
Julia Jufri
ACTE Regional Manager, Asia-Pacific
t/f: +65-6764-4579
e: [email protected]
For more information, contact:
Debbie Flynn
CEO
Brighter Group
The Pod, London's Vertical Gateway
Bridges Wharf, Battersea
London SW11 3BE England
T: 020 7326 9880
F: 020 7326 9890
E: [email protected]
W: www.brightergroup.com