Charter Martin - Sustainable Solutions

The editors would like to thank all the authors for their thinking and hard work and the employees of The Centre for Sustainable Design, econcept and Greenleaf Publishing for co-operation and motivation. Thanks also go to our families for their encouragement and support.

Jacqueline Aloisi de Larderel
Director, Division of Technology, Industry and Economics, United Nations Environment Programme

Regardless of recent efficiency improvements in the development of products and services, a growing population and the emergence of a dynamic global consumer culture are fuelling environmental deterioration. UNEPs Global Environment Outlook 2000 highlights the urgent necessity for adopting sustainable practices at all levels of society, and over 100 environment ministers, gathered by UNEP in June 2000 in Malm, Sweden, for the first global environmental forum, called for the development of cleaner and more resource-efficient technologies for a life-cycle economy.

Changes in consumption and production patterns will depend on the actions of all stakeholders. Today, the business sector is increasingly expected to respond to the demands of society for improved environmental, social and ethical performance. The global sustainability debate has evolved to the point where businesses must consider the impacts of products and services throughout life-cycle and supply chains. This calling for change is the fundamental rationale behind business and governmental support for moving corporate responsibility issues to the forefront of the global agenda.

At the 1999 World Economic Forum in Davos, UN Secretary General Kofi Annan proposed a Global Compact to ensure that there is a human face to the global market. He urged companies to commit themselves to apply recognised principles and standards in three areas: human rights, labour standards and environmental protection.

The business sector is beginning to realise that financial and social benefits will arise from incorporating practices of sustainability. Energy efficiency, recycling and maximising the use of raw materials can all deliver profitable returns, as can clean, efficient production processes and innovative sustainable products. The power of consumptionas a driving force towards sustainable developmentis in many ways greater than the power of legislative and regulatory measures, hence the escalating attention among decision-makers worldwide for the concept of sustainable consumption.

Since the Rio Earth Summit in 1992, UNEP has been catalysing the implementation of Cleaner Production and Sustainable Consumption throughout the world. This remarkable book demonstrates that solutions are available and that innovative thinking, drawing from current technological changes, can lead to considerable improvements towards sustainability.

Sustainable Solutions successfully demonstrates the enormous business opportunities relating to ecodesign and sustainable product design (SPD). UNEP congratulates the authors of this publication which emphasises a variety of innovative examples that are drawn from both large and small companies and from both developed and developing countries. Decisively, Sustainable Solutions approaches the elements of consumption and production in an integrated manner. With the adoption of a life-cycle economy remaining as a considerable global challenge, this book will carry us somewhat closer to a sustainable future.

Martin Charter
The Centre for Sustainable Design, UK

Ursula Tischner
econcept, Germany

SUSTAINABLE SOLUTIONS ARE PRODUCTS, SERVICES, HYBRIDS OR SYSTEM changes that minimise negative and maximise positive sustainability impactseconomic, environmental, social and ethicalthroughout and beyond the life-cycle of existing products or solutions, while fulfilling acceptable societal demands/needs. Sustainable solutions require multi-stakeholder engagement and involve changes or shifts in consumption and production patterns. The aim of sustainable solutions is to create a positive net sustainable value (positive impacts should outweigh negative impacts) for all stakeholders in the delivery process. Changes may be incremental at the product level or radical if system shifts are needed.

Ecodesign has evolved primarily from the engineering and life-cycle assessment (LCA) communities and has therefore often been technically rather than business or organisationally focused. The first phase of greener product development has tended to produce one-off eco-(re)designs within research and development (R&D) departments, with relatively few companies implementing environmental considerations throughout the product development process. As a result, ecodesign management systems have remained immature. The reasons for this are manifold, but include a lack of corporate vision, perceived high costs, weak market awareness and the risks associated with being too far ahead of the market.