Fast-moving industries involved in the production of consumer goods, food, apparel and precious stones have all come under pressure about the provenance of materials, components and products in their supply chains. Many companies in these sectors have responded by developing mechanisms to assure customers and consumers that products can be traced and sourced with environmental and social considerations in mind. Such traceability has reshaped expectations of corporate accountability and transparency.

Attention is now turning to oil and gas. The sector is already facing a reputational crisis following the BP Deepwater Horizon oil spill, the WikiLeaks disclosures and recent events around the Keystone XL oil pipeline and controversy in the UK over the European fuel quality regulation means that it is likely inevitable that there will be growing demand for greater transparency. As in other sectors, traceability will be a key feature of the rising tide…

Sustainable consumption has been high on our agenda in recent months. Most recently, our latest report Signed, Sealed… Delivered? highlights the diminishing returns from sustainability labels and calls for sustainability to be ‘built-in’ rather than ‘bolt-on’ (or, in this case, labelled-on) to consumer brands.

So with my antennae sensitised for unsustainable consumption, I was stunned to flick through the Financial Times‘ Weekend magazine Christmas Unwrapped and read endless exhortation of excessive consumption…

This is the last in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, two, three, four, five, and six.

Back in the UK now and reflecting on the news filtering out this (Sunday) morning. Given the threat yesterday of a chaotic collapse, with echoes of Copenhagen, I was relieved to hear of the final outcome. The very best was never going to be equal to the full climate challenge we face, but this COP has made some major strides in securing a long-term mitigation roadmap with ‘legal force’.

This is sixth in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, two, three, four, five, and seven.

As the high-level ministerial segment reaches its final day, there are many tired faces around the centre, including some needing a lunch time nap as in the picture below.

A surprising exception is Christiana Figueres, the Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC and responsible for getting a good set of outcomes in the next 24 hours. I have attended two progress briefings she has given. The first – and by far the more interesting – was a meeting with the youth groups…

This is fifth in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, two, three, four, six, and seven.

One of the joys of COPs is that strange things happen which make you realize that these grand UN events are as vulnerable to human foibles as a local school fete. I stayed on (and on) at the conference centre to join a business briefing by Jonathan Pershing, the US Deputy Special Envoy for Climate Change. He is a very approachable man of huge integrity whom I first met in Bali at COP 13 when he was still at WRI. When he was later sworn in to his new position as US Deputy Special Envoy for Climate Change under the Obama administration, I was delighted.

Fourth in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, two, four, five, six, and seven.

People who know me also know that I am a great believer in serendipity. As I was driven this morning to the city’s Botanical Gardens for The Durban Dialogue organised by B4E, I spotted a Nando’s restaurant and immediately thought of Sir David King who, when he arrived in Oxford to direct the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment, agreed to meet me at their temporary offices. These were, as he explained to me as I called for directions, ‘behind Nando’s’. Amazingly, and serendipitously, standing near the registration desk a few minutes later was David himself. With surprise and delight, I told him of the Nando’s connection. He looked underwhelmed.

This is third in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, two, four, five, six, and seven.

Given SustainAbility’s growing interest in bringing voices of the future into the board room and in mobilising Gen Y as a source of inspiration and innovation to corporate sustainability thinking, I’ve been looking out for how visible and vocal youth organisations have been here in Durban.

The second in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: one, three, four, five, six, and seven.

In the lift to my hotel room this morning, I was embarrassed to be sweating profusely after a run along Durban’s beach promenade under a blue sky in 25 degrees with high humidity (yes, hard work at these COPs!). As the lift doors closed, a delegate from a COP 17 side event leaped in. ‘It’s freezing in the conference,’ she said, ‘I’m heading for my room to get a jumper.’ The irony was not lost on others in the lift, but it did highlight for me the continuing disconnect between the rhetoric and action. And Durban does not look remotely well set to close the gap between the two.

This is the first in a series of posts about and from COP 17. Others in the series can be found here: two, three, four, five, six, and seven.

Durban will briefly be in the climate spotlight just months before the 20th anniversary of the Rio Earth Summit. Few of us at Rio in 1992 would have believed that so little progress would be made in the intervening years. At the time, I had four children of school age. Frankly, the UN process has served neither them, nor my four grandchildren, well since. Climate procrastination has put future generations (with over two billion ‘climate innocents’ to be born by 2050) at severe risk of increasingly dangerous climate disruptions. We have seen how national and international governments and institutions responded to the 2008 financial crisis in just two crucial days, but also how, in two crucial decades, they have achieved very little on the much deeper climate crisis. Nature neither defers decisions nor haggles; nor, as widely observed after the financial crisis, does nature do bailouts.

Business seems unprepared as fair tax follows fair trade into the spotlight.

And why companies who fail to prepare for a Gen Y world are preparing to fail.

Whatever happened to leadership and climate responsibility which reflects a company’s values and principles?

Peeling away the gloss of oil industry terminology reveals disturbing truths about the direction the industry is headed.

The surprise of yet another article arguing that companies can't serve both shareholders and society effectively.

Geoff Lye contests the view that it is the private sector that ultimately should run society.

Geoff Lye sums up his thoughts on the outcome and implications of COP 15.

Geoff Lye chats with some prominent fellow queuers while hoping to get into the COP 15 main conference.

"I don't know why I am doing this. I've always hated COPs."

Business Day delegates listen intently to the welcoming speech

Geoff Lye comments on Yvo de Boer's direct challenge to the business community at COP15.