One Planet Business has sought to “translate” today’s environmental challenges into a framework that will engage the business community. Together with its research partners, WWF has collated a global evidence base of Ecological Footprint data, as well as wider flows of materials and overall CO2 emissions.

These methodologies have been used to measure the global impact of key areas of consumer demand such as mobility, food and housing, and the supply chains that meet these demands.

This analysis is proposed in a four-level framework:

• The aggregate global impact of human consumption;
• the impacts associated with underlying human demands;
• the industries and value chains that meet these demands and the relative impact of each as a component of overall demand; and
• the impacts of the individual companies that make up these sectors.

This analysis has been supplemented with WWF’s water assessment research, together with data from organisations such as the OECD and United Nations and leading think tanks such as the Wuppertal Institute for Climate, Environment and Energy.

Research Innovation

Innovatively, this framework connects environmental and economic realities at the global macro level with the meso levels of consumption areas and their associated industry sectors. It then maps this down to the micro level of individual companies and products.

This helps pinpoint the areas of most significant impact at the different levels of production and consumption. Coupled with an understanding of the economic and legal systems at the macro, meso and micro levels, it is then possible to highlight where the most effective levers for change exist and where the responsibilities lie.

Conclusions

The undeniable conclusion of this research is that to avoid ecological catastrophe, business and its stakeholders must find ways to meet human demand within the limits of one planet. This is particularly true for the three areas of demand that place the most strain on the Earth: housing, transport and food, which together account for 63% of the global Ecological Footprint, 65% of total CO2 emissions and 72% of the world’s material use.

This research draws out the key implications of overshoot for business: from increased resource prices and the risk of investment withdrawal to supply disruptions and growing regulatory pressure. In our resource- and carbon-constrained world, a new framework for business decision-making is evolving where ecological limits are paramount and will be a key success criterion for future business operations. Companies that do not grasp this face being forced out of the market.

Read more about this research and its conclusions in the first One Planet Business report “Creating Value Within Planetary Limits” (hyperlink to publications section)