Let's Talk Sustainable Business

Genica Schaefgen from Ecosia talks about how customers' privacy is at the core of the business, how Ecosia is the official "planting partner" of debit card company TreeCard - which dedicates 80% of profits earned from merchant transaction fees into planting trees, why the company is very careful who it partners with, and Genica's work with the Social Entrepreneurship Network Germany, which helps raise the visibility of socially-focused companies to politicians and other stakeholders.

Genica Schaefgen is Head of Ecosia Germany, a Berlin-based tech company best known as the "search engine that plants trees". In this episode, Genica explains how using Ecosia contributes to its global tree-planting projects, enabling a tree to be planted "every 1.3 seconds", why Ecosia positions itself as a social business and takes a holistic approach to its biodiversity projects, and how the company aims to hold itself accountable by publishing their financial reports every month.

Mari Granström from Origin by Ocean talks about scaling up and reimagining an algae processing value chain, how she feels about EU and global climate and oceans policy, developing collaborative partnerships, and the advice she would give to anyone thinking of setting up a company with a bio-based focus.

Mari Granström is the CEO and Founder of Origin by Ocean, a Finnish start-up building a business ecosystem based on farmed and harvested algae, which is turned into ingredients used in the production of everyday consumer goodsincluding in food, cosmetics, detergents, agriculture, textiles and packaging. In this episode we discuss why Mari decided to focus on the processed algae market, how Origin by Ocean uses biorefinery technology to tackle the problem of marine eutrophication and the company's partnership with Finnish brand Marikmekko.

The European Commission's Małgorzata Gołębiewska talks about how the EU Green Claims Directive aims to "level the playing field" for companies, the recent amendment to the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive, the important role independent verification will play in the future, and also answers a question she often receives - what will the cost be for companies needing to adhere to the EU Green Claims Directive?

Małgorzata Gołębiewska is Team Leader for Environmental Footprint & Green Claims, DG Environment, at the European Commission. She leads the preparation and negotiation for the EU Green Claims Directive, a proposal to help combat greenwashing which sets out requirements on how to substantiate environmental claims and introduces rules on environmental labelling schemes. In this episode, we discuss the extent of greenwashing in the EU, how important it is to rebuild consumer trust and help consumers make more sustainable choices, and the role of labels such as the EU Ecolabel.

Radley Yeldar's Louise Ayling talks about how reporting standards such as the ESRS can help bridge the 'communications gap' prevalent in sustainability and how they provide an opportunity for companies to talk about their impact in a more transparent and compelling manner. We also discuss some of our favourite sustainability communications campaigns and whether 'greenwashing' remains a useful term.

Louise Ayling is Director of Sustainability and a board member at Radley Yeldar, a creative consultancy specialising in brand, corporate and sustainability communications. In this episode, Louise talks in-depth about Radley Yeldar's practical guide 'Words that Work: Effective Language in Sustainability Communications", which reviewed the sustainability webpages from 50 of Forbes' '100 most valuable brands' and compared their communications style with ten leading 'sustainable brands'. We discuss the importance of spotting and avoiding 'Stock Sustainability' and whether she feels greenwashing is still prevalent among most brands.

Eco-Age's George Harding-Rolls talks about the greenwash.com website he helped set up and its aim to help consumers better identify greenwashing. We also discuss whether companies should become advocates for legislative change in sustainability to "change the rules of the game", rather than focus too much on creating "the perfect green product".

Experienced corporate campaigner and sustainability professional George Harding-Rolls is Fossil Fuel Fashion Campaign Lead and Director of Policy & Advocacy at Eco-Age, having previously worked on Fashion, Plastics & Circular Economy at the Changing Markets Foundation.

In this episode, George joins host Bárbara Mendes-Jorge to discuss the need for improved greenwashing regulation, whether greenwashing should be seen as anti-competitive and how important it is for different departments within companies to openly discuss sustainability issues in order to prevent greenwashing.