Don’t Talk, Act: Sustainability Requires Action

Following the Law of Diminishing Marginal Returns, sustainability is between the stages of anxiety and euphoria. The stage of the new is over; sustainability, or with its reductionist name and literally translated into Spanish as sustentabilidad, has been in the international discourse for years.

There is confusion between “sostenibilidad” and sustainability; according to the United Nations, the difference between the two is that sustainability is the process by which natural resources are preserved, conserved and protected only for the benefit of present and future generations without taking into account the social, political and cultural needs of human beings, while “sostenibilidad”  is the process by which the economic, social, cultural diversity and healthy environment needs of the present generation are satisfied without putting at risk the satisfaction of these needs for future generations.

Another reductionism is that sustainability is still associated only with the environmental, leaving out the economic, social and institutional.

The stage of anxiety and that of euphoria have come together; nothing in this world is sequential any more, but simultaneous. In truth, it was never sequential, it was just measured that way. 

Anxiety for those who know that there are non-tariff barriers in their sectors, for those who do not have time to reorient their industries to adjust to the new laws or standards imposed by the demanding markets. Anxiety, because it is not known how to do it or if the ways of doing it and the benefits of doing it are clear.

But these are a matter of competitiveness, of access to markets. It is no longer the subject of Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) and even less of philanthropy. What is interesting is that it does both.

For example, the EU Deforestation Free Regulation (EUDR) entered into force on June 29, 2023, and its provisions will apply from Dec. 30, 2024, and apply to cocoa, coffee, soya, palm oil, meat and rubber products. This list of products is the beginning, but others such as agave and citrus fruits, are already being considered.

Anxiety, for those who must manage water and calculate and mitigate their carbon footprint and water systems in countries that have restrictions and pollution.

At this stage of anxiety and euphoria comes artificial intelligence. Anxiety in the society that will be impacted and euphoria among those who provide AI services.

Carbon footprinting and ESG are at the euphoria stage, although more at the conversation stage than the action stage; there is no one who does not talk about these issues, but very few “do.” Some calculate, but very few mitigate, and even fewer certify.

Sustainability is clearly in its euphoria stage, and this is noticeable in that everything is labeled as sustainable. At conferences, the most pronounced word is sustainable or sustainability. And when that happens, it is the closest thing to emptying a concept of content.

Before, everything was big data, globalization, intelligent and now sustainable. Of course, big data and globalization have passed into the hangover stage: they are talked about, but everyone is already tired of the terms, on the one hand, but also because they have been internalized. Big data is already used and we are already globalized.

In this stage of anxiety and euphoria around sustainability, there is what  Gunderson, Lance and C. S. Holding calls“panarchy” – “a conceptual framework that explains the dual, and seemingly contradictory, characteristics of all complex systems: stability and change.”  It is the study of how economic growth and human development depend on ecosystems and institutions, and how they interact. An integrative framework that brings together ecological, economic and social models of change and stability to account for the complex interactions between these two different domains and different levels of scale.

Anxiety is the push and euphoria is the pull. How do you get out of anxiety? Is it necessary to get into euphoria?

You can get out of anxiety by implementing sustainability, analyzing non-tariff barriers, getting ahead of tenures, certifying, carrying out traceability, mitigating carbon and water footprints, investing, analyzing international benchmarks by sector of action, and aligning with global benchmarks, such as SBTi, SASB, S&P Global, among others.

If sustainability is activated, it is necessary to be anxious, and you can take advantage of the euphoria to get ahead of the competition, to minimize risks, to be influential in your sector, to think about a second curve; that is, before the hangover stage is reached, before the curve inevitably falls, generating a new curve. 

You don't have to go far. Steve Jobs was the master of the second curve. When the Mac was a success, Jobs and his creative team were planning to enter the music market with the IPod; when the IPod dominated the market, they designed the IPhone and the IPad.

And the key success factor is timing; like in a jazz orchestra; timing in improvisation, with mastery in execution.