Partnership Strengthens Sustainable Biz Reseach

Partnership Strengthens Sustainable Business Research

The New Zealand Business Council for Sustainable Development (NZBCSD) has formed a strategic partnership with Waikato Management School.

The partnership gives the council access to Waikato Management School’s significant capabilities in sustainability research and education.

Stephen Tindall, Chair NZBCSD welcomed the partnership which will support the emphasis placed by the Business Council on “learning through sharing”. “This is our first strategic partnership and we are confident that it will help us further develop our research programme. Education is fundamental to driving sustainable development in New Zealand and we are committed to working closely with the education sector through a range of projects supporting business/ school partnerships and youth employment. This is a natural extension which also fits well with our research objective.”

Waikato Management School Dean Professor Mike Pratt said the School was very pleased its relationship with the NZBCSD had been formalised into a strategic alliance.

“Waikato Management School is committed to promoting sustainable business in New Zealand and around the world,” he said.

“Of the NZBCSD’s major current projects, which include: identifying sustainable supply chains, economic incentives for sustainable development and climate change – there are people within the School to contribute to all of these,” he said. “In addition, the School is well equipped to produce case studies from its own enterprise and those it researches or advises, to support the Council’s goal of positively role modelling sustainable business as beneficial to the bottom line as well as environment and society.”

Professor Pratt said the School had undergone a re-purposing exercise using the Peak Performing Organisation framework. Rather than establish a ‘Centre’ for Sustainable Business - a conventional academic approach - the School was integrating sustainability as its core purpose throughout its organisation. Its challenge was to be recognised as one of the world’s leading business schools committed to the principles of sustainable business.

Sustainable development is about economic growth that takes proper account of environmental effects and is socially responsible. The NZBCSD believes that sustainable development is about improving the quality of life for everyone and that a company’s responsibility does not end at the office door or the factory gate.

Tindall adds: “Our members are all working towards the goal that sustainable development becomes “the way we do business around here”.

The corporate contribution to sustainable development can be fulfilled through excellence in the management of the financial, environmental and social dimensions of all corporate activities, products and services.

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