The New Innovation in Sustainability: Less Gloom, More Fun? Happy Earth Day!
Irfan Kamal April 22nd, 2011
The world’s demand for resources (food, energy, water, minerals) seems to be outrunning our ability to supply these needs in a way that doesn’t dramatically impact our lives. We are increasingly exposed to threats such as core inflation (described recently by Chinese officials as a long-term, not short-term challenge), financial burdens of securing energy supplies (and the cost of investing in new ones), and the multiple economic and social risks of long-term climate change on our planet and way of life.
The trouble is that, according to “Mainstream Green“, a new report released by Ogilvy Earth, all this doom and gloom hasn’t been particularly effective in driving mainstream consumers to make (and push for) changes to reduce demand for energy and other resources.
In the US, there’s a 30 percentage point gap between people’s stated importance of living sustainably (80% say this is important), and their action (50% engage in sustainable behavior, e.g. taking public transportation or hiking/biking to work; using eco-friendly products and recycling). (It’s less in China — 14 points — for reasons covered at length in the report.) The mainstream consumer isn’t adopting or championing behavior change.
The possible solution?
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