INTRODUCTION
 Doing more with less — this is a desire
of all humans. As a business person you want to produce more of
your product by using less resources such as electricity, water,
raw materials etc. This will increase your profits, and,
automatically help the environment, even though this is not your
first thought.
As a private citizen you want to
air-condition your home (or heat it), bathe, wash your clothes,
maintain your garden, use less electricity, water and detergents
etc. This will provide you with the comforts you seek while
saving you money and simultaneously improve the health of the
environment.
These are two examples of green
productivity. Some call this, or similar concepts,
eco-efficiency or cleaner production. The term “green
productivity” best captures the concept of being
productive (something we all want in whatever capacity we act)
and helping the environment (being “green” as it is
now commonly called).
In whatever capacity we act (producer,
consumer, government decision-maker or citizen) we have regard
for our fellow human beings. We don’t want them to work in
unhealthy factories and we don’t want people downstream to
suffer from degraded water or air quality as a result of our
lifestyles. This is the ethical dimension of being human.
Taken together, the economic, the
environmental and ethical elements of our lifestyles can be
called our “triple bottom line”.
The Foreword, by Tachi Kiuchi, Chairman
and CEO Emeritus of Mitsubishi Electric America, takes up the
theme of the triple bottom line. It is a very heartfelt,
personal account of how a successful businessman learnt the
lessons of green productivity well before anyone had coined the
term.
As a trained economist and influenced by the
conventional perspective of that discipline, I had to read this
contribution three times before I came to fully appreciate its
deep messages. Like Tachi Kiuchi, I have had a range of life
changing experiences in the rainforest, but it was only by
sitting quietly deep inside a forest and pondering its
complexity — a complexity that is its life — did I
come to understand the message that Tachi Kiuchi gives us.
We then come to the body of the book.
It elaborates on the theme of its title — basically
elaborating on tools which any smart and thoughtful business
person can use to improve profits while providing environmental
benefits. This has been written by Bill Shireman, CEO of Global
Futures and President of The Future 500. As editor I have made
slight changes to his work and added Appendix 2, which was
compiled by the Environmental Management Centre, the University
of Queensland. I have also added the illustrations.
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