TNEP Consulting Associates

Sustainable Business Practices Pty Ltd - Dan Atkins, CEO

Dan, founder and director, focuses on strategy, integration, communication and culture change services to organisations that are committed to working towards a sustainable future. Dan has extensive international and domestic experience with corporate and government sectors in Asia, Europe and Australia. As a chartered accountant, Dan specialised in understanding the financial implication of sustainability aspects and incorporating sustainability considerations into business strategy and corporate reporting. Dan was the former Project General Manager of Environmental Affairs for Toyota Australia, where he headed up both the corporate and manufacturing environmental groups. Toyota was recognised by the United Nations Association of Australia, for the best environmental program for a business enterprise in June 2004.

Dan’s previous experience also includes being the founder and leader of Deloitte Touche Tohmatsu’s Environmental Services Group in Australia and spending two and half years managing Deloitte’s Global Centre of Excellence for Environmental and Sustainability Services in Copenhagen, Denmark. Dan currently holds the positions of co-chair of the Reference Group for the Victorian Commissioner of Environmental Sustainability and a member of the South Australian Premier’s Roundtable on Sustainability. Dan has also commenced a PhD with RMIT School of Education with the topic focusing on climate change strategy, policy and communication. Dan has also been previously involved in the World Business Council for Sustainable Development’s eco-efficiency pilot project, the Business Council of Australia Sustainable Development Task Force, the European Environmental Reporting Awards and the United Nations Environmental Program for Financial Institutions.

Sustainable Business Practices provides consultancy services to corporate and government sectors that are committed to working towards a sustainable future. The strategic consideration of the risk and opportunities that the sustainable development agenda represents is becoming a material consideration for many organizations. Developing an appropriate strategy and articulating a vision that meets the relevant stakeholders’ expectations is becoming a critical component of shareholder value.
How that vision and strategy is integrated within the organization is largely dependent on getting the frameworks in place and a culture to execute the strategy in a way which is aligned to the overall business objectives and values. Relationships with key stakeholders (engagement and being prepared to listen and offer mutual value propositions). Communication of performance is critical to build trust, transparency and display commitment to both employees and external stakeholders.

EcoFutures Pty Ltd - Molly Olsen and Philip Toyne

Molly Harriss Olson arrived in Australia as a 22-year-old student to scuba dive at the Great Barrier Reef. “It made me realise that there is something vital, even sacred, about the beautiful ecosystems of this world,” says Olson. “I just knew I would spend my life doing all that I could to protect them.” And she is.  After earning a masters in environmental policy from Yale University, she headed straight for Greenpeace to become a maritime campaign organiser. She then joined Swedish-based organisation The Natural Step, which focuses on the environmental education of business leaders. Soon, she was working at the White House as executive director of President Bill Clinton’s Council on Sustainable Development, a 25-member working group drawn from business, government, environment, labour and civil rights groups.

All that experience came together when Olson moved to Australia, convinced that working with corporations on the environment was the way to go. She met and married Phillip Toyne, who has equally impeccable activist and ecology credentials. The couple set up EcoFutures, an international strategic planning policy company that works on building sustainable strategies for industry and business.

“The latest climate research shows that by 2015 we will already be locked into a 2% increase in global temperatures. That could mean we would eventually lose up to half of Kakadu’s wetlands in the Northern Territories and half of the tropical rainforests of Northern Queensland, as well as suffer serious coral damage throughout the Barrier Reef. Australians have the highest per capita rates of greenhouse gas emissions and we need to figure out a way to radically reduce that consumption to avoid climate catastrophe.”

Olson says she has lost hope that the Australian government will grasp the nettle of climate change. Australia and the US are the only developed Western nations that are not among the 120 countries that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol.

“Already, companies like BHP Billiton, DuPont, Visy, Interface, Fuji Xerox and so many more are ahead of government policy. So this is where my efforts and strategies are focused,” says Olson.