UNEP (United Nations Environment Programme) has long recognised the importance of Business in contributing to the sound management of the environment and has established many programs and published guides to help in this area.
“GEO-5 for Business”, launched on 21st June 2013, is written for business leaders who are responsible for ensuring that risks and opportunities are understood, addressed and turned into long-term competitive advantage for their companies. The report assesses the operational, market, reputational and policy implications of environmental trends on ten business sectors:- building and construction; chemicals; electrical power; extractives; finance; food and beverages; healthcare; information and communication technology; tourism; and transport.
“GEO-5 for Business” builds on the findings of UNEP’s fifth Global Environmental Outlook (GEO-5) report (http://www.unep.org/geo/geo5.asp ) released in June 2012. In many ways, “GEO-5 for Business” serves as a set of signposts for readers to dip into Global Environmental Outlook GEO-5 and draw out the key information that they may need. On page of the Executive Summary of “GEO-5 for Business”, is a table which shows the Environmental Trends from the main Global Environmental Outlook GEO-5 report and links this to key implications for Business. The trends provide page references to the relevant section in the main Global Environmental Outlook GEO-5 report. On pages 4 and 5, the risk and opportunities for the ten business sectors are summarised.
The main body of the report expands upon the items included above and these are well supported by detailed citations and references at the end of the report.