PROGRESSIVE PENTLAND: Pentland Group has teamed with the World Council for Sustainable Business, Lancaster University and 2Degrees, a platform for sustainable companies, to create a center that will help businesses focus on addressing environmental and ethical issues. It will open on Oct. 27.
The Pentland Centre for Sustainability in Business will focus on various fields, including environmental sustainability, ethical supply chains and business methods. It will draw on research from the Lancaster Environment Centre, Lancaster University Management and be supported the Rubin Foundation Charitable Trust.
“We are excited by this opportunity to facilitate academic research through a commercial lens and have high hopes that this center will emerge as a thought leader in this fascinating and important field,” said Stephen Rubin, chairman of Pentland Group, in a statement.
Professor Gail Whiteman, a climate change expert, believes the center will help businesses have a positive impact.
“The Pentland Centre is trying to help businesses understand the ethical impacts of their supply chains: Pentland was an early mover on this,” said Whiteman. “My overriding mission is to link the best minds in science and the best minds in business and local people to help deliver positive change. It is about boiling down the messages to make the science more understandable for leaders in business.”
She added the messages need to tie in with their economic motivations as well. “We are living in a market-based world. It has to be about offering solutions — not just criticisms. Our role is to support those businesses that are already convinced that climate change is an issue. We can provide the most progressive companies with the knowledge and solutions to support what they are doing.”
