Michael Conroy on Activist Campaigns and the Certification Revolution

CWR co-host Bill Baue speaks Michael Conroy, author of Branded! How the "Certification Revolution" is Transforming Global Corporations. Conroy discusses how activist campaigning for improved corporate social and environmental practices has gotten companies to respond. The two sides moved from antagonism to tense collaboration in the creation of certification schemes that solved activist concerns while preserving--and often boosting--companies' profitability. Conroy brings a hands-on view to the story as a program officer at the Ford Foundation and Rockefeller Brothers Fund, where he helped fund the activists NGOs as well as the resulting certification processes. He also serves as chair of TransFair, the Fair Trade certifying body in the US, as well as serving on the board of Forest Stewardship Council, which certifies lumber and paper practices.

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Branded! How the "Certification Revolution" is Transforming Global Corporations

CWR Headlines: Listen

--China quake may cut carbon offset supply
--Energy executives fear a bubble brewing in renewable technology
--New report says obesity contributes to climate change

CWR Commentary: Listen

Michael Ash of the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, provides this week's commentary on the Toxic 100 list of the top corporate polluters that PERI produces.

Toxic 100

Gary Hirshberg on Business as the Cause and Solution of Global Crises

CWR co-hosts Bill Baue and Francesca Rheannon speak with Gary Hirshberg, CEO of organic yogurt maker Stonyfield Farm, and author of Stirring It Up: How to Make Money and Save the World. Hirshberg believes that business is a necessary force for creating a sustainable economy and society, as outlined in his book. Yet he admits that business is a primary cause of our current unsustainable economy, a seeming contradiction that he explains in our conversation.

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Stonyfield Farm

Stirring It Up: How to Make Money and Save the World

CWR Headlines: Listen

--Chevron Donates $2 m in Disaster Relief to Burma but New Report Charges the Company with Abetting Human Rights Abuses
--Military Contractor in Iraq Hires Translators Who Can't Translate, Putting Iraqi and US Lives at Risk
--Climate Counts Releases 2008 Ranking of Commitment by Companies to Reversing Climate Change

CWR Commentary: Listen

Mindy Lubber, president of Ceres and director of the Investor Network on Climate Risk, provides commentary on a recent Ceres report examining how mainstream mutual funds vote on shareholder resolutions that urge companies to address climate change. A 2004 SEC rule requires mutual funds to disclose their proxy voting records each year. The report finds that mainstream mutual fund opposition to climate resolutions is thawing--but ironically, support for climate resolutions is also decreasing. Filling this gap is abstentions, which have doubled from 2004 to 2007. For the sake of disclosure, CWR co-host Bill Baue co-authored the report.

Ceres

Ceres Report: Mutual Funds and Climate Change: Opposition to Climate Change Resolutions Begins to Thaw

Michael Klare: Declining Energy Resources Spur Increasing Global Conflict

CWR co-host Francesca Rheannon speaks with Hampshire College Professor Michael Klare about his new book, Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet: The New Geopolitics of Energy. Klare defines the term "resource nationalism," whereby access to energy increasingly drives global politics. For example, the Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan oil pipeline runs from the Caspian Sea to the Mediterranean Sea, through Georgia, thereby circumventing Russia. In the interview conducted last week, Klare predicted possible conflict over energy access between Russia and Georgia, ensnaring the US. As this episode of CWR was in production, Georgian officials announced they are "very close" to war with Russia. Klare ends the interview suggesting renewable energies as a solution for diverting energy access from conflict to peace.

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Michael Klare: Rising Powers, Shrinking Planet: The New Geopolitics of Energy

Baku-Tbilisi-Ceyhan pipeline

May 6 Reuters article: "Georgia says 'very close' to war with Russia"

Complete interview with Michael Klare on Writer's Voice

CWR Headlines: Listen

--Dock Workers Close West Coast Ports in Iraq War Protest
--EPA Official Ousted While Fighting Dow
--Shareholders Target Over 50 Companies on Toxic Product Concerns

Corporate Watchdog Report, commentaries from the Business Ethics Network: Listen

Jodie Van Horn of the Rainforest Action Network analyzes biofuels, which divert agriculture from food to fuel, spurring food riots globally and driving deforestation.

Rainforest Action Network Biofuels Campaign

Business Ethics Network

Richard Heinberg: From Peak Everything to Resilient Communities

CWR co-hosts Bill Baue and Francesca Rheannon speak with peak oil expert Richard Heinberg, senior fellow at the Post Carbon Institute and author of The Party's Over, Powerdown, The Oil Depletion Protocol, and, most recently, Peak Everything. CWR caught up with Heinberg during his northeast speaking tour, where he is addressing local officials in the Pioneer Valley of Massachusetts where Corporate Watchdog Radio originates. In the absence of federal leadership addressing climate change and peak oil, Heinberg has turned his attention to creating resilient communities, and he proposes 10 steps to create local disaster response plans to prepare for peak oil as well as environmental and economic collapse. While the data Heinberg presents paints a dire picture, he also advocates for hope and optimism as a strategic response to existing and impending crises.

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RichardHeinberg.com

Post Carbon Institute

CWR Headlines: Listen

--Coalition of Immokalee Workers Petitions Burger King for an Extra Penny a Pound for Tomatoes
--JPMorgan Chase Aims for 20 Percent Carbon Reduction
--Climate change could spark century long World War

Climate Guides: Policy and Business Solutions to Global Warming

Two slim guides have recently been published on climate change solutions, one written to CEOs on how business can profit by helping mitigate and adapt to climate change, one addressing what government policies are most promising. CWR co-host Bill Baue speaks with University of Michigan Professor Andy Hoffman, co-author with John Woody of Climate Change: What's Your Business Strategy?, published May 1 by Harvard Business Press as part of its "Memo to the CEO" series. Baue also speaks Working Assets Co-Founder Peter Barnes, author of Climate Solutions: What Works, What Doesn't, and Why--A Citizen's Guide, out recently from Chelsea Green.

Plus, we hear commentary from Sierra Club Executive Director Carl Pope on the failure of the Environmental Protection Agency to regulate carbon dioxide emissions, even after being ordered to do so by the Supreme Court. Thanks to Sierra Club Radio for this commentary.

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Climate Solutions: What Works, What Doesn't, and Why--A Citizen's Guide by Peter Barnes

Climate Change: What's Your Business Strategy? by Andy Hoffman and John Woody

CWR Headlines: Listen

--Stern Report Underestimated Consequences of Climate Change
--Canada Bans Bisphenol-A in Baby Bottles
--57 Nations Endorse Report Promoting Shift from Industrial to Small-Scale Local Agriculture

Chris Martenson on Decoupling Growth from Prosperity (Part Two)

The second in a two-part conversation with Chris Martenson of the Martenson Report, who recently spoke about the convergence of economic, environmental, and energy crises at the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA) Annual Conference. Martenson has a doctorate in neurotoxicology from Duke, an MBA in finance from Cornell, and is a former vice president at Pfizer. In the early 2000s, Martenson quit his high-status position when he recognized profound instabilities in our economic, environmental, and social structures. The interview culminates with Martenson mapping out the idea of re-imagining and transforming the stories we tell ourselves as a culture about growth, surplus, and prosperity.

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The Martenson Report

Part One: Chris Martenson on Economic, Environmental, and Energy "Hockey Sticks"

We also hear commentary from Jennifer Taub of the Isenberg School of Management at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst on how mutual fund conflicts of interest intersect with genocide-free investing.

Jennifer Taub working paper: Able But Not Willing: The Failure of Mutual Fund Advisers to Advocate for Shareholders' Rights

CWR HEADLINES: Listen

--Senate Extends Energy Tax Credits in Housing Bill
--New Report Lists Top 100 Polluters
--Amount of Farmland Certified by Rainforest Alliance Reaches Million Acre Milestone
--Brazilian Lovers Can Now Show Their Love--For the Planet

Chris Martenson on Economic, Environmental, and Energy "Hockey Sticks"

The first in a two-part conversation with Chris Martenson of the Martenson Report, who recently spoke about the convergence of economic, environmental, and energy crises at the Northeast Sustainable Energy Association (NESEA) Annual Conference. Martenson sees "hockey stick graphs," or exponential graphs that rise slowly and steadily before suddenly shooting upward, increasingly happening in all three of these areas. Martenson has a doctorate in neurotoxicology from Duke, an MBA in finance from Cornell, and is a former vice president at Pfizer. In the early 2000s, Martenson quit his high-status position when he recognized profound instabilities in our economic, environmental, and social structures. He developed the End of Money seminar series, which has evolved into the Crash Course on these instabilities and options for navigating them.

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The Martenson Report

CWR HEADLINES: Listen

--World Bank Accused of Seizing Control of Climate Change Funds
--Agribiz Lobbying Against Certification of Imports as Free from Slave Labor