SMIB For Smiles Sustainability Forum 2013

NEWSLETTER
March 2013
Dear Friends of SMIB for Smiles,
First of all, we would like to thank all of you again for your participation in SMIB for Smiles first Sustainability Forum. Your generosity, time and experience were of great help to the auditorium. We think that each little step can bring society and businesses to care more about Sustainability and its impact on our lives. Today we want to briefly share with you a summary of what our guest speakers shared with us during the forum. Dont hesitate to contact us if you need more information or have any questions about the Sustainability Forum or SMIB for Smiles! Thank you again for your participation and enthusiasm!

What does SMIB FOR SMILES mean? Founded in 2011 by students of the Strategy and Management of International Business program, SMIB for Smiles is the first Charity Club of ESSEC Business School Asia Pacific. SMIB for Smiles mission is twofold: Improve the education conditions of underprivileged children through concrete actions and Increase interest & involvement in Social Enterprise and Corporate Social Responsibility Management.

Dr. Andreas BIRNIK

Professor of Sustainability Strategy at NUS MBA Opening Address on the following topics: climate change, suggestions in terms of skills/knowledge to acquire for a sustainability career & presentation of his social enterprise Carbon Story. Dr. Andreas Birnik gave us some facts and figures about the Climate Change Situation. We learned about the Carbon Disclosure Project and how they name and shame companies. This intervention helped us to all be on the same page and understand how serious the issues we were about to discuss truly are. He raised the following questions: How can a company help reduce CO2 emissions through the revamping of its Product Life Cycle? How can we continue to live like this when we are confronted to such shocking figures? After this presentation, not only the student had a better business insight on the question, but also understood that there are many areas of improvement on the subject that need to be addressed.

Chris MESSER
Sustainable Development & Public Relations Manager for Accor Chris Messer introduced us the Sustainability Strategy of Accor and more specifically the Planet 21 Action Program. It evolves around three pillars: Planet, Profit and People. Accor carries on many studies through its employees but also through its customers. In 2011 for example, it spent 300 million in electricity worldwide, and it is still increasing. Actions had to be taken. For Accor, its sustainability actions are also about reputation management, peoples expectations, new regulations and increasing costs.

Neil HUTCHINSON
JCU Presentation of the TropWATER research portfolio, the Centre for Tropical Water and Aquatic Ecosystem Research (TropWATER): The TropWATER research portfolio covers from freshwater to coastal marine waters, from biological communities to water quality and physical process, as well as socio-economic systems underpinning our management of natural resources. TropWATER is an amalgamation of aquatic expertise from across James Cook University. It brings together over 100 research and supporting staff and >100 post-graduate students into one cohesive research group.

Paul POH
Energy Management Services Manager for Schneider Electric Paul Poh presented us with the Sustainable Strategy at Schneider Electric and what the key achievements of the company in this field are. He especially showed us how important innovation and a global perspective are when addressing sustainability issues. Schneider Electric launched several programs aiming at helping villages and small communities to access electricity. As a result, 340 000 households gained access to electricity in 2012 and 13 villages got equipped with Schneiders VillaSmart and VillaSol solutions in Nigeria, Senegal and Brazil.

Linda AICH-BWANGA
Founder of Green Caravel Linda is the founder of the start-up Green Caravel. By creating her company, she tried to answer the following question: What if we could change the World by shopping? A pretty attractive proposition. Indeed, why are we paying a huge premium for products like a Starbucks Coffee or a Swarovski ring? Linda tries to build her new business around a federative slogan: Be social, Be fair, Be Green. Through these words, Green Caravel demonstrates how businesses can enter in a virtuous circle by increasing their Corporate Social Responsibility impacts!

Madame Le Consul de Monaco Jacqueline DEROMEDI

We were presented the Sustainability Strategy of Monaco, focusing on energy consumption. Although Monaco is small, it manages to attract 5 million day visitors and many day workers. Monaco has therefore been committed to a sustainable development, especially thanks to the influence of the Prince Albert II. Monaco is currently focusing on three main areas: energy efficiency in buildings, renewable energy and greenhouse gas reduction. It is one of the only cities in the world to use Sea Water Heat Pumps to produce energy!

Eric ATTON
Operations General Manager Asia Pacific for Vallourec Vallourecs commitment and actions toward water preservation: Plant example in Batam, Indonesia. Eric more specifically explained to us how Vallourec was addressing sustainability issues on the Batam plant through the GreenHouse project. The goal of this project is to reduce the Groups energy consumption by 20% by 2020. The GreenHouse project works through three key points: Continuous improvement teams, specific work on furnaces and new technologies implementation. Eric Atton helped us understand that the first actions you take in a business environment are usually very successful and enable you to be more sustainable through minimum effort. Why not try it?

Thank you again for your participation and interest in our first Sustainability Forum 2013!
We hope it will be the first of many others! Our Study Trip Newsletter will be out soon as well, look out for it

It is YOUR time to act!

Global warming due to human activities, is now recognized as a global threat. The need to reduce it has grown urgent. It is essential to optimize our energy consumption. This objective requires daily actions and we, as students, teachers and staff members, have a role to play in preserving our resources.

Simple gestures can make a difference: 1. Turn off lights when leaving a room. 2. Turning off computers when they will no longer be used for a while. 3. Unplug chargers and other appliances on standby.

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