My news roundup
Enlightened leaders understand that their most valuable asset is their workforce, a position greatly reinforced by the pandemic. They also know that by listening to their people, they stand to gain a huge premium in terms of retaining loyal talent. As home-working forced upon us by the crisis transforms the way we work, private and public sector employers are seizing opportunities offered by flexible working to reduce the commuting burden as well as carbon footprints. They understand their social responsibilities – from cutting emissions to ensuring sustainable, transparent supply chains – and know that citizens will reward conscientious decision-making. Everywhere I look, I find examples of thoughtful stewardship across Europe, and here are some of the latest developments:
Flexible working boost: Last year’s pandemic-induced upsurge in teleworking across Europe looks like it is here to stay as countries embrace flexible working, which is revolutionising the UK labour market in particular. Some of Britain’s leading companies foresee workers permanently opting to split their time between home and office after the pandemic, according to a Financial Times investigation. The head of Unilever, for example, says his office workers will never return to their desks full-time. Ireland’s government has just announced that it is seizing the “unparalleled opportunity” offered by workplace changes to shift people from cities to the countryside in a network of remote-working hubs. The European Union has enshrined a new right for working parents of children to request flexible working arrangements from August 2022. Flexible working also offers significant potential to slash carbon emissions by reducing commuting while lowering time spent travelling. Moreover, it can also help to reduce gender inequalities in labour markets.
Sustainable mining pledge: As Europe assumes a position of global leadership in its effort to become the first climate-neutral continent, its top companies are becoming influential champions of sustainability. Take BMW and Volvo, for example, which are among the first global companies to have signed up to a World Wildlife Fund (WWF) call for a moratorium on deep-sea mining. The German and Swedish automakers are committing themselves not to source any minerals from the seabed, to exclude any such resources from their supply chains, and not to finance deep seabed mining activities. It’s a brave and visionary step, because deep-sea mining would extract cobalt, copper, nickel, and manganese – key materials commonly used to make batteries for electric vehicles. The forward-thinking leaders of these companies have understood an important dimension of the new agenda: consumers demand social responsibility and will reward businesses that safeguard the future.
Blade runners: Vast opportunities are opening up across European industry as innovative businesses leverage the new value created by decarbonisation – and in the process create thousands of new green jobs. At-scale recycling of offshore wind turbine blades, for example, could create an extra 20,000 jobs in the UK alone, according to a report by the Energy Transition Alliance (ETA). This sets out the huge potential market for the UK supply chain in solutions to tackle the blade recycling challenge – a global market that encompasses 2.5 million tonnes of composites already in use in the wind energy sector, according to the report. Recycling is just the start – a spin-off circular economy from offshore wind could extend current projections of 60,000 jobs in the sector by an additional 20,000 jobs. Moreover, ETA – a partnership between renewables think-tank ORE Catapult, zero carbon partnership investor OGTC, Britain’s National Composites Centre (NCC) and the University of Leeds – is itself an inspiring example of the industry collaboration that will be key to extracting green value.