Challenge

Sustainability has become a dominant force shaping business and policy agendas.

Leaders in both fields are increasingly incorporating aspects of sustainability into their long-term strategies – to guide national development or to create value and competitive advantage for businesses.

Capital markets are putting a premium on firms who incorporate sustainability as a value-creating component of their overall strategy and move beyond the traditional corporate social responsibility (CSR) framing.

Consumers and citizens are becoming increasingly aware of the environmental externalities created through economic activity and consumption, which infringe on their very own welfare and the prospects of their children.

While much has been achieved in terms of recognizing and addressing the sustainability challenge – the next decades will be decisive in their impact on the future of civilization.

With natural support systems already being overstretched, continued population growth, expanding resource needs and higher levels of consumption are creating an urgency to accelerate the integration of a sustainability mindset into the decisions of all economic actors: policy makers, business executives and consumers.

Fundamentally, Asia will play a pivotal role in addressing the challenge. With 60% of Earth’s human population and the largest share of global economic growth, policy and business leaders here are making choices that not only impact the welfare of their constituencies but the future of the environment globally.

Mandate

The Earth Observatory of Singapore (EOS) overall mission is to conduct ‘Science for a sustainable man / nature paradigm in South-East Asia’.

Within this context, the mandate of the Sustainability Directorate is to create impact with senior regional decision makers in business and policy, enabling the integration of research findings on climate change impacts and natural hazards into the decision making for their organizations and constituencies.

In our experience, there is a significant gap between for example the scientific knowledge on climate change and the level of understanding about challenges, risks and opportunities, which arise for businesses and policy makers.

Our tools to bridging this gap are economic and policy research projects, executive education programs, workshops etc. targeted at today’s decision makers.

Our aspiration is to become a regional thought leader in understanding sustainability risks, as well as identifying solution approaches and opportunities.