Barbed Wire Accessibility

Did you ever notice how difficult it is to get access to people who don't know who you are. It seems that senior, junior, or super senior staff all feel that they need to be insulated from the outside world that they don't know. An assistant or secretary is given instructions not to let anyone through the moat into the castle, that they don't know. This results in a situation where the assistant is manning a watch tower of barbed wire keeping an eye out for strangers. That is what is called a prison, which keeps new ideas out and old ideas in.
By creating the prison, no new information or ideas get through. The business, ngo, academic, government person trying to be reached becomes isolated. Their main sources of information newspapers, radio, etc. already give very little attention to the subject of sustainability. Their circle of friends with whom they socialize via tennis, sailing, golf, baseball, rotary or other networks usually pursue the same selectivity with respect to new ideas (people). This is one of the main reasons that sustainability is not taking root as quickly as it should. People are familiar with what they know. What is happening below the radar, with respect to sustainabilty is not getting through. So if you don't read about it, hear about it from your network, or learn about it at the office, then it is probably not happening. In addition, the opportunities are not getting through. The ones that did get through: Tyco, Global Crossing, Enron, Ahold, Worldcom, etc. have not always been beneficial.

Why not try something radical. Instruct your assistant to allow two new people to get through your "security gate". If you do that every month, you will have met 24 new people in a year and perhaps 10% of those meetings develop into something. That is 2.4 more new ideas than you are getting now. See it as your committment to innovation and sustainability, and a richer life.

 "To be truly radical, one must make hope possible, rather than despair convincing."
                 -Raymond Williams

News

Study: U.S. Firms with Better Governance Disclosure See Higher Shareholder Returns
A study by the firms Sibson Consulting and Spencer Stuart shows U.S. companies that disclose more detailed information about their corporate governance practices yield higher shareholder returns than less transparent companies.
BSR NEWS MONITOR SUMMARY OF ARTICLE FROM DOW JONES NEWSWIRES, MARCH 31, 2003, WWW.DJNEWSWIRES.COM

85% of US Companies Have Implemented Sarbanes-Oxley Changes; 15% of Execs Think It An Expensive Waste Of Time
Mar 27, 2003, 3:39pm
The Sarbanes-Oxley Act has resulted in changes in controls and compliance practices at nearly 85 percent of large U.S. multinational companies, according to the latest PwC Management Barometer.
http://www.srimedia.com/artman/publish/article_479.shtml

SRI Analyst Articles Planned for The Financial Analyst(Netherlands)
The Financial Analyst(Netherlands) in partnership with Brooklyn Bridge will publish a series of SRI sector analysis, written by the leading SRI research companies. In September, a special will be produced on SRI,covering all the major issues related to SRI. For
further details, contact Eric Wassenaar

Four Banks Adopt Social and Environmental Guidelines for Projects in the Developing World 
The banking divisions of ABN Amro Holding N.V., Barclays plc, Citigroup Inc. and WestLB have drafted an agreement on social and environmental guidelines for financing projects in emerging markets. 
Financial Times, April 7, 2003 www.ft.com

EPA Reveals U.S. Publicly Traded Corporations Hide Billions in Environmental Debt
By Donald Sutherland
The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has disclosed that 74 percent of U.S. publicly traded corporations they surveyed openly violate the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission's (SEC) environmental financial debt accounting regulations.
http://www.riskworld.com/news/02q2/nw02a096.htm

British Industry Surpasses Targets in Carbon Dioxide Emissions Reductions 
Forty-four British industries that signed 10-year climate change agreements (CCAs) with the government in 2000 cut CO2 emissions by 13.5 million tons in 2002, nearly four times the agreed targets.  According to BBC News and The Guardian, most of the extra reductions came from production cuts in the steel industry. The companies earned significant reductions in the climate change tax.
The Guardian, April 8, 2003, http://www.guardian.co.uk/>www.guardian.co.uk

EPA/MBDC Packaging Design Challenge Has Begun
The EPA Office of Solid Waste, in partnership with MBDC, has announced the launch of a design challenge to rethink and redesign e-commerce shipping packaging for a cradle-to-cradle life cycle. The design challenge is specifically targeted at the shipping packaging associated with the suburban home delivery of Internet purchases of books, including systems for packaging recovery.
To learn more about the design challenge, visit http://www.mbdc.com/challenge/.

FTSE4Good Index Raises Standards for Company Human Rights Practices
FTSE Group, the UK-based global index provider, has announced a new set of human rights criteria for its socially responsible index series FTSE4Good. This is the second major revision to FTSE4Good human rights criteria since the series launch in July 2001. 
For a list of high-risk countries and full details of the human rights criteria, please visit http://www.ftse.com.

Inter-American Awards For Microenterprise Development were created to recognize the achievements of organizations supporting microenterprise development in Latin America and the Caribbean.
The Award categories are:
Award for Microfinance
Award for Social Entrepreneurship
Award for Business Development Services
To request forms please visit www.foromic.org or to obtain more information please e-mail micawards@iadb.org

Conferences

Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) International Corporate Governance Network (ICGN)
Panel on:
Corporate Governance And Corporate Sustainability Reporting:
What Do Stakeholders Want?
Amsterdam Room
Hotel Krasnapolsky, Amsterdam
16:00 - 18:00
Wednesday, 9 July 2003
To register for this FREE event please contact:
GRI Secretariat Tel:  31.20.531.0000  Fax:  31.20.531.0031 E-mail:  info@globalreporting.org

Canadian Social Investment Conference
Organized by the Social Investment Organization, Canada's national association from socially responsible investment
Empire Landmark Hotel - Vancouver, BC
June 1-3, 2003
For complete program and registration information, visit  www.socialinvestment.ca.

French SRI Analyst Road Show
Paris June 4-5, Palais de la Bourse
Organised by Forum pour l'Investissement Responsable
• Energy– Utilities
• Finance
• Distribution
• Cars
• Health & Pharmaceuticals
• Transport
• Telecommunications
For further information email

May 22. Afternoon. First meeting of the European Forum on Sustainable Trade hosted by DG Trade and STIC-Europe.
The purpose of the Forum is to facilitate a dialogue between policy makers in the European Commission and the European Civil Society Dialogue Participants with Southern business representatives, especially focussing on the concerns and obstacles faced by Southern businesses in implementing the regulations.
For information:http://www.epe.be/euhub/mayevents/registration/index.html

INAISE International Conference-Expanding social finance
Towards a worldwide social finance circuit
Utrecht, the Netherlands 15-16 May, 2003 -
Venue: Mitland Hotel
Register on INAISE website www.inaise.org

14th EBBF Annual Conference Emerging Values for a Global Economy
Sept. 26-28, 2003
DePoort Conference Centre (nr Nijmegen NL) http://www.ebbf.orgwww.ebbf.org

Communicating Environmental Performance to Investors' that will take place at the Sofitel St James, London, on the morning of 4th June 2003. Investor Relations Society. www.irs.org.uk

TBLI conference
The fifth anniversary of TBLI 2003 will take place on November 6-7, 2003 in Amsterdam. What started in 1999 as a small event has grown into the world's largest conference on SRI (Socially Responsible Investing) and sustainable investment. During the two day event, the latest developments on screening, auditing, reporting, analysis, corporate citizenship, indexes and research will be covered. Anyone involved in the financial sector should attend.

The entire program can be found at TBLI Conference Program

Speakers(over 80) including: Philippe Lespinard-CIO BNP Paribas Group, Ron Blackwell- AFL-CIO, Jos Delbeke- European Commission-Commissioner for the Environment, S. Prakash Sethi,Ph.D ZICKLIN - SCHOOL OF BUSINESS, Joan Bavaria-Trillium Asset
Analyst meetings IT, Mining, and Telecom sector with the following presenting Intel, Canon, NEC,Philips, Anglo American, Noranda, Rio Tinto, France Telecom, Deutsche Telecom, BT, Vodafone, Telefonica, Telenor

Sponsors: If you would like to be a corporate or a network sponsor or reserve an exhibition booth send an email to sponsor@tbli.org, or visit www.tbli.org for sponsorship details. We welcome the following TBLI 2003 sponsors:

Corporate:Global Environment Fund, Calvert, Dexia Asset Management, KPMG, Nutreco, FTSE International, Rabobank

Media:IPE, SRIMedia, CSR Wire, Wall Street Journal Europe, SRIWorld

Network:E5, EBBF, ASRIA, Trillium Asset Management, Impronta Etica, ECC Kohtes Klewes, Michael Jantzi Research, Ecosecurities, Rotterdam School of Management, ENVIRONMENTAL INVESTMENT PARTNERS, Social Investment Organisation, WSP Environmental, Inc., VBDO, UK Social Investment Forum, Sustainable Investment Research Institute (SIRIS), Good Bankers, Sept ou 8, Good Company, GROUPE One, Social Investment Forum, Maqassar,CSR Europe, Association of Institutional Shareholders,Social Accountability, Accountability, Oekom Research, Caring Company, AFG-ASFFI, EIA, Forum Nachthaltige Geldlangen, EPE, Ethibel, CSR Global,Forest Trends, EACA

Award

Every year Brooklyn Bridge , the organizer of the annual TBLI conferences, chooses an organization whose efforts further the cause of sustainable investment. Through the TBLI award, Brooklyn Bridge compliments and highlights organizations that have gained our respect for their exemplary and superior performance in the field of sustainable business activity. We particularly admire their honesty, transparency, perseverance, commitment, humanity, and value added (profitability) to society. This Euro 5.000 award is presented at each TBLI conference, as an alternative to a conference premium, with the intention of changing certain manners or habits into new and inspirational ones. Brooklyn Bridge has made the choice of giving all to a few, instead of giving few to all.

If you know a company that should receive the TBLI Award 2003 , please send us your suggestion along with your motivation for choosing that company/organization to tbliaward@tbli.org .

Order now:CD-ROM TBLI Conference

Did you miss attending TBLI 2002, or previous events and would like to receive all the presentations, acv's, and quick time video of the event, visit TBLICD-Rom order page? The price is Euro 148, (including VAT 19%, and postage)

Want to know what previous attendees said about TBLI? Visit Triple Bottom Line Investing:

Brooklyn Bridge will be starting Expert Meetings as part of the TBLI Academy, in the coming months. Full Information will be provided, in the june newsletter.

If you want to know more, contact us at academy@tbli.org

Robert Rubinstein will be teaching a MBA course on SRI at Rotterdam School of Management, starting September 2003.

If you would like to have a lecture given within you organization contact: lecture@tbli.org
New lecture series starting:

Is SRI happening?
There are no angels.

Socially Responsible Investment: A Global Revolution
by Russell Sparkes
Socially responsible investment is changing from niche market to mainstream. It affects corporate policies and leads to new regulations.
List Price: $40.00
Hardcover: 200 pages
Publisher: John Wiley & Sons; (December 2002)
ISBN: 0471499536
http://www.amazon.com/exec/obidos/ASIN/0471499536/
ref%3Dase%5Fsocialfundscom/002-6865739-0700019

When Venture Capitalists Say “No”—Creative Financing Strategies & Resources
by Ron Peterson
“This book is a must-read for every entrepreneur. Chock full of examples of real-world successes, it’s an inspiration for startups confronting a dire market of historic proportions.
ISBN 9-9728246-1-8, 272 pages, $29.95. Order from Comanche Press MD, (301) 229 6240, fax (301) 229 5462, toll free 877 245 3774, cell 240 308 0337, PO Box 565, Glen Echo, MD 20812-0565 or www.threearrowscapital.com. E-mail tarrows@comcast.net, ($3.50 S&H), April 2003.

The Restoration Economy
by Author Storm Cunningham looks at the previously undocumented trillion dollars worth of restorative activity happening globally in the areas of both the natural and built environment.
http://www.cleanedge.com/current_book.html

Buying Into The Environment: Experiences, Opportunities And Potential For Eco-Procurement
Edited by Christoph Erdmenger, International Council for Local Environmental Initiatives (ICLEI) April 2003 | 285pp | 234 x 156mm | Hardback
ISBN 1 874719 67 5 | £35.00 US$65.00
To place an order for this title or to view the "Introduction: Public purchasing: a new, old policy tool" by Christoph Erdmenger online,
please visit the Greenleaf website at:
http://www.greenleaf-publishing.com/catalogue/buying.htm


"The Baseline Revolution. A 21st Century Approach to Management and Reporting."
By Hans V.A. Johnsson and Per Erik Kihlstedt
Based on their perception of "the fourth (not the "new"!) economy", the authors present a well documented view of how accounting fails to provide support for strategic decision-making.
visit: www.baseline-revolution.com

Environmental Finance
A Guide to Environmental Risk Assessment and Financial Products
By Sonia Labatt and Rodney R White
(published by Wiley Finance)
This comprehensive book opens with a discussion of the concepts and tools used by financial institutions to develop environmental policies and products
Exclusive 20% discount, for only £47.60/$63.95 including postage & packing (normal price £59.50/US$79.95).
To order your copy, email info@environmental-finance.com, quoting BK3/20% as the subject, or call the order hotline on +44 (0)20 7251 9151.

BB raises consciousness of self-interest to institutionalize sustainability o Conferences o TBLI Resultancy o Academy o Lectures o Global Network o Recruitment o Knowledge brokering o Venture catalyst Brooklyn Bridge principles: We assist individuals and companies with achieving their goals of institutionalizing sustainability, or linking with relevant parties. Mutual and global benefit must be the basis.

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