I believe that SME's have one of the most important roles in the future of sustainability. We have a lot more SME's then multinationals and SME are lead in much more responsible way then multinationals in my opinion.

So even though it might not look as if they not play an important role I believe the role has been and still is underestimated.

In terms of incentives? Well I think for SME's that is the problem. Because we have so many SME's and their marketing and lobbying influence is so small in comparison to multinationals they do not get the attention they deserve. And as a consequence not enough incentives to do even better.

What do you think?

Cost reduction and government grants are two starting points for SMEs.

In Australia the cost of power and waste is spiraling. SMEs may start to pursue energy efficiency and better waste management to reduce costs. Pursuing these opportunities might then expose the SME to broader sustainability opportunities.

Also, in Australia, the government has introduced a grant aimed at SMEs called Re-tooling for Climate Change.

Also from Australia, a programme from Design Victoria (a Victorian Government initiative delivered by RMIT University):

Sustainable by Design
http://www.designvic.com/SustainabilityKit.aspx

Extract:
"Design Victoria is committed to helping small to medium enterprises build their competitive advantage through design-led innovation and excellence. Sustainable by Design focuses on improving sustainability performance with design being the catalyst to achieve this success. "

I agree with matthewtrigg. The technologies are still not scalable and this is a huge problem for SMEs especially.

I went to a few small business owners to talk to them about sustainability strategies. One lady in particular mentioned that she tried to use bio-degradable plastic bags in her coffee shop. Apparently, the bags were of poor quality and the company which supplied those bags had to replace them with conventional plastic bags. She then stopped thinking about being sustainable.

All these people actually want to do the right thing. But, sometimes there are no incentives and tools to help them do the right thing. I want to look into the Re-Tooling for Climate Change Initiative. Looks interesting.

At Green Foundations, we are trying to look for solutions to this problem in particular. If you know anyone who is willing to help us out, please do let me know.

To find out more about Green Foundations, go to : http://greevolution.wordpress.com/green-foundations/

Cheers.

A good topic.

When I was doing my research for my project, I interviewed a few small business owners. One story caught my attention, in particular. A young lady, in her late twenties runs a coffee shop somewhere in London. She tried to use bio-degradable plastic bags. But, they were of poor quality and the supplier ad to replace them with conventional plastic bags.

Small issues like this are actually large barriers for SMEs. These people do not have the time or energy to invest in thinking about being sustainable.

My project, Green Foundations is trying to address this problem. We are looking for people to help us out because we lack resources (mainly expertise).

To find out more about green foundations check out : http://greevolution.wordpress.com/green-foundations/

Thanks!

You can look at this in two ways.

First of all, SME's generally account for around 98% of businesses in developed countries and employ around 60% of the private sector workforce. Such a huge number of businesses and employees must leave a tremendous carbon footprint and therefore one could argue that they have an equal if not greater responsibility to sustainability. They have less pressure on them as it is easier to target one company than it is to target thousands.

Secondly, you could argue that major companies pump several thousand (in some cases several million) more tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere. However, when this is broken down by employee, economies of scale and the resources available mean that many large companies actually manage to have a lower carbon footprint per employee than medium and small businesses.

My company, Seymour Green, have only recently started out. We are a new initiative with a few employees. All our vehicles are electric, we have no air conditioning, we recycle all our waste (which isn't much) and try to be sustainable in every way possible.

OK, were a green company so these responsibilities are emphasised more, but in the case of any company you have to go on the basis of every little helps- becase it does :)