Jeffrey Hollender is the co-founder and CEO of Seventh Generation and the author of "The Responsibility Revolution: How the Next Generation of Businesses Will Win." He currently serves on the[…]
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If growers of food paid the full cost of soil erosion, water pollution, adverse health affects on farm workers, organic food would cost half the price of traditional food.
Question: Do you have faith in consumers?
rn
rnJeffrey Hollender: I have faith in consumers, but will never rndepend upon them to solve all of the challenges that we face. I mean, rnyes, the marketplace is important, and there are more and more consumersrn every year buying green and sustainable products. That’s a good rnthing. But consumers face some fundamental challenges.
rn
rnWhen I talk to young people, they constantly ask me, why are the good rnthings expensive and the bad things cheap? We have created an economic rnconstruct through rules and regulations and tax codes that allows rnbusinesses to escape from most of their negative impacts.
rn
rnSo, if you're an automobile manufacturer and you sell a car that gets rnpoor gas mileage and that poor gas mileage creates a lot of air rnpollution that translates into increased asthma, allergies, cancer—you rnas a manufacturer bear no responsibility for those negative impacts. rnThose negative impacts are dumped onto society and we pay those negativern impacts as a society.
rn
rnNow I think that if you’re going to do bad stuff, if you’re going to be arn farmer and use pesticides that pollute the groundwater, you should havern to pay for all of those negative impacts. And if that was the case—if rntraditional growers of food paid the full cost of soil erosion, water rnpollution, adverse health affects on their farm workers because of rnexposure to pesticides—something quite amazing would happen; organic rnfood would cost half the price of what traditional food would cost. Andrn we wouldn’t ask consumers to make a very difficult decision, which is rndo the right thing, make the right choice, buy the sustainable product, rnbut don’t get any financial benefit for making that choice.
rn
rnSo, ultimately we have to change the system. We have to change the rneconomic landscape so that business and consumers are all aligned and rnincentivized to make the sustainable choice. You shouldn’t have to pay rnextra to buy a hybrid car. You shouldn’t pay extra to buy organic rnclothing. Those products are better and more sustainable and more rnresponsible for the planet and they should cost less.
rn
rnRecorded on June 11, 2010
rnInterviewed by Jessica Liebman
rn
rnJeffrey Hollender: I have faith in consumers, but will never rndepend upon them to solve all of the challenges that we face. I mean, rnyes, the marketplace is important, and there are more and more consumersrn every year buying green and sustainable products. That’s a good rnthing. But consumers face some fundamental challenges.
rn
rnWhen I talk to young people, they constantly ask me, why are the good rnthings expensive and the bad things cheap? We have created an economic rnconstruct through rules and regulations and tax codes that allows rnbusinesses to escape from most of their negative impacts.
rn
rnSo, if you're an automobile manufacturer and you sell a car that gets rnpoor gas mileage and that poor gas mileage creates a lot of air rnpollution that translates into increased asthma, allergies, cancer—you rnas a manufacturer bear no responsibility for those negative impacts. rnThose negative impacts are dumped onto society and we pay those negativern impacts as a society.
rn
rnNow I think that if you’re going to do bad stuff, if you’re going to be arn farmer and use pesticides that pollute the groundwater, you should havern to pay for all of those negative impacts. And if that was the case—if rntraditional growers of food paid the full cost of soil erosion, water rnpollution, adverse health affects on their farm workers because of rnexposure to pesticides—something quite amazing would happen; organic rnfood would cost half the price of what traditional food would cost. Andrn we wouldn’t ask consumers to make a very difficult decision, which is rndo the right thing, make the right choice, buy the sustainable product, rnbut don’t get any financial benefit for making that choice.
rn
rnSo, ultimately we have to change the system. We have to change the rneconomic landscape so that business and consumers are all aligned and rnincentivized to make the sustainable choice. You shouldn’t have to pay rnextra to buy a hybrid car. You shouldn’t pay extra to buy organic rnclothing. Those products are better and more sustainable and more rnresponsible for the planet and they should cost less.
rn
rnRecorded on June 11, 2010
rnInterviewed by Jessica Liebman
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