If we wanted to define a "green entrepreneur"
by deriving its definition from the two words,
what would we get?
An entrepreneur in its broadest sense is a
person who is willing to launch a new venture
or enterprise and accepts full responsibility
for the outcome.
In this context "green" is a product, service,
or process that either benefits the environment
or reduces the negative environmental impact
of existing products, services, or processes.
So , a green entrepreneur is someone who starts
a business to make a product, offers a service,
and/or uses a process that benefits the environment.
The concept of "green entrepreneurship", therefore,
entails elements of entrepreneurship – such
as innovation, risk, a brand new business
idea – and the ecological and environmental
engagement of those who do business.
If we look at green entrepreneurship from
a business' perspective, much of green is
about solving old problems in new ways.
For example:
How can we keep our houses warm in winter
and cool in summer without burning fossil
fuels?
How can we build vehicles that use as little
gas as possible?
How can we create energy without polluting
the environment?
How can we produce or sell goods using as
few resources as possible?
Green business ideas and solutions to environmental
problems can be really simple.
Tom Osborn, for example, is a young entrepreneur
from Kenya.
He founded GreenChar when he was only 18 years old.
Most of the households in his country burn
wood for cooking and women are the ones looking
after the stoves.
Burning wood makes a lot of smoke and women
are at high risk of contracting a respiratory
illness or infection.
Firing stoves with wood also contributes to
deforestation and has a negative impact on
the environment.
He realized that around him there was a lot
of sugarcane waste, available all year round,
and he came up with a brilliant idea: to
make briquettes as a sustainable alternative
to firewood.
GreenChar briquettes burn hotter and longer,
and they are nearly smokeless.
Cooking fuel consumption can be reduced by
50%.
For every tonne of briquettes, 25 trees are
saved, 5 tonnes of carbon-related emissions
are avoided, and 10 people minimize their
risk of respiratory illnesses.
Tom found a green, clean and efficient solution
to some of the problems
caused by the use of firewood and turned it into a viable business.
Like Tom, green entrepreneurs are people who
have the knowledge, initiative, and resources
to solve problems or find innovative ways
to bring existing solutions to market.
And that could be through green products,
green processes or brand new green business
ideas.
Some entrepreneurs start a green business
primarily because of
their passion for the environment.
They see a need for an environmentally-friendly
solution, and they work toward creating a
product or service that meets that need.
They might be targeting a market niche, but
the desire to do something good for the planet
is what really drives them.
For others, helping the environment can be
a way to reduce cost. For instance, running
a manufacturing company that uses energy-efficient
and low-waste processes.
Still others have discovered that there is
a "green" application to a product that already exists.
Marketing an existing product to a new type
of customer is a more incremental, less risky
approach to green entrepreneurship.
Think about LEDs, or light-emitting diodes.
Thanks to their low energy consumption and
small size, they have been used since the
early 1970s as indicators and displays on
a variety of equipment and installations.
Nowadays, thanks to technological improvements
which led to a longer lifespan and better
efficiency, they are being used in a number
of other applications, such as in cars' lights
and as a more sustainable replacement to light
bulbs in houses and offices.
Green entrepreneurship will likely be the
"only " choice for new entrants.
New markets and emerging business models - such
as in the circular economy - will leave little
space to products or solutions with negative
impact on the environment.
A circular economy, for instance, aims at
keeping resources in use for as long as possible,
extracting the maximum value from them whilst
in use, then recovering and regenerating products
and materials at the end of each service life.
Irrespective of what motivates them, successful
green entrepreneurs develop and use key competencies
through the entire business-creation process.
According to UNCTAD's methodology, based on
the behavioural approach, these are: opportunity-seeking,
planning, communication and environmental
leadership, technological awareness.
These competencies are at the heart of specific
training modules for green entrepreneurs,
aimed at developing environmental competencies,
which were originally conceived for small
and medium-sized business owners in the construction
sector in Zambia.
Through group activities and self-assessment
exercises, participants are encouraged to
creatively come up with "green solutions"
that may be adopted and applied in building
affordable houses in a sustainable and environmentally-friendly
manner.
Why is the construction sector so important?
Well, around half of all non-renewable resources
used by mankind are used in construction.
This makes it one of the least sustainable
industries in the world.
If environmental protection and management
could be integrated at the planning stage
of any construction process, then appropriate
measures could be adopted to avoid and minimise
pollution, and to reduce the environmental
impact of construction projects.
14Trees is a recently launched joint venture,
which aims at making a low-carbon, affordable
housing materials in developing countries.
Nearly 3 billion people around the world live
in earth-based houses.
Population growth and urbanization are putting
pressure on resources and increasingly fragile
ecosystems.
In many countries the use of wood to fire
clay bricks is becoming unsustainable.
Under the 14Trees initiative, bricks are made
from a mixture of earth and a small quantity
of cement which, compressed in a mould, is
left naturally to cure without firing.
The process saves up to 14 trees per house,
that is where the name of the initiative
comes from, and reduces the total construction
costs by nearly 25 percent, compared to traditional
solutions.
There are indeed several opportunities for
entrepreneurs to respond to challenges and
problems brought about by current consumption
and production patterns, which are unsustainable
and are showing clear and undisputable signs
of their negative impact on our environment.
Changing patterns means innovation and to
innovate it is essential to boost entrepreneurship
as a seed of creativity, structural changes,
increasing efficiency and a mechanism to convert
knowledge into growth.
Among the 17 Sustainable Development Goals
and related targets set out in the United
Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development,
half of them call for concrete actions on
climate change, to protect the planet from
degradation and to sustainably manage its
natural resources.
Responding to those challenges with innovative
and more resource-efficient products requires
careful planning, technological awareness
and environmental leadership.
Green entrepreneurs are the ones who succeed
in creating a business model that is not only
economically profitable, but also creates
environmental and social value.
