(gentle music)
- Hello, and thank you so much
for joining us for this discussion with Kara Hurst
VP of Worldwide Sustainability at Amazon.
And Sir Martin Sorrell, Executive Chairman of S4 capital.
We're thrilled you're here and we're excited
to be having this discussion.
So to just kick this off with a few words of comment
then I'm gonna throw it over for a bit of a conversation
I've worked in climate change for a very long time now
but I would say that right now, we are at the most
important moment we've ever faced for determining
whether we're gonna deal with this crisis.
It sounds like an exaggeration to claim
that the 2020s are the most consequential decade
in the history of humanity, but it isn't.
Within 10 years we'll know whether we were the generations
that lost control of the climatic system with all
of the devastating implications that will lead to
or the generations that turn this around
and reach an abundant thriving relationship
between humans and the natural world.
Now to make this change, we of course need technology
and finance and innovation, but we also need leadership.
And for that reason, Global Optimism and Amazon
co-founded The Climate Pledge 18 months ago
which has now grown into a community of businesses
all committed to transformational action
and to reaching net-zero emissions by 2040.
10 years ahead of the Paris Agreement.
So we're gonna dive into the discussion and
Kara I'd love to kick off with a question to you.
Can you just set out for us?
Cause I think people would be interested to understand,
how does The Pledge make a difference in tackling
climate change and also what distinguishes The
Climate Pledge from other climate commitments?
- Yeah, thanks for that, Tom.
And we're so excited to have all of these companies
continue to join The Climate Pledge.
So The Climate Pledge is a call to urgent action.
We took a look of course at the sciences.
You're seeing in a moment in time in which we're operating
and we really thought we can go faster.
I think one of the things that also distinguishes The Pledge
is a commitment to sending these market signals,
the demand for products and services that companies need
to help us decarbonize.
So we have come together across geographies
across industries and said, we think urgent climate
action is needed.
We're demonstrating those things of course
with decarbonization in our own operations
in our facilities and our transportation networks
our fulfillment at Amazon, but we're also partnering to
figure out what technologies are needed, where do we need to
invest and how do we support natural climate solutions
and nature, which is a critical component
of fighting climate change.
So it's really a very broad based effort sending very
strong signals and we're excited that we think we
can go much faster than what we initially had laid out
of course, in the Paris Agreement.
So a commitment to net-zero carbon by 2040 really signals
both very bold action, big action,
and urgent.
So it's a really exciting group and continues to grow,
which we'll talk about today I'm sure as we have
many more signatories that we're announcing
- You know, that 2040 goal is kind of what captures
the imagination and drives people to go further and faster.
And I've seen, you know, many times
as we all have how planting a flag
and making a goal can kind of precipitate that flywheel
of more ambition.
And I think that's partly where the joining
of S4 Capital is so interesting.
I mean, it's, it's not always been the case
that creative agencies have been
on the lead of this issue, but
but you have stepped in here, Sir Martin so
tell us why S4 capital has joined The Climate Pledge.
- Our ambition has always been to wield the power
of what we do in creativity and technology.
Because we, we do data and analytics
which informs the creation of content
which is then distributed through digital media.
And we want to use that for good, for
for good purpose and for long-term purpose.
And so whether it be through our sustainability initiatives
which we'll talk about a little bit about more
about later or through the nature of the work that we take
on that we do with clients, we're committed
to doing our part and we're especially excited.
There are 4,200 of us now in 31 countries after just two
and a half years, we're especially excited to
be the first company in the advertising
and marketing services industry to sign The Pledge.
And I hope that as I said before, by way of example
our peers from the holding companies to advertising agencies
to consultancies will be inspired to join us in committing
to the ambitious goals set forth in The Climate Pledge.
Now within S4 already, MediaMonks, our content practice
has been working alongside The Climate Pledge team
since the beginning, since its inception
as we have the honor of building the platform
with theclimatepledge.com.
We're working alongside the team as a true partner
now and in the future. Because of this work
and our company's commitment to sustainability
being paramount to our people and our mission,
signing The Climate Pledge was a natural next step.
We want to reduce the negative environment
impact environmental impact of our own operations.
We want to increase the positive impact
of our work and what we produce
and take care of an inclusive and diverse workforce
because we believe that's the only way to
develop our organization in the best way forward.
So that's a sort of summary of where we see it.
- That's great, thank you, Martin.
It's so great to hear you set that out
both in terms of the business, as well
as the advice and how that kind of manifests.
And, and we can maybe come back to this
but we have to see more creative agencies
and other types of advisory service provider firms thinking
about the impact of the advice they give, right, which is
which is often many times more significant
than the operations, but,
but Kara, I mean, let me
let me come back to you, I mean, you know,
we spend quite a bit of time thinking about how The Pledge
can be expanded to new sectors of the economy
and new companies, but you also have quite a large business
that you also have responsibility for looking at
operations, supply chains, reductions, how Amazon itself
through a period of astonishing growth is also
gonna meet this net-zero by 2040 commitment.
So give us an update.
How's that going?
What successes have you found?
Where are the challenges?
- Yeah, great question.
And I think, you know, just to, to tackle that first part
of what you said, we're super excited about the breadth
of industries that we're seeing take on The Pledge.
Certainly the leadership that Sir Martin and S4 are bringing
in the creative services industry, but we also
have companies joining us at this time in renewable energy
right, like, Ørsted and Acciona.
We have companies in the food industry, Daabon
and we have Cranswick in the UK.
We have our first supermarket with Iceland Foods.
So there's a lot of really exciting
companies joining that show a breadth of sectors.
Generation Investment, our first financial services industry
So leadership in every industry, which helps us because
of course at Amazon we do have businesses
across multiple different industry sectors
transportation, fulfillment, logistics
our cloud computing business with AWS.
And we're in, you know, our, our products that we sell both
on our retail site, but certainly also that we make
across multiple different industry sectors.
So we're looking at all of that.
And of course, first and foremost
as Sir Martin described, we have the components
of de-carbonization in our own business.
So we are investing as an example
in electrification of fleet.
We announced that we've ordered a hundred thousand vehicles
from Rivian that will begin to be deployed this year
and we'll have 10,000 on the road by 2022
and all 100,000 by 2030.
We've also partnered in the EU with Mercedes-Benz
another signatory to The Pledge and ordered
1800 vehicles from Mercedes-Benz.
So those kinds of actions that really demonstrate how
we are going to do this
in addition to our commitments on renewable energy.
We are the largest corporate purchaser of renewable energy.
And we're, well, you know, on the way we set
out a goal initially of 100% by 2030
we think we can do it faster, hopefully by 2025
but we're investing heavily in wind and solar.
And we think that's really critical to send, again
the signal that companies like us need more renewable energy
projects at scale, and we'll continue to be
in the market for those.
So I think things like the renewable energy commitment
a commitment to reduction of packaging, commitment to
electrifying our fleet and sending those kinds of signals
are really beginning to transform our operations at Amazon.
So I wanna ask you both about where The Pledge goes next
in this essential year, but I also
I just think there's an amazing intersection
between Amazon that touches so many millions of people
around the world through the way that they, you know
their online shopping habits and other different things.
And Martin I mean there's no one better place than you
to think about how we move culture further forward to get
on top of these big issues.
And it feels like we're at this cultural inflection moment
on climate, the impacts have become so great,
people are already aware of it.
It feels like we can kind of step further forward now.
So I mean, Martin, do you feel that's true
and what's it gonna take to create a mass engagement
on this issue in a manner that can really
change the moment we're in?
- We may see a change in the political environment
particularly in the US that's helpful.
But this is in work that we do as an organization
and also how our work gets done.
As we work with many brands around the globe
we've got an outstanding opportunity
as our competitors do too
to become a catalyst for change.
And just as we want our own operations
to be carbon neutral, we want our projects to
have a net-zero negative impact as well.
And through our work, we want to create awareness
not only amongst our clients, but our industry too.
And those that come into contact with our work.
So our goals to become a truly sustainable production
partner to brands, and to be a front runner in an industry
that needs to do more with sustainability.
And as a first step
we'll be launching a green production manifesto this year
realizing our role in helping brands transform
both inside and out.
And S4 Capital is dedicated to adopting exemplary
sustainable practices ourselves.
Now, as you may know, we're solely digital
we're a hundred percent digital.
And in a lot of ways embracing virtualization
can help brands and individuals mitigate
their climate footprint significantly.
For example we built a virtual solutions capability
as an alternative to in-person events.
And these virtual conferences can amount
to less than 1% of the carbon emissions
that traditional events that were so common used to do.
Still we're highly aware that partners such as ourselves
are big consumers of energy, especially electricity
and this realization galvanizes our efforts to
develop increasingly sustainable processes.
And over the last 12 months, we've accelerated our efforts
and we've doubled down on our integrated production approach
with clients. And doing so has enabled our production
to become more sustainable.
And we've also been able to bring efficiencies in
CO2 footprints.
- All right, I love it.
Now I'd love to just ask you both,
2021 could not be more important.
I mean, I would say more important even than 2015,
This is the year in which we really step up
and we make progress,
well like we were saying at the beginning
the window in which we can do that really begins to close.
We're gonna be working closely together
throughout this year with the rest of the companies
in The Pledge to really make a material impact
and show the world we can go further and faster.
What are the biggest things we can do together this year
to have an impact to ensure that we end up
where we need to be. Kara, why don't you kick off?
- Sure, I'm excited about 2021.
I think there's a lot of action, both leading up to COP26.
We're seeing all of the country discussions
on their NDCs and thinking about really
what does this look like to go very big?
I'm thrilled to have a company
like S4 who will also help us with messaging
and bringing in the creative community because communication
about these goals is critically important.
So we wanna have demonstrated tangible, incredible progress.
We wanna have big commitments that help us go faster.
We wanna have great communication about what
this means to bring as many people in as possible.
So I think this is the year where we really can turn
towards saying, we have a limited amount
of time and we wanna have everybody involved, all sectors
governments, multinationals, multilaterals, NGOs
and certainly people all over the world.
And so we, it takes all of us really to come in both
industry tech companies, but large industrial companies
built environment, energy companies, all of us to really
think about how we transform and then all of our
creative partners to think
about how we continue to communicate this
and really invite people into this.
So individuals can make transformation in their lives.
And we can continue to think about really
the actions that we all take that will contribute
to making progress, because you're absolutely right.
We're optimistic, the moment's now
but we have to really get started this year.
- Sir Martin?
- S4 as we've said,
S4 Capital was the first company in the creative
and marketing or advertising and marketing services sector,
to sign The Pledge.
And that's a great step forward, particularly for us
but it's still just one, one small step
actually. It's a sprint in the right direction
but now we hope that our industry peers
and others will take the baton and run with us.
- Absolutely, now, that's the thing.
This is it.
We're gonna find out if we're serious or not.
Thank you so much, Kara Hurst, Sir Martin Sorrell,
this has been wonderful to talk to you.
It's gonna be a very exciting year looking forward
to partnering with both of you
and making serious steps forward.
Looking forward to it.
Thank you very much.
(gentle music)