climate

Kris Lin-Bronner: The Magic of Dr. Bronner's (Rebroadcast)

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Kris Lin-Bronner is Strategic Adviser and CSR Manager for Dr. Bronner’s Magic Soaps, the top-selling brand of natural soaps in North America. She is responsible for overseeing and managing many diverse projects under the umbrella of sustainability and social responsibility.

Kris advises the Special Operations Team and affiliated Fair Trade projects on financial and operational matters, provides integrated risk assessments on new business ventures, and works to institutionalize Dr. Bronner’s sustainability efforts across multiple levels of the company, from operations to governance. Prior to joining Dr. Bronner’s, she worked in the non-profit sector for programs serving recently resettled refugee and immigrant youths in San Diego.

Kris earned an undergraduate degree from Harvard University and a graduate degree in International Economic Development from UCSD. She is a former hospice volunteer, as well as a design enthusiast, and she enjoys adventure travel. She was born in 1974 in Taiwan and currently lives in Encinitas, California with her husband David and their daughter Maya.

Some highlights from Kevin’s interview with Kris include:

  • How Dr. Bronner’s models what’s possible for companies in addressing climate change

  • The rippling impact of Dr. Bronner’s leading edge strategy around mitigating climate change impacts by engaging with the land use practices in their supply stream

  • Dr. Bronner’s goal to get enough people to care to create the critical mass to shift away from the extractive economic model to a more regenerative model and how they pursue that goal

  • The success of the Fair Pay Today program where Dr. Bronner’s and a consortium of businesses advocated for fair living wages for workers and their ongoing efforts to address income inequality

  • Dr. Bronner’s excitement about Project Drawdown and how to use it as a tool to assess what role Dr. Bronner’s can play within their scope of influence

  • As a top scoring B Corp, Kris shares how Dr. Bronner’s attracts new talent

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Organizations

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LIFT Economy Newsletter

Join 8,000+ subscribers and get our free 60-point business design checklist—plus monthly tips, advice, and resources to help you build the Next Economy: https://lifteconomy.com/newsletter

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Next Economy MBA

This episode is brought to you by the Next Economy MBA.

What would a business education look like if it was completely redesigned for the benefit of all life? This is why the team at LIFT Economy created the Next Economy MBA (https://lifteconomy.com/mba).

The Next Economy MBA is a nine month online course for folks who want to learn key business fundamentals (e.g., vision, culture, strategy, and operations) from an equitable, inclusive, and regenerative perspective.

Join the growing network of 350+ alumni who have been exposed to new solutions, learned essential business skills, and joined a lifelong peer group that is catalyzing a global shift towards an economy that works for all life.

Learn more at https://lifteconomy.com/mba.

---

Show Notes + Other Links

For detailed show notes and interviews with past guests, please visit https://lifteconomy.com/podcast. 

If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts/iTunes? It really helps expose these ideas to new listeners: https://bit.ly/nexteconomynow

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LIFTEconomy

Instagram: https://instagram.com/lifteconomy/

Facebook: https://facebook.com/LIFTEconomy/

YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/Lifteconomy

Music by Chris Zabriskie: https://chriszabriskie.com/

Amelia Swan Baxter: Building The Next Economy With WholeTrees (Rebroadcast)

Subscribe to Next Economy Now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, Google Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you find podcasts.

Amelia Baxter believes that the 21st century built environment is filled with opportunities for trees. Baxter co-founded WholeTrees in 2007 to develop and sell products and technologies that would scale the use of waste-trees in commercial construction, increasing forest revenues, and offering green construction markets a new material for the 21st century. Amelia has led project teams in over $2M in USDA research grants working toward the commercialization of the tree's natural engineering. By raising equity investment for her company, attracting national executive talent, and pinpointing nascent urban markets for trees as structure, Baxter has participated in the growth of a truly conscious and regenerative company.

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Interview Highlights:

  • How WholeTrees provides an ecological, economic, social, and aesthetic benefit

  • Coming from a place of heart as well as a place of necessity to attract great staff and business culture

  • How the character and inner work of company leaders ripples throughout the entire organization

---

LIFT Economy Newsletter

Join 8,000+ subscribers and get our free 60-point business design checklist—plus monthly tips, advice, and resources to help you build the Next Economy: https://lifteconomy.com/newsletter

---

Next Economy MBA

This episode is brought to you by the Next Economy MBA.

What would a business education look like if it was completely redesigned for the benefit of all life? This is why the team at LIFT Economy created the Next Economy MBA (https://lifteconomy.com/mba).

The Next Economy MBA is a nine month online course for folks who want to learn key business fundamentals (e.g., vision, culture, strategy, and operations) from an equitable, inclusive, and regenerative perspective.

Join the growing network of 350+ alumni who have been exposed to new solutions, learned essential business skills, and joined a lifelong peer group that is catalyzing a global shift towards an economy that works for all life.

Learn more at https://lifteconomy.com/mba.

---

Show Notes + Other Links

For detailed show notes and interviews with past guests, please visit https://lifteconomy.com/podcast. 

If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts/iTunes? It really helps expose these ideas to new listeners: https://bit.ly/nexteconomynow

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LIFTEconomy

Instagram: https://instagram.com/lifteconomy/

Facebook: https://facebook.com/LIFTEconomy/

YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/Lifteconomy

Music by Chris Zabriskie: https://chriszabriskie.com/

Rick Ridgeway: Why Patagonia is Moving from Sustainability to Regeneration (Rebroadcast)

"When you dig down into any social justice issue, more often than not, the causes have some root in environmental degradation."  - Rick Ridgeway

In this episode of Next Economy Now, Ryan Honeyman, a Partner at LIFT Economy, interviews Rick Ridgeway, VP of Environmental Initiatives at Patagonia.

Rick Ridgeway is one of the originals at Patagonia. He was rock climbing buddies with Yvon Chouinard before Patagonia was founded in 1973.

In this episode, we discuss Rick’s background as a photographer and filmmaker, his time on Patagonia's board of directors, and why Rick got his first “real job” only 12 years ago. We also dive into Patagonia’s famous mission statement to “Build the best product, cause no unnecessary harm, and use business to inspire and implement solutions to the environmental crisis.”

As you’ll hear, Rick is especially interested in moving away from “causing no unnecessary harm” (or sustainability) to “doing good” (which is regenerative). Rick and I discuss how things like soil health, regenerative agriculture, rotational grazing, and clothing that benefits the climate are increasingly on Patagonia’s radar.

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Interview Highlights:

In this interview, Ryan and Rick discuss a number of topics, including:

  • Why Patagonia doesn’t mention solving social or community issues in its mission statement

  • What happened when Patagonia discovered forced labor in its Tier 2 and Tier 3 suppliers last year

  • Why the Sustainable Apparel Coalition is the largest trade association in apparel and footwear in the world

  • Whether he is optimistic or pessimistic about the future

  • Patagonia’s new initiatives in carbon sequestration

  • Why you should know Fred Kirschenmann (from the Aldo Leopold Center for Sustainable Agriculture), the Carbon Underground, and Kiss the Ground

  • And much more

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LIFT Economy Newsletter

Join 7000+ subscribers and get our free 60 point business design checklist—plus monthly tips, advice, and resources to help you build the Next Economy: https://lifteconomy.com/newsletter

---

Next Economy MBA

This episode is brought to you by the Next Economy MBA.

What would a business education look like if it was completely redesigned for the benefit of all life? This is why the team at LIFT Economy created the Next Economy MBA (https://lifteconomy.com/mba).

The Next Economy MBA is a nine month online course for folks who want to learn key business fundamentals (e.g., vision, culture, strategy, and operations) from an equitable, inclusive, and regenerative perspective.

Join the growing network of 250+ alumni who have been exposed to new solutions, learned essential business skills, and joined a lifelong peer group that is catalyzing a global shift towards an economy that works for all life.

Learn more at https://lifteconomy.com/mba.

---

Show Notes + Other Links

For detailed show notes and interviews with past guests, please visit https://lifteconomy.com/podcast

If you enjoy the podcast, please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts by visiting: https://bit.ly/nexteconomynow

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LIFTEconomy

Instagram: https://instagram.com/lifteconomy/

Facebook: https://facebook.com/LIFTEconomy/

YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/Lifteconomy

Music by Chris Zabriskie: https://chriszabriskie.com/

Varshini Prakash: The Sunrise Movement (Rebroadcast)

Subscribe to Next Economy Now on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Pandora, Google Podcasts, YouTube, or wherever you find podcasts.

As we dip into the winter months, we will be reposting some of our most popular episodes of all time from the Next Economy Now podcast. This is from our February 2019 interview with Varshini Prakash.

Varshini was born and raised outside Boston, MA. She got involved in the climate movement as an undergraduate at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She joined the UMass Fossil Fuel Divestment campaign early in her time at UMass and led the campaign for two years.

For the last three years, she has coordinated fossil fuel divestment campaigns with the Fossil Fuel Divestment Student Network at a regional and national level. She supported campaigns across the country through training, mentorship, and strategic guidance. Varshini supported the launch of Sunrise, a movement building an army of young people to stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process.

For the show notes, visit: https://www.lifteconomy.com/blog/varshini-prakash

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Some highlights from Erin Axelrod’s conversation with Varshini Prakash include:

  • The Sunrise Movement is mobilizing tens of thousands to stop business as usual with The Green New Deal

  • The Green New Deal aims to address our climate crisis as well as wealth- and racial inequity

  • Today’s youth leadership are particularly positioned to be vanguards for social change

  • Envisioning a world where all of our basic needs as humans are met while providing a benefit to each other and our environment and contrasting this vision with our current world which is more of a lose-lose, zero-sum game.

  • How the Green New Deal harkens back to The New Deal and how the Green New Deal will similarly take many pieces of legislation over a period of decades.

—-

LIFT Economy Newsletter

Join 7000+ subscribers and get our free 60 point business design checklist—plus monthly tips, advice, and resources to help you build the Next Economy: https://lifteconomy.com/newsletter

---

Next Economy MBA

This episode is brought to you by the Next Economy MBA.

What would a business education look like if it was completely redesigned for the benefit of all life? This is why the team at LIFT Economy created the Next Economy MBA (https://lifteconomy.com/mba).

The Next Economy MBA is a nine month online course for folks who want to learn key business fundamentals (e.g., vision, culture, strategy, and operations) from an equitable, inclusive, and regenerative perspective.

Join the growing network of 250+ alumni who have been exposed to new solutions, learned essential business skills, and joined a lifelong peer group that is catalyzing a global shift towards an economy that works for all life.

Learn more at https://lifteconomy.com/mba.

---

Show Notes + Other Links

For detailed show notes and interviews with past guests, please visit https://lifteconomy.com/podcast

If you enjoy the podcast, please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts by visiting: https://bit.ly/nexteconomynow

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LIFTEconomy

Instagram: https://instagram.com/lifteconomy/

Facebook: https://facebook.com/LIFTEconomy/

YouTube: https://youtube.com/c/Lifteconomy

Music by Chris Zabriskie: https://chriszabriskie.com/

Avi Lewis: A Message from the Future II: The Years of Repair

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Avi Lewis is an award-winning documentary filmmaker, journalist, and lecturer in Journalism and Media Studies at Rutgers University. His 25-year journalism career has spanned local news reporting to hosting and producing a variety of current affairs shows for television networks worldwide, to directing theatrically released documentaries, The Take and This Changes Everything, that premiered in festivals like TIFF and the Venice Biennale. In 2017, he co-founded and is now Strategic Director of The Leap – an organization launched to upend our collective response to the crises of climate, inequality and racism. He produced, and co-wrote with Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, the Emmy nominated short film, A Message from the Future and is producer and co-writer with Opal Tometi of the new short film, A Message from the Future II: The Years of Repair.

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Interview Highlights:

  • Avi shares the backstory on his film The Take, which highlights the surge of worker-owned cooperatives in Argentina and how he wound up co-founding The Working World with Brendan Martin (catch the interview with Brendan Martin on the Next Economy Now podcast here)

  • How Avi’s experience with The Leap Manifesto transformed him into an activist and inspired him to found The Leap

  • Avi humbly admits that he was slow to see that the climate crisis is not the overarching crisis but that it’s merely an expression of the multiple deeper social justice issues that give rise to it

  • Driving a vision of hope through a compelling collective vision that integrates justice movements globally through Avi’s and Opal Tometi’s new short film, A Message from the Future II: The Years of Repair

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

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  2. RATE & SUBSCRIBE: iTunes | Overcast | Stitcher | Spotify | Etc.

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Isha Clarke: Youth Vs. Apocalypse

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Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Isha Clarke is a high school student born, raised, and educated in Oakland, CA with a passion for intersectional activism. She knows that threats to the environment disproportionately affect people of color, low-income folks, and young people. It is essential to know this while fighting for environmental justice so we can can create a just and equitable world while maintaining a livable climate.

Interview Highlights:

  • How Isha Clarke got involved with the climate justice movement and organizations like the Sunrise Movement and Youth vs. Apocalypse

  • A bit of background on the video with Diane Feinstein and Sunrise Movement youth activists that went viral and the impacts of that interaction

  • How listeners can contribute to the resistance movements that are holding the line for the possibility of the next economy

  • Why historically marginalized and under-resourced groups need to be at the center of the conversations around the climate crisis

Resources:

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This episode is brought to you by the Next Economy MBA.

What would a business education look like if it was completely redesigned for the benefit of all life? This is why the team at LIFT Economy created the Next Economy MBA (http://www.lifteconomy.com/mba).

The Next Economy MBA is a nine month online course for entrepreneurs and aspiring entrepreneurs who want to learn key business fundamentals (e.g., vision, culture, strategy, and operations) from an equitable, inclusive, and regenerative perspective. 

Join the growing network of nearly 250+ alumni who have learned essential skills, increased their confidence in Next Economy business fundamentals, and joined a lifelong peer group that is catalyzing a global shift towards an economy that works for all life.

Courses are offered twice per year. Learn more and/or register today at http://www.lifteconomy.com.mba.

—

If you enjoy the podcast, would you please consider leaving a short review on Apple Podcasts/iTunes? It really helps expose these ideas to new listeners:

https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/next-economy-now-business-as-a-force-for-good/id1074584017

For show notes and past guests, please visit www.lifteconomy.com/podcast

Sign up for our monthly newsletter to get tips, advice, and guidance on how you can help create the Next Economy: http://www.lifteconomy.com/newsletter

Twitter: https://twitter.com/LIFT_Economy

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Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/LIFTEconomy/

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Amelia Swan Baxter: Building The Next Economy With WholeTrees

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Amelia Baxter believes that the 21st century built environment is filled with opportunities for trees. Baxter co-founded WholeTrees in 2007 to develop and sell products and technologies that would scale the use of waste-trees in commercial construction, increasing forest revenues, and offering green construction markets a new material for the 21st century. Amelia has led project teams in over $2M in USDA research grants working toward the commercialization of the tree's natural engineering. By raising equity investment for her company, attracting national executive talent, and pinpointing nascent urban markets for trees as structure, Baxter has participated in the growth of a truly conscious and regenerative company.

Amelia-HS-1.jpg

Interview Highlights:

  • How WholeTrees provides an ecological, economic, social, and aesthetic benefit

  • Coming from a place of heart as well as a place of necessity to attract great staff and business culture

  • How the character and inner work of company leaders ripples throughout the entire organization

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

  1. SHARE this post on social media!

  2. RATE Next Economy Now on I-Tunes!

  3. SUBSCRIBE to Next Economy Now: iTunes | Overcast | Stitcher | Etc.

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life. 

Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Varshini Prakash: Sunrise Movement Sees The Green New Deal on the Horizon

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Varshini was born and raised outside Boston, MA. She got involved in the climate movement as an undergraduate at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. She joined the UMass Fossil Fuel Divestment campaign early in her time at UMass and led the campaign for two years. In Spring 2016, the campaign won after a 2-week long mass escalation in which over 700 students, faculty, and alumni participated. 32 were arrested after peacefully refusing to leave the Whitmore Administration Building until UMass agreed to climate action. For the last three years, she has coordinated fossil fuel divestment campaigns with the Fossil Fuel Divestment Student Network at a regional and national level. She supported campaigns across the country through training, mentorship, and strategic guidance. Varshini supported the launch of Sunrise, a movement building an army of young people to stop climate change and create millions of good jobs in the process. 

Some highlights from Erin Axelrod’s conversation with Varshini Prakash include:

  • The Sunrise Movement is mobilizing tens of thousands to stop business as usual with The Green New Deal

  • The Green New Deal aims to address our climate crisis as well as wealth- and racial inequity

  • Today’s youth leadership are particularly positioned to be vanguards for social change

  • Envisioning a world where all of our basic needs as humans are met while providing a benefit to each other and our environment and contrasting this vision with our current world which is more of a lose-lose, zero-sum game.

  • How the Green New Deal harkens back to The New Deal and how the Green New Deal will similarly take many pieces of legislation over a period of decades.

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

  1. SHARE this post on social media!

  2. RATE Next Economy Now on I-Tunes!

  3. SUBSCRIBE to Next Economy Now: iTunes | Overcast | Stitcher | Etc.

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life. 

Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Paul Polman: B Corps, Climate Change, and the Future of Capitalism

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Paul Polman was Chief Executive Officer of Unilever from 2009-2019. Under his leadership Unilever set out an ambitious vision to decouple its growth from overall environmental footprint and increase its positive social impact.

Paul actively seeks cooperation with other companies to implement sustainable business strategies and drive systemic change. He is Chairman of the International Chamber of Commerce, Chair of the B Team and Vice-Chair of the UN Global Compact. Paul previously served as Chairman of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development.

Paul has been closely involved in global discussions on the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and action to tackle climate change. In 2016, Paul was asked by the UN Secretary-General to be a member of the SDG Advocacy Group, tasked with promoting action on the 2030 Agenda.

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Some highlights from Ryan Honeyman’s Conversation with Paul Polman include:

  • How Paul first got interested in sustainability

  • Why Paul chose not to report quarterly returns, and instead only report annual returns to his shareholders

  • How he reconciles the need for growth on a finite planet

  • The growth of the B Corp movement

  • What he thinks about expanding ownership to workers, suppliers, and community members

  • Paul’s thoughts on permaculture and regenerative agriculture

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

  1. SHARE this post on social media!

  2. RATE Next Economy Now on I-Tunes!

  3. SUBSCRIBE to Next Economy Now: iTunes | Overcast | Stitcher | Etc.

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life. 

Ryan Honeyman is a Partner at LIFT Economy and author of The B Corp Handbook: How to Use Business as a Force for Good (Berrett-Koehler Publishers). You can follow Ryan on Twitter @honeymanconsult or email him ryan@lifteconomy.com.

Brock Dolman: Thirsty for a Balanced Water Budget

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Brock Dolman co-directs the WATER Institute, Permaculture Design Program and Wildlands Program. He has taught Permaculture and consulted on regenerative project design and implementation internationally in Costa Rica, Ecuador, U.S. Virgin Islands, Spain, Brazil, China, Canada, Zimbabwe, Tanzania, Democratic Republic of Congo, Cuba and widely in the U.S. He has been the keynote presenter at numerous conferences and was featured in the award-winning films The 11th Hour by Leonardo DiCaprio, The Call of Life by Species Alliance, and Permaculture: A Quiet Revolution by Vanessa Shultz. In October of 2012, he gave a City 2.0 TEDx talk. Brock completed his BA in the Biology and Environmental Studies departments at the University of California Santa Cruz in 1992, graduating with honors. For over a decade, he has served as an appointed commissioner on the Sonoma County Fish & Wildlife Commission. 

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Some highlights from Kevin Bayuk’s conversation with Brock Dolman include:

  • Unpacking aspects of the ecological, biological, & economic importance of water

  • Adaptation to global warming by maximizing/stretching our water budgets at various scales

  • Suggestions for transitioning ecologically from viscous cycles to virtuous cycles & personal resilience strategies

  • An overview of some of Brock’s exciting projects at The WATER Institute at the Occidental Arts & Ecology Center and beyond

Resources:

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

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  2. RATE Next Economy Now on I-Tunes!

  3. SUBSCRIBE to Next Economy Now: iTunes | Overcast | Stitcher | Etc.

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Kevin Bayuk, Co-founder and Partner at LIFT Economy, works at the intersection of ecology and economy where permaculture design meets next economy organizations intent on meeting human needs while enhancing the conditions conducive to all life. He is the Senior Financial Fellow at Project Drawdown and a founding partner of the Urban Permaculture Institute.  You can follow Kevin on Twitter @kevinbayuk or email him kevin@lifteconomy.com.

Gretchen Grani: Guayaki's Authentic Invitation to Come to Life

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Regeneration & Sustainability Cebadora at Guayaki, Gretchen Grani has directed corporate sustainability and philanthropy for 2 natural products companies. Prior experience includes managing an environmental conservation nonprofit and serving on numerous nonprofit boards, environmental consulting, writing about ecopsychology, and volunteering at a St. Helena winery for 15 years. Gretchen is an advocate for personal regeneration and regenerative business as a solution to reversing climate change and solving the world’s biggest social and environmental problems.

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Resources:

https://www.climatecollaborative.com/

https://mamuse.bandcamp.com/track/we-shall-be-known-featuring-thrive-choir

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Marilyn Waite: Pursuit of Intergenerational Well-Being Through Climate & Clean Energy Finance

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Marilyn Waite is author of Sustainability at Work: Careers That Make a Difference, which has received critical acclaim and has been introduced in higher education curricula in the United States and China. Marilyn leads the climate and clean energy finance portfolio at the Hewlett Foundation and writes a monthly column, The Innovators, as an inaugural 1Hotels Fellow at NRDC’s Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2). She regularly advises cleantech startups and serves on the Board of Directors for The Biomimicry Institute and the Advisory Board for Engineers for a Sustainable World. Previously, Marilyn led energy and cleantech investments at Village Capital, managed nuclear and renewable energy projects at AREVA, and launched the online platform and mobile application SustainableVisit. She served as a Senior Research Fellow at Project Drawdown, where she led a team to model, quantify, and forecast the viability of energy solutions to curb climate change. Marilyn also worked at the intersection of science and policy at the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and in economic development at the United Nations in Madagascar. Marilyn lectured sustainable business at UIBE in Beijing and continues to teach at business schools and management programs. Multilingual in French, Spanish, Mandarin and English, Marilyn is a global citizen who is able to bridge cultural divides and apply systems level thinking to the most local of concerns. Marilyn holds a Master’s Degree with distinction in Engineering for Sustainable Development from the University of Cambridge and a Bachelor’s of Science Degree in Civil and Environmental Engineering, magna cum laude, from Princeton University. Her vision is a world where sustainability values of social cohesion, environmental consciousness, inter-generational equity, and economic health drive decision-making and business practices.

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life. 

Kevin Bayuk, Co-founder and Partner at LIFT Economy, works at the intersection of ecology and economy where permaculture design meets next economy organizations intent on meeting human needs while enhancing the conditions conducive to all life. He is the Senior Financial Fellow at Project Drawdown and a founding partner of the Urban Permaculture Institute.  You can follow Kevin on Twitter @kevinbayuk or email him kevin@lifteconomy.com.

Berry Liberman: Holding the Grief with the Hopeful Vision for a Resilient Future

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

Help these ideas reach more eyes & ears:

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Berry Liberman is the co-founder and Creative Director of Small Giants, the Publisher and Editor of Dumbo Feather magazine and a mum to the three cutest kids in the world. Small Giants was founded in 2007 to create, support, nurture and empower businesses that are contributing to the world in a meaningful way. Dumbo Feather is a labour of love. Designed, edited and printed in Melbourne, Australia, it is a quarterly journal highlighting the stories of extraordinary people, living lives of passion and commitment to changing the world we live in.

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Resources:

  • info@smallgiants.com.au

 

LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.


Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Eric Dayton & Adam Fetcher: Askov Finlayson’s Mission to “Keep the North Cold”

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Askov Finlayson was founded in 2011 as a men’s clothing shop in Minneapolis, MN. It began as a place for owners and brothers Andrew Dayton and Eric Dayton to feature brands they admired that weren’t available in Minneapolis at the time. Askov Finlayson has since been recognized by Esquire and GQ as one of the ten best men’s stores in America. In 2013, we began making products under our own name. We’re inspired by Minnesota’s traditions of exploration and year-round enjoyment of the outdoors, as well as the thriving design community in Minneapolis. It’s the combination of perseverance and creativity that we consider to be among the finest characteristics of America’s North.  Andrew and Eric also created and co-own The Bachelor Farmer, The Bachelor Farmer Cafe, and Marvel Bar, and all our businesses are located in the historic North Loop neighborhood of Minneapolis. The Bachelor Farmer was named one of Bon Appétit’s top ten new restaurants in the country when it opened and Marvel Bar is a three-time James Beard national semifinalist for Outstanding Bar Program.

Adam Fetcher is Vice President of Environmental Impact & Policy at Askov Finlayson, where he leads the company’s innovative Keep the North Cold climate mission. An outdoor clothing company at the forefront of the growing North movement, Askov has committed to measuring the company’s climate impact and then giving away 110% of its climate cost to innovative organizations working to solve the climate crisis – including Climate Generation, a Minneapolis-based group using education to empower the next generation of climate leaders.

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.


Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Massey Burke: Natural Building, Carbon Sequestration, and Resilience in Climate Chaos

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Massey Burke is a natural materials specialist in the San Francisco Bay Area. Her work centers on research, design, and hands-on implementation of building with low-carbon, natural materials, with an interest in applying natural building to existing buildings and the urban fabric. She also teams up with organizations such as the California Straw Building Association and the Ecological Building Network to generate technical information on carbon and natural materials in the built environment, and works on code issues surrounding natural materials through the Cob Research Institute and other collaborators. More on her work can be found here.

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.


Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County. You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Aaron Fairchild: Rooting Into Perennial Impact Under One Green Canopy

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Aaron Fairchild serves as Chairman and Chief Executive Officer at Green Canopy Homes.  With over 25 years in real estate construction, development and lending, Aaron has a deep understanding of residential & commercial finance, residential construction, and energy efficiency.  A third generation lender, entrepreneur, and a graduate of the University of Washington’ Executive MBA program, Aaron is an experienced fund manager, developer, and thought leader in corporate culture and mindfulness development.  Aaron is a Returned Peace Corps Volunteer from Gabon, Africa where he built schools and homes for teachers.  A two-term board member of Washington Environmental Council, he currently serves on the boards at Master Builders Association and Enhabit.

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Bettina von Hagen: Blending Capital & Worldviews That See the Forest for the Trees

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Bettina helped launch Ecotrust Forests and joined Ecotrust Forest Management (EFM) as CEO in 2008. Bettina has spent the past 15 years working to promote economic viability, social equity, and environmental health in the Pacific Northwest with a particular focus on forestry. A former commercial banker, Bettina has over 20 years of experience in banking, impact investing, and fund management. She also has significant expertise in emerging markets in ecosystem services, particularly the forest carbon market, where she is involved in developing markets and protocols for high-quality forest carbon projects at the state, regional, and federal levels. Previously, Bettina was Vice President at Ecotrust for forestry programs and for the Natural Capital Fund, a $20M fund which invests in key businesses and initiatives in the conservation economy. Prior to joining Ecotrust in 1993, she was a vice president and commercial lender at First Interstate Bank of Oregon and has been a Member of Environmental Advisory Board of Wells Fargo & Company since March 2006. She currently serves on the board of Forest Trends. Bettina has an MBA from the University of Chicago and a BA from the University of the Pacific.

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Some highlights from Erin’s interview with Bettina include:

  • The origin story of Ecotrust & Ecotrust Forest Management and the blended capital approaches to addressing complex ecological challenges

  • How unlike early U.S. conservation approaches that divorced people from the land, Ecotrust brings an approach that integrates conservation w/ community needs in ways that advances conservation while advancing livelihoods (ie: 100% of the landscape matters & 100% of people matter)

  • Ecotrust’s creation of a for-profit bank that targeted enterprises enhancing ecological and social outcomes – a bank that grew into and was acquired by Beneficial State Bank, carrying the same original intention

  • Ecotrust describes their worldview & style of forestry as the 5 R’s – Rotation, retention, reserves, resilience, relationships – suggesting practices that foster regional forest systems which yield greater value and health, rather than narrowly managing for a single commodity like timber

  • Ecotrust’s deep involvement & relationship w/ tribal communities from elevating indigenous worldviews to repatriating ancestral lands and other natural resources

 

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Erin Axelrod is a Partner at LIFT Economy, helping to accelerate the spread of climate-beneficial businesses, specializing in businesses that address critical soil and water regeneration. She is an avid ecologist, grassroots organizer and regularly forages for wild food in her home in rural Sonoma County.  You can follow Erin on Twitter @erinaxelrod or email her erin@lifteconomy.com.

Sandra Kwak: #WeStandWithHaiti & #4thWorld as U.S. Solar Energy Policy Erodes

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

SUBSCRIBE & RATE us on iTunes, Spotify, Pandora, YouTube, or anywhere you find podcasts!

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Executive strategist and systems thinker, Sandra Kwak is applying disruptive innovation to create a regenerative future. Before launching 10Power, she scaled AutoGrid from prototype to a global brand, creating automated intelligence out of big data from the smart grid. Prior, as Co-Founder / President / COO of energy efficiency company Powerzoa, she brought building management hardware and software tools to market. Sandra has also served as CEO of a software company producing the world’s first mathematically lossless video codec. She worked at Pacific Gas & Electric implementing the ClimateSmart program and has consulted with clients including Mitsubishi, the Transamerica Holding Company, and The San Francisco Foundation. Sandra has an MBA in Sustainable Business from Presidio Graduate School and a BA in Political Science and Visual Art from Emory University.  10 Power is an investee of LIFT Economy’s Force for Good Fund.

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Some highlights from Andrew’s interview with Sandra include:

  • Sandra describes how part of her inspiration for creating 10Power grew from her observation that concerted efforts to elevate social equity was missing from CleanTech sector as thousands lack access to electricity and all that affordable electrical infrastructure affords

  • With Haiti importing most of its energy, Sandra enumerates emerging opportunities for solar in Haiti including building virgin, state of the art infrastructure and innovative financing to increase affordability

  • Sandra laments Trump’s imposition of tariffs on solar panels, counterproductively backsliding U.S. energy policy as Haitian President Jovenel Moïse boldly removes tariffs entirely from solar panel imports with promises of rapidly electrifying Haiti with renewable energy

  • Deriving much of her hope and inspiration from youth, Sandra offers advice to anyone wanting to make a difference in CleanTech or in general, advising us to treat every experience as a learning experience, to find or create the conditions that enable us to thrive, and to elevate positive solutions

  • As they continue recognizing, investing in, and scaling solutions, 10Power will be raising a fund later this year (subscribe to LIFT Economy’s monthly newsletter to stay tuned for opportunities to support!)

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Kevin Bayuk: Our Journey to an Economy that Works for the Benefit of All Life

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Our dearly beloved co-founding member of the LIFT Team, Kevin Bayuk's has his roots in entrepreneurship, having spent nearly a decade starting and growing technology companies, and activating projects and organizations that regenerate healthy ecosystems and socially just and joyful environments. After immersing himself in all aspects of starting and growing companies, Kevin focused his attention on learning about and teaching eco-systemic design. Nowadays Kevin merges his experience in business with his experience in permaculture to help businesses care for people while enhancing the earth.  

Kevin also serves as the Senior Financial Fellow at Project Drawdown developing the business case to address climate change through existing practices and technologies. He frequently teaches classes, workshops, does public speaking, facilitates meetings, plans events and provides one on one mentoring as a founding partner of the Urban Permaculture Institute San Francisco. Kevin has helped design and start food security gardens and public learning experiences intent on reminding people that we, too, are nature.

Kevin has raised millions of dollars to capitalize business operations, led teams of more than 30 employees, and can speak well to the benefits and pitfalls of raising capital and the many paths of growing a business. He loves spreadsheets and loves to dig into operating models. One investor of Kevin’s last technology company said, “Kevin oozes strategy.”

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Some highlights from Ryan’s interview with Kevin include:

  • Kevin recounts his process of shifting away from a worldview overwhelmed by proliferation of problems/suffering to one where he recognized countless opportunities to solve problems and inspire a movement of solutions

  • How the genesis of Kevin’s interest in business & economy as powerful lever for social change grew from observations that much suffering is rooted in our system of economy that informs our cultural norms and identities

  • A leisurely stroll through LIFT’s long term vision, from LIFT 1.0 to LIFT 5.0 and how the LIFT Team balances cynicism and optimism on the path to realizing our vision

  • Some resources from which the LIFT Team derives inspiration

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Ryan Honeyman is a Partner at LIFT Economy and author of The B Corp Handbook: How to Use Business as a Force for Good (Berrett-Koehler Publishers).  You can follow Ryan on Twitter @honeymanconsult or email him ryan@lifteconomy.com.

Ahmed Rahim: Steeped in the Spirit of Hospitality at Numi Tea

Next Economy Now highlights the leaders who are taking a regenerative, bio-regional, equitable, transparent, and whole-systems approach to using business as a force for good. 

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Ahmed Rahim is Founder of Numi Inc. and serving as CEO and Chief Alchemist.  Before starting Numi in 1999 with his sister, Reem, Ahmed lived & worked in Europe for ten years. In the early part of the 1990's, Ahmed lived in Paris working as a professional photographer focusing on architecture and fashion, with works published in international trade and fashion journals including Elle, Prague Post, and Velvet. He spent nearly two years photographing the Middle East in places such as Iraq and Morocco. Ahmed eventually returned to Europe, this time ending up in the German Alps, continuing his photography in the music scene there where he performed as well. After a year Ahmed relocated to Prague, spending the next six and a half years there in filmmaking and photography. Towards the end of his stay in Prague, Ahmed was asked to help create and design teahouses. He then became a partner in a teahouse helping to expand and grow the business, and developed a deep love and interest in teas culminating in the creation of Numi's unique blends. Numi pioneered the introduction of teas such as Rooibos (red tea), Lemon Myrtle, Honeybush, Dry Desert Lime and others that were popular in Europe, but completely unknown in the United States. Ahmed is fluent in English, Arabic, French, German and Czech. He studied BA in Psychology and Theatre, from New York University, and has studied Film at various universities in Prague and in Paris.

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Some highlights from Kevin’s interview with Ahmed include:

  • The story of how Numi differentiated itself from a seemingly saturated market by offering the purity of real ingredients and replicating success from other bioregions, introducing teas that had experienced success in European markets

  • Ahmed describes Numi’s core operating principles and how they result in beneficial social and ecological impact that scales as the company grows

  • Numi’s foundation and their work creating Waldorf-inspired schools in Oakland, supporting local nonprofits, and advancing clean water and other beneficial impacts internationally

  • Ahmed’s coalition building that brings together leaders in the sustainable food world to collaborate and create a larger beneficial impact

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LIFT Economy is an impact consulting firm whose mission is to create, model, and share a locally self-reliant economy that works for the benefit of all life.

Kevin Bayuk works at the intersection of ecology and economy where permaculture design meets next economy organizations intent on meeting human needs while enhancing the conditions conducive to all life. He is a co-founder and  partner with LIFT Economy, the Senior Financial Fellow at Project Drawdown and a founding partner of the Urban Permaculture Institute.  You can follow Kevin on Twitter @kevinbayuk or email him kevin@lifteconomy.com.