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With responsibility, comes opportunity

It's not often that catwalk and boardroom collide, but a spot poll of regulars of either workplace will tell you that green is this year's colour. I am told that fashionistas have been wearing bright greens all summer, and I know that bright business leaders have planted the green issue at the top of their agendas too. There's no doubt that ‘Green is Good'.

Yet while fashion collections will change according to the season, the business world is likely to prove far less fickle. The issue of environmental responsibility is here to stay, and although we may be a good distance from the melting polar ice caps, the Gulf nevertheless has a vital role to play.
With typical astuteness, His Highness Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, Vice President and Prime Minister of the UAE and Ruler of Dubai, has led the way with his moves to ensure that Dubai's astonishing growth is sustainable, both in economic and environmental terms. His recent directive tasked builders and developers to comply with green building standards, and last week Dubai's Committee for Green Buildings outlined criteria for new government and private buildings in the emirate, that will come into force in January 2008.

Meanwhile in Abu Dhabi, the UAE's Masdar Initiative has launched the world's first fully sustainable green community. Masdar City Development will be the world's first zero-carbon, zero-waste community, and will establish a world-class standard for implementing integrated sustainable technologies.

On the international stage, too, the UAE has voiced grave concerns over the dangerous consequences of climate change, and urged industrialised nations such as the US to take necessary measures to comply with greenhouse gas emissions targets.

The Emirates is aware of its significant carbon footprint, as well as its role as a provider of fossil fuels to the rest of the world, and appears prepared to step up to the mitigation challenge.

The UAE's positive steps are just the beginning, and in a region where competition is becoming ever more fierce, the business community is waking up to the fact that it simply cannot afford to lag on the environmental issue. More than that, the most perceptive business leaders have identified the environment as a growth area. As such, there exists a chance for businesses to see the environment not as a cost but as an opportunity, and for governments to create the frameworks and the regulatory environments that are conducive to move business in that direction.

Governments across the region need to be responsive in terms of enacting progressive environmental legislation. This not only allows countries to preserve their habitat and their environment, but also creates the opportunities for new technologies to be deployed, and for businesses to invest and bring market forces and efficiencies to bear on making mitigation of climate change a good sound business opportunity. After all, green isn't just the most talked-about colour of the year - it's also the colour of money.

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