Email
Print
ShareWe've been to countless high-powered meetings where hushed air conditioned conference rooms have spotless tables lined with a glass and bottled water. All the three neatly parked on coasters, waiting to slake parched throats pressing corporate strategy, governance models, quarterly results, and sometimes, ironically, sustainability... you get the picture: very corporate, very efficient and the very image of a perfect world.
Now here is what happens in reality: people in the meeting open the sealed bottle of water and perhaps take a sip or two. The bottles are left behind in the conference room after the meeting. Before the lights go out, the office boy comes along and trashes them. Precious drinking water goes down the drain. Worse, the plastic bottles end up in giant landfills.
And that is only the visible part of the story. Think about the energy that went into bottling the water, in manufacturing the bottle itself and in ensuring it reached you via some form of transport -- all gone with a few sips.
We understand why it is important to package drinking water. It's to shield it from contamination, protect it from accidental handling, spoilage and ensure that it reaches you in the first place. Without good packaging, we'd perhaps have to see a huge loss in resources because of poor shipping and clumsy usage, adding to the cost. Finally, packaging gives us the chance to absorb information about the product -- in this case, its use, constitution and origin.
You can see that there are three interest groups at play here -- the consumer interest, the commercial interest and the government (for the environmental impact it has to manage).
The big challenge is to meet the needs of all three, ensure that the packaging is environment-friendly, usage of packaged water is kept to a minimum and the waste water generated by the bottles is minimised. It's not easy. The task requires a massive revolution in consumer thinking and legislation. And the more popular packaged drinking water becomes, the bigger is the problem.
Of course, this is not unique to Bangalore. But a solution adopted by Wipro, a Bangalore-based IT giant that needs no introduction, calls for attention. At all its conference rooms of the sprawling Wipro campus in Electronic City, visitors find a corner table that has the following: a clean, covered jug with drinking water, several glasses and a note saying that the water is safe for drinking, that it has been purified at Wipro's own local purification plant and that using this water helps reduce waste. It's a time- tested, sensible approach to addressing a severe environmental issue. Every small business uses it. It's just that the large ones need the courage to do the same. Today, bottled water in a corporate environment may look acceptable; in the world of tomorrow it will be as unacceptable as smoking. It should already be.
Wipro has a commitment to the environment that is reflected in its approach to simple things. It has a spirit of mutualism that it says is embedded in its approach to sustainability.
Azim Premji calls it focusing on the triple bottom line -- people, profit and planet.
What can trigger the revolution required to save precious water, reduce the huge amount of trash generated by bottled water and curb spending on transporting it? Besides, ahem, saving the planet? The revolution can begin anywhere, through local regulation and government legislation, through consumer pressure and even through pressure for cost control. But the real answer is somewhat simpler: begin to carry your own reusable bottle of water, fill it up at the cooler, brazenly place it on conference tables before you and proudly pour from it.
A town in rural Australia, Bundanoon, recently managed to ban the sale of packaged, bottled water. It is perhaps the first place in the world to take such a determined and strong-minded step. The aim, say residents of Bundanoon, is to protect the earth and their wallets. In New South Wales, state departments and governmental agencies have been banned from buying bottled water in a bid to cut costs and save natural resources. Two thumbs up to them.
It's a great idea to emulate. And the best part is, entire delegations and study groups from Vidhan Soudha don't have to make visits to Australia and the US to understand how this was done. Even if one minister refuses to have bottled water at meetings, it will be a huge step forward. A small one. But a critical one.
We can continue to read annual reports and websites of companies that claim to have a business that demands conscience and how they are taking measures to reduce their impact on the environment through reduced travel and the adoption of green technologies.
But you know they are missing the wood for the trees if you still see packaged water on their tables.
