(Photography by SooPhye/Options)
Climate change. Rapid population growth. Finite resources. Clean water scarcity. Air pollution. Deforestation. The long list of challenges that planet Earth struggles with just to accommodate the demands of 7.6 billion people, and counting, easily inspires despair for most. It is all very daunting and oftentimes feels like a losing battle. For so long, environmental degradation was seen as the price humanity had to pay for prosperity.
But Sir Jonathon Porritt, the UK’s leading environmental icon, refuses to despair. Instead, he believes that the world still has a window of opportunity to make sensible, well-thought-out changes before it is indeed too late. Had he succumbed to a sense of hopelessness, Porritt perhaps would not still be working in the rough terrain of sustainability.
Every few months or so, Porritt is in Kuala Lumpur where he serves as independent sustainability adviser to the board of Sime Darby Plantation Bhd. Working under the non-profit Forum for the Future, which he founded, the Briton had advised Sime Darby Bhd’s board prior to the conglomerate’s demerger.
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