The planet doesn't need corporate sustainability – it needs regeneration

The next corporate revolution will come from a rethink of how sustainability should drive businesses.

- Jeffery Tan

At first glance, the corporate world seems to be winning the sustainability race. Renewable energy capacity is soaring. Financial institutions representing over US$130 trillion (S$167 trillion) in assets have pledged net-zero commitments. ESG - environmental, social and governance — has become part of the corporate lexicon, and chief sustainability officers now sit at the decision-making table.

But this veneer of progress hides a grim reality. We remain on track for 2.9 deg C of global warming, biodiversity is collapsing, and six of the nine planetary boundaries that keep the Earth stable have been breached.

We are, it seems, efficiently rearranging the deckchairs on the Titanic.

The problem is not lack of effort or intention. The very concept of “sustainability” is the problem. To “sustain” is to maintain the status quo. In practice, this has fuelled a philosophy of harm reduction: using less, emitting less, doing less bad. But this incrementalist approach of slowing decline is not enough when the planet needs major repair. The goal must shift from minimising damage to regenerating the natural and social systems on which we all depend.

That requires embracing an agenda of regeneration: a shift from linear, extractive thinking to circular, restorative models. In the field of regenerative agriculture, the research nonprofit Rodale Institute coined the term “organic regenerative agriculture” in the early 2000s and developed the concept of agricultural systems that renew their own resources.