PwC commits more to Caribbean conservation

PwC firms across the Caribbean have sent a powerful environmental message to the region by committing to offset 100 percent of their business, air travel and energy consumption in a concerted effort to significantly reduce their carbon footprint.

Through this transformative initiative, PwC firms operating in The Bahamas, Bermuda, British Virgin Islands, Cayman Islands, East Caribbean, Jamaica, TT and Turks and Caicos, have each pledged: “While driving efficiency to reduce our absolute carbon impact, we commit to offset our air travel emissions and energy consumption by 100 percent.”

In a media release Zia Paton, advisory partner and corporate responsibility leader, PwC TT , explained the initiative: “By making this commitment, PwC in the Caribbean is setting an example and demonstrating that businesses have a key opportunity to grow demand for clean energy across the globe. We are proud to adopt this proactive initiative implemented by the PwC global network as we do our part in minimising the environmental impact from our operations.

“As we work together to reduce our carbon footprint across the Caribbean, we are also engaging all people to raise awareness of sustainability issues and encouraging them to take action to reduce their own environmental impacts. This underscores our overall perspective as PwC in the Caribbean already supports a number of environmental and sustainability-focused non-profit organisations throughout the region.”

Across all the regional firms, elimination of single-use plastic items from offices and corporate events is encouraged in conjunction with their customary office reduce, reuse and recycle programmes.

Paton said of the conservation outreach: “These commitments are in recognition of the need to accelerate the pace of change when it comes to managing our carbon footprint and contributing to creating and maintaining sustainable and thriving communities. These are opportunities for all of us to make small changes that can lead to big impacts. At PwC, our purpose is to build trust in society and solve important problems. We are a network of firms in 158 countries with over 250,000 people who are committed to delivering quality in assurance, advisory and tax services. Equal to that we are committed to environmental sustainability and we encourage every business and every Caribbean citizen to do the same.”

With support from Natural Capital Partners, PwC member firms select carbon offset portfolios to reflect local priorities. Underpinning the approach is a set of strict quality criteria, including ensuring offsets are in keeping with established standards or protocols as verified by an independent third party. Through PwC’s purchasing, the network seeks to drive projects with multiple benefits, including helping to create markets for renewable products in order to support local economic and social development and create sustainable landscapes. PwC firms are also encouraged to submit local projects to consider for future investment.

Through these projects, the PwC global network of firms, including those in the Caribbean, is projected to have collectively impacted nearly three million people worldwide, protected or restored 656,000 hectares of forest, generated 209,000 mega watt hours of clean energy and created over 570 new full-time jobs.

For more info about these initiatives and PwC’s commitments in the Caribbean: www.pwc.com/cb