The "Network for Responsible Marketers" - an initiative to bring together marketing practitioners either directly or through their Professional Associations to encourage an active role in promoting sustainable consumption.

The term sustainability, although unhelpful in that it is not very descriptive, is nevertheless used as a short-hand to describe the full extent of responsibility to include the very wide agenda that encompasses the environmental, social and ethical concerns of business while maintaining the basic economic functions of the business.

Most activity in connection with sustainability has been concerned with sustainable production or CSR (Corporate Social Responsibility) and the claims made by these for improved "shareholder value" can only be realised if there are fundamental benefits to the business. It is the marketers role to ensure that any benefits flow through to improve not just the image of the business (which cannot be sustained if there is little underlying substance), but the actual competitiveness and performance of the business.

Marketing has a key role to play in promoting sustainable consumption, and the purpose of this Network is threefold:

• to manage knowledge about the role of marketing - effective and ineffective tools and approaches, shared experiences, surveys and analyses that offer insight into sustainable consumption
• to stimulate new research to fill knowledge gaps - enabling research that would benefit all marketers and their businesses
• to disseminate knowledge and understanding throughout the marketing community

The Network was born out some work undertaken for UNEP - the "Sustainable Motivation" project undertaken by MPG International and sponsored by Esomar. The project revealed gross inadequacies in marketing comprehension of sustainable production and consumption and has now been subsumed into The Network for Responsible Marketers. This paper is available in the Forums section, where it is possible to comment on the discussion.

 News

• Sector Sustainability Challenge 2005
  “Sustainable Consumption and Production - The Role of Marketers”.   
  Recently completed study evaluating the role of marketers and mapping the sustainability agenda onto the marketing skills set, sponsored by DTI/DEFRA. The results are presented in the wiki to enable debate about the issues and the report can be downloaded.