What happens when influential social and environmental NGOs, business sector, and public sector members convene to engage around making the world and our practices more sustainable? With such diverse participants, be sure to add a great facilitator!

Check out The Sustainable Food Laboratory. They state, “No matter where the food comes from, the way we get it from field to fork should build, not deplete, social, financial, and environmental value.”

Which certainly sounds like something I personally believe in. While I am skeptical of the big corporate players, I see deep value in bringing all the full range of players in a system together to see what they can create.

One of their projects around commodities includes a meta-standard. They explain, “A Meta-Standard would leverage the current certification and labeling schemes and act as a tool for commodity buyers, producers, retailers, investors, financers, shareholder activists and others to activate market forces to improve instead of degrade the productive capacity of the planet.”

Hmmm, looks interesting. I look forward to seeing how they develop.