Welcome to our new series on what’s being done to tackle climate crisis, with perspectives from Tatler’s own Asia’s Most Influential and Gen.T honourees. This week, we discuss the value of innovation versus taking action towards a more sustainable world
From finding more efficient ways to produce and store renewable energy to inventing better processes to manage waste, the solutions to climate change will involve a lot of innovation. Saving the planet would also require a fair amount of action to mobilise countries, change policies and incentivise industry to consider the environment more carefully. How do entrepreneurs working at the frontier of climate change solutions view and manage innovation vs action? Which one do they prioritise? Here, four of our Asia’s Most Influential and Gen.T honourees shed some light on these questions.
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We need both innovation and action, according to Douglas Woodring (Asia’s Most Influential 2021), founder and managing director of Ocean Recovery Alliance. “You need innovation to kick new things into action, but you need action in order to showcase and prove that innovation works. Sitting idle—no action—doesn’t get us anywhere,” says Woodring.
The entrepreneur is no stranger to action. Since leaving his career in asset management and launching his non-profit organisation in 2010, he has spearheaded many initiatives educating others and pioneering solutions to marine plastic pollution, including the Plastic Disclosure Project (a tool to help calculate and report on plastic waste and footprint), Global Alert app (a trash reporting app to encourage cleanups), and Plasticity Forum (a global summit to discuss solutions to plastic waste).
Ocean Recovery Alliance also works directly with various stakeholders across an organisation, developing bespoke activities and programmes to help them achieve all kinds of sustainability-oriented goals and reduce waste. At the heart of this work, Woodring employs what he refers to as “creative surprise” or creating excitement about climate action to engage governments, industry and communities, and truly impact their long-term business practices.
