There are four pillars of sustainability; Human, Social, Economic, and Environmental sustainability. These four are very crucial to your business as they can have very positive long term effects for you, future contributors to your industry and the world at large.
Human, Social and Economic sustainability are topics for another day, but the last – Environmental sustainability, which is so important that future lives literally rely on it – would be our focus for today.
We know, sustainability sounds like a far-fetched concept to some of us in this part of the world. In fact when we see the term “Climate Change” a lot of our responses would be “This is not our problem in Nigeria”
Yet when we zone into very serious and recent issues like the flooding in areas like Rivers, Delta, Bayelsa, and Kogi states that has caused an uprising death toll of 600 and the displacement of almost a million Nigerians. We can see how Climate change is not just an “American” problem but very much an issue knocking on our front door.
From loss of lands and properties, to farmlands and raw produce getting eroded away, and then to transportation and business logistics. This problem continues to bite into and affect businesses today, not to mention e-commerce stores that rely on insurmountable deliveries by the second.
Although e-commerce businesses still have some practices and processes that negatively impact the environment, we have to agree that in comparison to physical Brick and Mortar businesses, they are more eco-friendly. What are ten delivery vehicles polluting the environment over a hundred individual cars emitting toxic carbon fumes whilst running to the physical store for personal purchases.
If you still run a physical store, what you need firstly is a switch up and to tap into the numerous opportunities e-commerce business provides. That’s what we are here for, EZ Technologies can help you digitise your processes and ensure your smooth transition into digitization.
Now you know that you should be running an online store to be more sustainable, we would also like you to know the ways in which e-commerce stores can harm the environment and how to do better in your own little way. The state of our environment is not just important to us as inhabitants but as business owners. Hence, we must make it our responsibility not to exacerbate this situation with our business processes.
A couple of things e-commerce business owners can do to be environmentally sustainable
- Limit returns of goods: Returning goods means burning more fossil fuels, and emitting carbon dioxide into the environment. As a business owner, avoiding situations like “what I ordered vs what I got” and ensuring you’re transparent and honest with business dealings to avoid having to make round trips every time.
- Limit usage of plastic or excessive cardboard packaging: Some companies now provide store credit for the return of product containers after a certain period of usage. Others try to make packaging reusable into other household items, and a few others ensure it is just right, allowing little to no excess use of cardboard papers. To be sustainable, less packaging is best.
- Donate to sustainable activities like sanitation periodically: You notice that a lot of companies these days host activities where people can make the roads cleaner, situations where people come together and pick up dirt/garbage. Apart from instilling a sense of care and togetherness in the community and giving your business a strong competing advantage over other brands, this promotes a cleaner culture.
We must all take responsibility for this world we live in, starting from caring for our communities. To transition into e-commerce, a greener, safer, and more efficient commercial process,
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Remember, even as an online store owner, we must constantly look for ways to show extra care to the environment. No matter how eco-friendly your business is, there are always better ways to evolve and go greener.