CSRWire recently published a short commentary by Peter Salmon of the digital marketing company Moxie. Salmon wrote that he'd recently attended Sustainable Life Media's Sustainable Brands International conference, and that for him it "was one of those definable change moments, the birth of sustainability 2.0?."

He then went on to define the term: "The sustainability debate has been positioned all wrong - as an environmental problem, as something business needs to account for, a risk to be managed or a tax to be paid. The business community has been going along with this to an extent, but it doesn't sit well. And now, in a volatile global economy and competitive environment, sustainability is being pushed aside as a luxury while business focuses on efficiencies, and the bolder ones look to innovate their way out of recession. But it's not an and/or situation. The answer is and/and. Sustainability 1.0 - compliance, CSR, reduction, limits - is over. Sustainability 2.0 is here. Sustainability 2.0 is an outcome-focused all-encompassing approach. It's a process that builds prosperous businesses creating innovative products and services; businesses founded on good financial results, responsible use of resources, and community well-being."

Here's what I find remarkable about this: Salmon is presenting "Sustainability 2.0" as something new. It's not. I first heard about and began to use the term "strategic sustainability" in the mid-1990s, and the concept is pretty much the same as Sustainability 2.0. Essentially, it involves applying sustainability principles as a strategic tool to build a meaner, leaner, greener company that serves people, planet and the bottom line.

If there's anything new here, it's the catchy slogan, Sustainability 2.0. But what Salmon is writing about has very little connection to the Web 2.0 concept from which the term is derived.

Strategic sustainability, or Sustainability 2.0 if you prefer, has been the smart executive's approach to sustainability for over a decade, and it still is. If anything has changed, it's that things are more make-and-break for corporations now. These are stormy waters we're sailing into. For many companies, Salmon's "outcome-focused all-encompassing approach" could spell the difference between survival and failure.

If anything new has been born, it's Sustainability 2.0's emergence as, more than ever, a mission-critical business strategy.

[Flickr photo courtesy of Kimberlyfaye]