CSRwire’ Talkback discusses Johnson & Johnson’s Earthwards program, designed to promote greener product development throughout the enterprise in Toward Greener Products: The Complex Journal of Product Innovation:
Companies often refer to sustainability as a journey and innovation as a key driver in the sustainable product development process. This is true for Johnson & Johnson as well. We actually created a formal process to spur greener product innovation, calling it Earthwards and basing it on lifecycle thinking.
The Earthwards process has been and will continue to be applied to an array of products from our Consumer Products, Pharmaceuticals, and Medical Devices and Diagnostics sectors. Products that successfully emerge from the Earthwards process are recognized as such only if they have achieved a greater than 10 percent improvement in at least three of 12 goals across seven impact areas — materials used; packaging; energy reduction; waste reduction; water reduction; positive social impact or benefit; and product innovation.
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