Top 5 nature no-no's for businesses

'Biodiversity in Schools' founder and CEO Mark Nolan outlines 5 big mistakes that Irish businesses are making when helping nature.

In recent years it’s been brilliant to see Irish businesses becoming more sustainable. When we started Biodiversity in Schools 15 years ago even the term biodiversity left most businesses with a blank, confused face. However, nature is very much on the agenda of the most progressive businesses right now. Having said that, others are still very far behind. 

Having worked with businesses in this space, I have a particular interest in how biodiversity action is implemented and communicated and offer solutions to the 5 most common mistakes we see in the media:

1 - Stop with the beehives

Honeybees don’t need our help. Beehives don’t need our help. As the saying goes, keeping bees to help nature is like keeping chickens to help birds. Wild bees, like bumblebees and solitary bees, certainly need help - but not honey bees.

Despite this really obvious situation we see countless businesses still doing this every year. Even some of the largest companies in Ireland build beehives into their plans and somehow these projects manage to go from idea stage to implementation to press releases without any intervention. Do it for wellbeing maybe. Or food empathy, sure. But not nature.

The end result is not a showcase of biodiversity leadership but instead demonstrates just how out of touch the business is.

Solution: Enough with the beehives! Wild bees and other pollinators, yes. Honeybees… no.

2 - Do no harm

This is pretty simple. If you’re looking to help nature, you should leave your site better than before you started. Nature positive! This became glaringly obvious to me following a visit to a school in the west where a large, local pharmaceutical company thought it would be better to spray the school’s natural wildflower meadows with herbicide, scatter with non-native and invasive wildflower seeds, and plant non-native ornamental trees. This was a bad day for the school, the children and biodiversity - yet was the company’s biodiversity action day!

Solution: Make sure to get proper advice from an expert and don’t wing it.

3 - Right species

Another fairly straightforward one here. If you want to help Irish biodiversity, focus on Irish species. For example, when it comes to trees, luckily for any sustainability coordinators out there we only have around 20. However, from our visits to schools we see companies planting weird and wonderful species from all around the world which may look lovely but will do pretty much nothing for Irish nature - almost the equivalent of planting plastic trees!

Solution: If you’re going to do it, do it right and focus on native.

4 - Don’t greenwash

Your biodiversity action budget needs to be bigger than the project’s marketing budget and needs to go to the core of your operations, not just window-dressing. If it’s the other way around I think you’re heading for greenwashing territory. We saw a great example of this during a visit to a school in the north–midlands where a very large company donated a tree to the school garden. Nice one. However, along with the tree was an impressive plaque to commemorate the occasion - and well covered in the local papers. In terms of cost, the plaque itself was a multiple of the cost of the tree. And really, at the end of the day, the company just planted a single tree and it simply wasn't enough. In reality, the company has done nothing but showcase to everyone how they haven’t quite grasped the scale of the biodiversity crisis.

Solution: Let your actions speak louder than your words.

5 - Ecoliteracy

One of the biggest problems facing nature right now is society’s poor understanding of it. This can be found everywhere including businesses. This low level of ecoliteracy can shine through in press releases and imagery associated with a business’s work for nature. I’ve seen countless biodiversity action plans plastered with pictures of exotic species or even non-existent AI generated animals. Waffling with ecological-sounding language is usually the cherry on top. 

If you’re expecting people to respect your work for nature, you have to show you have a minimum understanding and a respect of it. Sadly, most people probably don’t even notice this and most businesses get away with it. However, to anyone with any nature knowledge it is a glaringly obvious mistake that will unfortunately call into question the very credibility of the overall project. 

Solution: We know it can be tricky and you can’t know everything. That’s okay! It’s new to a lot of people. But please make sure to get expert advice on your plans, texts, images and videos. If not, you're perpetuating the problem, not being part of the solution.

Check out ways businesses can work with 'Biodiversity in Schools' to boost biodiversity and empower young people here:

https://www.biodiversityinschools.com/sponsor-a-school