Beyond Growth: Reconciling Business and Planetary Boundaries, San Francisco

BSR Members Only

Date and Time

February 8, 2024
9:30 am-1:30 pm PST

Location

San Francisco

Despite considerable progress, the world is not on track to reach the aspirations of the Paris Agreement and the 2030 Sustainable Development Goals. Recent analysis suggests that most of the global thresholds for a "safe and just" planet have already been breached. We are now at a crucial juncture. Achieving these ambitious targets is vital for long-term societal and economic resilience, and doing so requires urgent and rapid business transformation and innovation. Through this series of dialogues and workshops, BSR members will be challenged and inspired to think beyond existing business strategies and economic growth objectives. Join us to explore ways to design innovative models that can meet these challenges and deliver new value for generations to come.

Scheduled Speakers

• Patrick Flynn, Advisor and Chair of the CSO Council, Watershed
• James Leape, Co-Director, Center for Ocean Solutions and William and Eva Price Senior Fellow, Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment
• Helen Mountford, CEO, ClimateWorks Foundation
• Aron Cramer, President and CEO, BSR
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Aron Cramer
President and CEO, BSR
San Francisco
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Aron is recognized globally as a preeminent authority on just and sustainable business. In addition to leading BSR, which has grown substantially throughout his tenure as President and CEO, Aron advises senior executives at BSR’s 300+ member companies and other global businesses and partners on the full spectrum of environmental, social, and governance issues.
Aron joined BSR in 1995 as the founding director of its Business and Human Rights program. He later opened BSR's Paris office in 2002, where he worked until becoming President and CEO in 2004. Aron has served on advisory boards to CEOs at AXA, Barrick Gold, Marks & Spencer, Nike, Recruit Holdings, SAP, Shell, and he serves as a director of the We Mean Business Coalition and RISE.
Aron speaks frequently at leading business and public fora and is widely quoted in top-tier media, such as the Financial Times, Le Figaro (France), The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, Axios, and Politico. He is co-author of the book Sustainable Excellence: The Future of Business in a Fast-Changing World, which spotlights innovative sustainability strategies that enable business success.
Prior to joining BSR, Aron practiced law in San Francisco and worked as a journalist at ABC News in New York. He holds a BA from Tufts University and a JD from the University of California, Berkeley.
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• Deb Gallagher, Director, Climate Change, BSR
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Deb Gallagher
Director, Climate Change, BSR
New York
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Deb leads BSR’s climate work in the US. She works closely with BSR’s external partnership teams to accelerate decarbonization while engendering climate justice. She works with Transform to Net Zero (TONZ) collaborative initiative members to amplify leadership behaviors that promote a just and resilient future. Deb leads efforts to create a series of TONZ Transformation Guides on issues such as climate transition action plans (CTAPs), climate policy engagement, and climate justice.
Prior to joining BSR, Deb was a professor at Duke University, where she led the Business and Environment program. Her research focused on business leadership behaviors required to advance sustainability, including stakeholder relationship management, ESG data acquisition and use, public policy engagement, and design of strategic partnerships. Over the course of 20 years at Duke, she mentored over 200 sustainability leaders. Prior to Duke, she held environmental leadership positions in manufacturing and government.
Deb holds a PhD in Public Policy from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, a Master's in Public Policy from Harvard Kennedy School, and a BS in Chemical Engineering from Northwestern University
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• David Wei, Managing Director, Climate and Nature, BSR
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David Wei
Managing Director, Climate and Nature, BSR
New York
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David works with companies to develop and implement credible environmental goals, manage climate and nature risks, integrate justice into environmental action, and incubate collaborations to build a net-zero economy. 
He strives to maximize the impact of our applied research, collaborative initiatives, and work with individual companies. This often means innovating how companies credibly align with the Paris Agreement, adapt to inbound climate disclosure regulation, and take advantage of growing interest in science-based nature goals. David also directs BSR’s Transform to Net Zero collaborative initiative. 
Before joining BSR, David was a climate diplomat for the Marshall Islands with the advisory group Independent Diplomat and led on emissions reductions and transparency in the UN climate negotiations for the Alliance of Small Island States. As an international lawyer with the Foundation for International Environmental Law and Development, David built up the environmental treaty expertise of governments across the globe. He began his career as a securities litigator with Fried Frank in New York and a commercial litigator with Cassels Brock in Toronto, before focusing on climate change. 
David holds a LLM in International Law from New York University, a JD and MA in International Relations from the University of Toronto, and a BA in Ethics, Politics, and Economics from Yale University.  
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