Integrating Climate and Nature: A Dual Approach to Business Resilience
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Online
Free
Open to the Public
Solving the climate crisis requires a holistic understanding of nature’s critical role. The most productive way forward is to use integrated strategies and take a dual approach to climate change and nature.
Integrating Climate and Nature: A Dual Approach to Business Resilience
Speaker: Lara Birkes, Managing Director of Climate & Nature, BSR
Tuesday, February 18, 2025
12:15pm to 1:45pm
Online via Zoom (details below)
Open to the public
About the Topic
Over half the world’s total GDP is highly dependent on nature and its services, with an estimated $58 trillion exposed to nature-related risk. Lara Birkes, Managing Director for Climate and Nature, explores how businesses can act on these interconnected challenges and thrive in an increasingly complex operating environment.
About the Speaker
Lara Birkes is responsible for leading BSR’s Climate and Nature team globally, and driving the organizations work with Member companies impact consulting, grants, and collaborative initiatives.
Lara is a sustainability and policy professional with over fifteen years of experience managing partnerships, sustainability initiatives and policy engagement with companies, international organizations, governments, and NGOs.
Prior to BSR, Lara was Global Head of Sustainability at Sonder, joining in 2020 to establish the corporate responsibility function, implementing policies to engrain responsible business practices across the company pre to post IPO.
She serves on the Advisory Board of EQX Biome, a start-up working to mobilize financial markets to protect the world’s remaining biodiversity hotspots. In 2024 Lara started hosting a web series & podcast called Nature IS to raise awareness of the critical need for protection, conservation, and regeneration of biodiversity.
Previously Lara was a Senior Advisor with Brodie Partners, a business sustainability consultancy. Prior to that she led Hewlett Packard Enterprise (HPE) global sustainability team. As Chief Sustainability Officer & VP, Lara guided the development and management of strategic Living Progress programs, oversaw the operation of the HPE Foundation, and collaborated with senior leaders across the organization to ensure the full integration of corporate responsibility into the company’s business strategy.
Lara came to HPE from the Virgin Unite Foundation in London working as Acting Director of Strategic Partnerships & Initiatives. Previously she was based in Geneva and led the Global Policy Affairs team for the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), driving engagement with international organizations, governments, and multilateral institutions. Lara also served as the Head of Strategic Initiatives with the World Economic Forum (WEF), managing the Organization’s G20 initiative, their community of U.S. Government officials and the Working Group on Trade and Climate Change.
Bringing a diverse background of public and private sector policy experience, Lara was a fellow in the Development Division of the World Trade Organization (WTO) and the International Center for Trade & Sustainable Development (ICTSD) in Geneva. She served as a Fulbright Scholar in Morocco, worked as an International Economic Specialist with Washington D.C. law firm Miller & Chevalier, and held positions on Capitol Hill with the U.S. Senate Finance Committee and in the Office of the Democratic Leader.
Lara holds a B.S. degree in International Business & Management from the University of Montana, a M.A. degree in International Trade Policy from the Middlebury Institute of International Studies in Monterey, California and is a World Economic Forum Global Leadership Fellow.
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Questions
Contact Rachel Christopherson at the Center for the Blue Economy at cbe@miis.edu or (831) 647-4183.
Gratitude to Our Sponsors
We thank the Loker Hicks Foundation and the Nancy Eccles and Homer M. Hayward Family Foundation our sponsors.
About the Host
The Center for the Blue Economy is a research center at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies, that provides economic and policy analysis to support the development of a robust and equitable blue economy for the 21st century. The Center uses the World Bank’s definition of the Blue Economy: the sustainable use of ocean resources for economic growth, improved livelihoods and jobs, and ocean ecosystem health. We must maintain ocean health to maintain human health, economic health, and the health of the planet. Climate change is linked, inextricably, to a healthy ocean. We are co-leading a movement for Ocean Climate Action Now. We’ve launched a new website in collaboration with our research partners, Monterey Bay White Sharks. Consider joining our Center for the Blue Economy Newsletter List (3-4x per year by email).