Workshop overview: Building the capacity for sustainability within the organic food trade through understanding, implementation, and reporting

Who should attend: This hands-on workshop is designed for professionals who are newly developing a formal sustainability program as well as those who want deepen their skills in sustainability and report writing.

What attendees will come away with: This workshop is aimed at providing attendees the ability to apply The Natural Step Framework, presenting the business case for sustainability, sustainability report writing skills as well as the opportunity to network with peers in the industry who are committed to sustainability.

 Feedback from the recent workshop  

"the SFTA workshop was a wonderful opportunity to consider the bigger picture of what we are trying to achieve in terms of a more sustainable food system while also giving practical skills on how to get there. Between relevant course content, excellent facilitation and networking opportunities, this is a workshop worth attending." Shauna Sadowski Annie's Inc.

Details:

The Sustainability 101 training is designed specifically to be a blend of education and hands on experiential learning.

The day starts out with an understanding of what sustainability is using The Natural Step framework as a guide for defining and articulating sustainability.   Additionally we will look at the business case and how to build buy-in and capacity for sustainability within a company.

There is an increasing need for tools for companies to measure their level of integration and improvement to see the benefits of their sustainability program efforts.  SFTA has a public set of metrics that were co-developed by members, and are utilized by members to write annual sustainability reports.  We will review the steps leading up to writing an annual sustainability report, how to write your first report, and the next steps to analyze and prioritize future projects and strategy. 

The workshop will include case studies from SFTA members on how they have addressed either data collection or how they used that data to drive improvements for sustainability into their operations.  These case studies tie into exercises developed specifically around strengthening skills for the reporting process.

The workshop is lead by SFTA staff and industry experts in the organic food trade.

Logistics

Transportation 

The Hall of the States building is located near Union Station Metro station:

Hotels

There are a number of hotels in the Washington DC area, we do not have a recommended hotel, but suggest finding one that is near a Metro station.

Agenda

9am – Welcome / Intro

9:20a - Overview of SFTA           

9:40a - Fish Game (Exercise) – practical application of sustainability

10:05a – Personal Definition of Sustainability (Exercise) -

 SFTA definition of sustainability 

 Systems Thinking

 Mental Models transitions into the natural step 

10:30 - Break

10:45 - The Natural Step Framework   

11a - Food Product Violations (Exercise)

11:20a  -        TNS Vision Backcasting  (Exercise)

     TNS Benchmarking/Goal setting/Strategy

11:40a - Pathway to Sustainability

11:50a - Reflection / Wrap-up

12p LUNCH

Afternoon Session 

1p – Taking theory to practice

1:15p – What does Implementation look like? – Member presentation

How to develop a process map

Understanding your business and how the SFTA declaration areas inform your reporting.

2:15 –Break

2:25p – Determining a baseline – Member presentation

How to measure and understanding metrics

(Exercise: Case Study)

3:25p – Reporting – Member presentation

            Sharing best practices in report writing.   

3:45 – 4pm – Break

4pm – Review

 How to use your Sustainability report in communications, strategy

(Exercise)

4:45 – closing / wrap up

          Integrating sustainability in your business for success.