Interview with Paul Hawken at ORWM18 + Snow Show

In June of 2017, President Trump announced that he would withdraw the United States from the Paris Climate Agreement. In a letter to OIA members, Executive Director Amy Roberts noted that the withdrawal threatens not only the $887 billion outdoor industry and the 7.6 million American jobs it supports but also the very future of our planet.   As outdoorists, we see and feel the impacts of climate change when each season becomes harder and harder to predict. As businesses in the outdoor industry, we know we have an important role to play. Our Sustainability Working Group is a global leader in the promotion of responsible and resilient supply chains, and Sustainable Business Innovation is one of our association’s core pillars. Another is advocacy. Following President Trump’s announcement, more than 2,000 mayors, governors and business leaders—including many in this industry—signed the “We’re Still In” letter affirming their commitments to the Paris Agreement’s climate targets. Outdoor Industry Association remains committed to climate advocacy through our work in D.C. and at the state level to work toward fact-based, innovative and bipartisan solutions.   A few weeks ago at the Outdoor Retailer + Snow Show in Denver, our industry heard from keynote speaker Paul Hawken, the author of the book Drawdown, who explained that those solutions are not far-off. Many solutions are, in fact, already in existence, viable and accessible. Following the keynote, OIA’s Sustainable Business Innovation Manager Jessie Curry had an opportunity to sit down with Hawken for an in-depth conversation. Over the next 20 minutes, we’ll dig into the book, its solutions and learn what outdoor industry companies—and even individual outdoorists—can do right now to drawdown carbon from our atmosphere and help ensure a viable planet for us all.