University of Waikato Professorial Lecture

'Will business ever be truly sustainable' - by Professor Eva Collins

Everywhere you look, our planet bears the devastating scars of climate change and environmental pollution. Businesses have often been the culprits behind this damage, but increasingly today’s business leaders are speaking up and taking steps to improve the sustainability of their company’s products and services.

In her Professorial Lecture on 11 October, ‘Will business ever be truly sustainable?’, Professor Eva Collins from the University of Waikato’s Management School will discuss how businesses have engaged with sustainability -- sometimes effectively, and sometimes with negative results.

The Professorial Lecture Series introduces the University’s newest professors to the community and gives them a chance to demonstrate how their work is having a real impact on the world around us.

Professor Collins is an internationally recognised expert on management and sustainability issues. Her research addresses some of the tensions that exist between traditional business models based on continual economic growth, and sustainability concepts focused on the renewal of scarce natural resources.

“It’s still quite controversial to this day for business to play a role in sustainability and biodiversity initiatives, which is pretty crazy when you think about it,” she says.

“But in this new era of hyper-transparency, it’s becoming much harder for businesses to hide their environmental and social misdeeds from the public. For example, ignoring your company’s carbon emissions is no longer an option for New Zealand exporters who want to access international markets.”

In her talk, Professor Collins will highlight a number of key sustainability trends she expects to see in the business world over the next decade.

These include much greater collaboration between industries to share their unique expertise and find practical solutions, increasing government regulation around product stewardship and recycling of waste, and a stronger focus on business sustainability from a holistic or systems perspective.

“There is certainly a place for government regulation, but it’s rarely aspirational. So that’s where we need those entrepreneurs and companies who are willing to lean in and find game changers for sustainability by looking at different business models,” she says.

"I'm an optimist. Successful businesses change with the needs of the time, and they can do that now - they can help us avoid a climate catastrophe by becoming a more sustainable society. But to be part of that new Renaissance, New Zealand businesses will need to look beyond quarterly earnings statements and the short-term costs of changing their operations."

About Professor Eva Collins:

Professor Collins is an American-New Zealander who joined the University of Waikato in 2002 and is currently the Associate Dean of Research & Postgraduate at Waikato Management School, and a visiting fellow for sustainability research at Cambridge University in the UK.

She was a member of the Ministry for Environment’s Waste and Resource Efficiency Advisory Group, and currently serves on the Sustainable Business Network’s Go Circular 2025 governance group.

She is a research leader on an $11 million MBIE-funded research project ‘Āmiomio Aotearoa: A Circular Economy for the Wellbeing of New Zealand’, which combines the expertise of academics across business, science, engineering and mātauranga Māori to co-design innovative solutions that will increase wellbeing for New Zealanders.

Event details:

This 45-minute Professorial Lecture will be held at the Gallagher Academy of Performing Arts at the University of Waikato in Hamilton, starting at 5.45pm. Opus Bar will be open from 5.15pm to enjoy a drink prior to the lecture starting.

Free parking is available on campus via Gate 2B, Knighton Road, Hamilton.

Please register your attendance and bring your eticket with you on the night.