Corporate spending on climate change and sustainability initiatives is set to rebound to over $5.3bn during 2010, according to a major new study from research firm Verdantix which predicts that the market for green business-to-business products and services will continue to expand rapidly over the next three years.
The study assessed the sustainable business investment of over 450 of the UK's largest firms, and found that spending on employees, equipment, consulting, project implementation and support services is recovering rapidly following a slow 2009.
"Business spending on initiatives directly linked to climate change and
sustainability goals fell by three per cent in 2009," said Verdantix director
David Metcalfe. "The good news is that the market will bounce back in 2010 and
grow by eight per cent."
The research, which is based on publicly available financial data and a survey
of over 200 corporate budget holders, also found that spending is set to
increase by 14 per cent a year to reach $8.4bn by 2013.
Metcalfe said that sustainability programmes are now a substantial and growing part of many large businesses operations.
"A key finding is that on average large UK firms with annual revenues greater than $1bn will spend 0.16 per cent of revenue on their climate change and sustainability programme," he said. "This equates to an average of $11.7m per firm."
The survey found that the retail and energy sectors top the spending list. Retail firms are expected to invest a total of $944m, and oil and gas companies are predicted to spend $637m on sustainability related projects this year.
Energy efficiency programmes attracted the highest level of spending across the board with $744m earmarked for investment, but marketing programmes are also set to accelerate with $436m expected to be spent on sustainable product and service marketing and a further $310m likely to be invested in promoting firms' corporate sustainability programmes.
Verdantix said that spending will accelerate faster than expected if oil prices bounce back to above $100 a barrel, carbon prices recover or the economic recovery continues at a faster than expected rate.
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