State of Sustainability

People care about sustainability, but that does not necessarily mean they will pay more for it. In this episode of State of Sustainability, Saif Hameed revisits the sustainable consumer and explores what brands need to understand about concern, behavior, pricing, and identity in 2026. Sustainability concern is rising, particularly among younger consumers and people in emerging markets. But unlike consumers in developed economies - whose concerns may be shaped by media coverage and broad...

Product carbon footprints promise to make Scope 3 emissions more useful, but can they really deliver the precision businesses expect? In this episode of State of Sustainability, Saif Hameed, founder and CEO of Altruistiq, revisits product carbon footprints (PCFs), exploring how they have evolved and why they are becoming increasingly important for companies, suppliers, and procurement teams. Saif explains the relationship between corporate carbon footprinting, life cycle assessments, and PCFs...

Water sounds like a familiar topic until you actually dive into how messy, local, and operationally sensitive it really is. In this episode of State of Sustainability, host Saif Hameed breaks down why water can’t be treated like carbon: it’s not fungible, it’s not evenly distributed, and its impacts are far more tied to place, regulation, and business risk. He explains why water is often overlooked in corporate sustainability, especially in the food and beverage sector, even though it can be ...

What does rewilding really mean? And do people championing it really understand how it works in practice? In this episode of The State of Sustainability, Saif unpacks the differences between organic, regenerative, and rewilding practices. As well as why so many sustainability advocates misunderstand rewilding, despite promoting it. Saif explains the contrast between organic farming's strict, input-focused certification process and regenerative agriculture's more flexible, outcomes-based...

In this episode of The State of Sustainability, Saif explores the rise, decline, and future opportunities of plant-based proteins, focusing on the technological innovations, branding challenges, and market dynamics. He shares insights from the industry’s early boom with Beyond Meat and Impossible Foods to the recent slowdown, along with predictions on where the space might go next. Saif covers the initial hype around plant-based meat and why the sector captured so much attention in 2019 and ...