Talking Points:
- Harvesting a New Moment
- Calyn’s Research Goals
- Research Partners
- What are the SDGs? How are they used?
- What is SDG360 thinking/framework and how did they apply it to hemp?
- Infographic that illustrates the co-benefits/synergies that hemp industrialization can bring to sustainable development at city, state, national, and international levels.
- Recommendations for Future Research and Partnerships
Guest Speaker Background
Calyn Ostrowski is the Associate Director of Strategic Partnerships and Development at UW-Madison’s Global Health Institute where she leads advancement efforts to accelerate evidence-based research and informed decision-making in the areas of one health, health systems strengthening, climate change and women’s health.
Her research focuses on industrial hemp’s versatility to advance the United Nations’ 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) in Wisconsin and worldwide. Through multi-disciplinary engagement with cannabis industry leaders and experts across UW-Madison, coupled with academic and industry literature review, she is developing recommendations for future collaborations, research and curriculum whereby the social, economic, environmental and health benefits of the cannabis plant might be further evaluated.
Calyn has dedicated her career to building measurably better lives for communities worldwide. As executive director of the Worldwide Foundation for Credit Unions, she developed strategic partnerships to improve the economic security of communities around the globe and oversaw the World Council’s Global Women’s Leadership Network to advance female leaders and increase women’s access to financial services worldwide.
During her tenure at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, named one of the Top 10 Think Tanks in the world, she worked with global policymakers, practitioners, donors, and researchers to generate innovative and transdisciplinary solutions to improve women’s health in developing countries.
An advocate in her local community, Calyn has served on several nonprofit boards including the University of Wisconsin Law School Economic Justice Institute, Badgerland Girl Scouts, and Domestic Abuse Intervention Services.
She holds a master’s degree in nonprofit management from Case Western Reserve University and bachelor’s degree in political science and psychology from the University of Wisconsin‐Madison where she dove on the Women’s Swimming and Diving team.
Calyn Ostrowski introduced herself and said: I’m not a banker, and I am not necessarily an agriculture and I’m not a cultivator. But my background really is a common denominator throughout my career has been empowering, local to global communities through the lens of health and well being. I am currently located and the associate director of strategic partnerships and Development at the University of Wisconsin Madison’s Global Health Institute, where I also received my undergraduate degree. And a lot of this sort of multidisciplinary thinking began. From there, I went to graduate school and got a master’s degree in nonprofit management. I thought I wanted to go to law school. And thank goodness when touring the law schools, I learned about a program at Case Western Reserve that really brought together the law school, the social work school, the business school and applied it to really community development.
So from there, I had an incredible opportunity to join the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, it’s a nonpartisan foreign policy think tank in Washington DC. So Congress created that think tank to really serve as a, a place where an a space for, again, multidisciplinary and multi stakeholder groups coming together from the worlds of policy, the worlds of academia, the worlds of NGOs, everything, everyone coming together to share ideas and exchange knowledge to really improve not only policy, but then additional research that drives really evidence based policymaking. So I was really enjoying that work. But my husband and I had an opportunity to relocate to Madison, for a family of reasons. And it just wasn’t sustainable for me to continue to commute between Madison and DC. So I started looking around for international development opportunities here in Madison, Wisconsin, which, at the time, 10 years ago, really, at the university, I had begun to speak with GE ahi, we just celebrated our 10 year anniversary. And as all good things come when time is right, I was able to join the team three years ago.
But in that time, I worked as the executive director of the World Council of credit unions Foundation, and was there for about almost six years. And the World Council of credit unions really is the trade association or global trade association that works with national associations around the world, and then also kind of at the NAC at the state levels as well, to use credit unions and cooperatives as a driver for economic development, financial well being. And so I had the good fortune of overseeing their foundation and worked quite closely with the organization to, to drive their programs and really got to see health from a different angle, through through cooperatives and through credit unions and seeing what they are offering to their members that’s different than a traditional bank and how those credit unions are set up differently to really serve the members. So I drank the credit union kool aid for a while and then was recruited to a credit union, which is where I guess the banking title comes from.
I was a managing vice president of business development and financial empowerment for a large, cooperative credit union here in Wisconsin. And at that time, I had an opportunity to really work on financial wellness. And again, that common thread of economic development, but wellness, health, and wellness. And so that was just really great. But then JJ had this opportunity, full circle, to get back into global health and climate change, which was really the intersectionalities of where I work, and really enjoy being a badger alum and the opportunity to come and join ghci, late 2019 has been really great. It’s a really interesting time to be part of global health. As we all have been living through the last two years, the Global Health Institute is a multidisciplinary, multidisciplinary, hub for research, education and outreach here on campus. So we’re really unique and that UW itself has these professional schools like the medical school, the vet, school, pharmacy, all all here on campus all in one location. And we really work to bring these different ideas and disciplines together. So we work with 21 different schools and disciplines across campus, really serving as that hub to drive.
(Calyn Ostrowski shared her screen to give visuals and infographics that they worked on and highlighted the hemp connection to the SDGs.)
New research drives new curriculum development and our core thematic areas here at GSI are really driven by the UN SDGs. Our core thematic areas are banned climate change, one health, health system strengthening and women’s health. And all four of those really interconnect across each other and which is why it’s so important for us to have people from engineering as part of our group, and veterinarians part of the group because it really is ethical that the health of the planet really impacts the health of humans. And so, basically, my job is to focus on partnerships for the Global Health Institute. But separately, I was getting really interested in the hemp and cannabis space. I’ve always really enjoyed cannabis. I didn’t know why. Until I learned about the ECS it made a lot of sense, given some of my former athletes, UW diver, just lots of beating up of joints and things like that. And then just balancing work and life and so began to learn about the hemp industry and learn about Wisconsin’s history and the have space, which we can talk a little bit more about that. And so through just showing up at different events, and learning about a group called Toby tivity.
There are a group of women who started chapters around the world to really destigmatize and provide education and opportunities for women to come together around the planet. So I thought that seemed like a really great way for me to jump in. And it was great until till COVID hit and we had to stop meeting. So I started just kind of getting involved individually like on my own unrelated to UW and unrelated to being in the credit union. But sort of all these things in the marketplace were taking place at the same time. Including when I was at the credit union federalisation of the Farm Bill had just passed 2018, Wisconsin saw a huge surge in applications growing for processing. And I happened to be just in the room when the decision was made to shut all those accounts down. Just too much fear and uncertainty around regulations.
And so it just was really interesting to see that angle, and then be able to take sort of the lessons that I learned seeing that firsthand and apply it to now what I’m doing at UW with this work around the United Nations SDGs and the mission of GH AI, and then how that actually interrelates to our vision and mission at UW to really improve health and climate and how my goal is to really illustrate how hemp can be that multiple, versatile, from basically across all 17 SDGs, drive, social, environmental and economic change.
Question and Answer
- Where does hemp have the greatest impact on the SDGs? So, where is it? Now there’s a lot of talk and from someone who’s in it, and I eat, breathe, and sleep it, as do many of us on the call, when I tried to talk about economic ESGs. People are asking, “Wait, what, how, and where?”
Calyn Ostrowski replied:
I’m not sure how familiar the audience really is with the United Nations 17 Sustainable Development Goals. So it might be helpful to just take a step back and really explain what that is. And really, how hemp is such a key driver to achieving some of the targets and the goals that are established in the SDGs. So the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals.
The UN is made up of 193 member states and these groups have agreed upon 17 Sustainable Development Goals. Focusing on ending poverty and protecting the environment, accelerate economic growth, through 2030. And the 17 goals have 169 associated targets, about 10 ish per gold. And really those targets are where the magic happens. And those are the indicators to really help move the needle and find synergies across the various goals where greater research and collaboration can happen. Sustainable development is really defined as economic growth to meet the needs of today’s generation without compromising the future of generational needs. The SDGs are across our cross cutting, and they’re interdisciplinary with many of the indicators and the sub targets sort of repeating across several SDGs. So they can see directly where those interconnected issues like health, like climate change and equity kind of interconnect. And what’s really unique about the SDGs is that during such a really divisive political climate, the SDGs have really remained favorable across the world and serve as a blueprint for Um, catalyzing local action to make local assets and leveraging local knowledge and resources to make global change.
The SDGs have been primarily utilized in the past by governments. But like you were saying at the beginning more and more, we’re seeing corporations and in particular here in the cannabis space, talk about the SDGs in relation to their ESG, accounting and deliverables. So they do interconnect. And I would really like to see the industry start drilling down even further into the targets to see where there’s some unique opportunities. And so through the SDGs commonalities can be identified. And what we have done at UW is use SDG 360, thinking to really break down complex interconnected systems. So thinking about the SDGs, we basically took the SDG wheel, and used a 360 analysis to really look at the interconnections across all 17 goals. This method really helps to break down complex systems and really holistically understand synergies, as well as trade offs of a topic like global hemp and we really used our four core thematic areas to get this research started. So it’s a stepwise process, STG 360.
And it really optimizes impact by establishing really the broadest base for support possible. So through explicit identification of costs, and resources, the SDG 360 helps to create space for, for conversation for democratic deliberation and decision making around what critical sectors need to be working together? Where are we having unintended consequences, what are the trade offs, and really mapping using the SDGs to help map and facilitate relationship building and iterative perspective taking. So what we did is we applied at the start.
So we took those 17 goals here, and we started to tag them. And by that I mean, we looked again, using our fourth core thematic areas that were already influenced by the SDGs, around health, climate change health systems and one health and begin to take, which let’s cluster these 17 goals. There’s so many of them. Let’s begin with a cluster, oops, a cluster of goals that are based on some industry, publication, review, academic publication review conversations with our grant partners.
So we have campus partners working with us that span the medical schools, School of Pharmacy, School of Human Ecology, and missing others, but then we’re working with the UW Health and some policymakers here in Wisconsin, as well as industry partners like the last prisoner project and Steve DeAngelo. So we took a lot of the knowledge that we were learning from all of that, and used that coupled with our mission and our vision to find just the first four clusters that made sense for our work. And we found that SDGs three good health and well-being nine industry innovation and infrastructure, climate action, and life on land, seemed like a really good step. So we took those four, and we looked again, at those sub targets. So as I was saying, each goal has about 10 targets, we fine tooth comb those targets, identify where there was synergy with him. So under good health, we found literature around epilepsy in all kinds of different health benefits.
In STG nine hemp concrete hemp fiber, and then again, climate action, there are numerous applications that relate across all the SDGs. But we wanted to start with these four and so using them again, these targets are interconnected. The SDG analysis continued and we just kept taking, taking the targets and then following them to where they were also co listed in the SDGs and then ended up basically doing a full All right. So here we started, we brought in the research we learned from those first four, and found more of them. And then those basically led to an entire sweep of all 17. Goals, all 169 targets. And this is what we ended up with. So to answer your question, This is how hemp relates to the UN Sustainable Development Goals at a very specific level. And what’s exciting about drawing it this way is you can really see the visual of when you send your hemp in the middle of the SDG wheel.
And you do that 360 analysis, you can really find where those code synergies exist, but then also perhaps even some of the end, unintended consequences. So this is just a little bit more specific as to what those targets actually say. So at the wheel, when you look around, there were quite a few around SDG two, which is zero hunger. And as many of that hemp and many of the properties of hemp are incredibly important to ending food insecurities. And these targets really helped to drill down where things like maintaining genetic diversity of seeds falls into place, how investment in rural infrastructure and agricultural research and extension services like we do here at UW are so important to ending food security, and how hemp specifically can be a driver of that change.
When you look at, for example, down and SDG, nine, industry innovation and infrastructure, well, all of this is great that hemp has all of these benefits, but without the infrastructure, we can’t transition to a hemp economy and have the benefit of what this plant can truly do across all of the SDGs. So that’s how we’ve been using it.
I would encourage people to use this in their own organizations. And also, when thinking about hemp and cannabis, and however they’re using, you’re working in this space. Because what’s exciting about it is when we brought a couple of months back, we brought our grant partners together to have a similar conversation that we’re having today, where we presented some of the research on, some of these folks don’t necessarily work directly in hemp, so is explaining to physicians, who are being called upon in their practice to answer questions around dosing, and they’re just like, I don’t know. I mean, Wisconsin, we’re, we don’t have a medical program where we’re, a top 10 research institution with incredible excellence in education, we have students graduating from professional schools going to legal states, but we don’t necessarily have the education to support them.
And so this SDG 360 thinking really allowed for people across campus to come together, and then use this wheel to show them where they fit in this space. But then where maybe they also saw themselves and the other parts of the wheel, which will now hopefully, as next steps drive, future Curriculum Development here at UW. And other, we’re already doing some really cool things. For example, the School of Pharmacy is, I believe, one of the first in the nation to be offering an ECS. It’s a required course for graduate pharmacy students. And it’s on the ECS, I understand it, I think we’re one of the first. So we had, we had the school pharmacy on the call with us, and they were so fascinated hearing from our School of Human Ecology, who’s working with our School of Agriculture to grow hemp and how they’re then processing it, and using it for papers. So we’re, we’re starting to do that here at the university.
And of course, the industry is rapidly executing upon this, and academia is just one of the sectors that really needs to get in there and start breaking down some of these silos, educating our students, and then really serving as a resource to drive evidence based policies. So that’s how we’re using the SDGs. And I know I have I’m wonder if she’s still on here, I have a board member and Chairman, who’s also on the call, who’s doing some interesting work in the health space and is very knowledgeable about DHI that might want to chime in to as to how hemp and JJ all work together.
- When we talk about scale and what is needed on the research side that maybe the industry isn’t focusing on, I’d also like to dive into other recommendations you have for industry partnerships.
Calyn Ostrowski replied:
I mean, definitely one of the areas and I’m this is just my bias coming through because of my lived experience. But I was really, really trying to encourage my credit union friends to get on today’s zoom call, because I feel like there’s so much overlap in the values of the cooperative system. And in cooperative societies in agriculture, as well here in Wisconsin, that’s one area where I think partnerships could really be advantageous not only getting people access to financial services in the industry, but then also being able to address inequities and being able to start businesses in this space. I mean, so much of it is investor heavy, that without access to things like small banking, or small business loans, or even just a checking account, it’s just kind of a non-starter. So that feels like as we wait for federalisation and greater guidance from the various policy groups, that partnerships with credit unions, I think is a great space. I’d really like to see the conversation expand into I know there’s quite a bit of grant money now available through USDA, and that’s really exciting.
But even USA ID and one of our grant partners is based in Nigeria, the University of Lagos and similar to Wisconsin, they’re not allowed to really do a whole lot in terms of researching the plant. But there’s opportunities for knowledge sharing and opportunities for scholarly exchange and universities partnering together. And perhaps that’s with industry as well, for sure. But I definitely see some more academic to academic partnerships. There’s quite a bit happening already in academia, I think I just saw on LinkedIn today that Leafly put out, I didn’t get a chance to look at it. But um, universities and academia are doing research in this space, and we really want to see Wisconsin added to that list.
So there’s, I mean, the opportunities and the partnership, on hemp, is endless. It’s truly endless. And we need partnership, we need knowledge sharing, we need spaces, to be able to come together and talk about what policymakers have learned, what industry has learned, what academia has learned. So we can really move fast and have the infrastructure catch up, and all the other things that sort of are being patchworked right now.
- John Carpenter added and asked a question.
On the meat means are channels by which to disseminate information about the health benefits of industrial hemp into the broader marketplace. Do you see channels through podcasts such as researchers that have taken research all the labs prior to going into full blown longitudinal blind as getting it out into the marketplace for people to become more knowledgeable about than to go back to their physicians?
And I’m thinking of people like Andrew Huberman, David Sinclair, Ken Barr, a lot of people coming out of the Sports, medicine and sports nutrition world are taking a lot of The research they’re doing now, which may precede P be a precursor to ultimately something that’s going to be adopted within what traditional medical field. But these individuals are becoming passionate about it and going into their Doc’s are going to other people and spreading it more informally and organically, but quite strongly.
Calyn Ostrowsi replied and said. absolutely podcasts, Zoom webinars, and he puts together, I see Jeff on the, on the line regenerable put an excellent conference together at the United Nations last week. And we’re very generous and live streaming it. So that ended for free, where everyone could participate here. So I think the more that people can start finding anywhere, any platform to be able to demystify and share, where they’re bringing their expertise in to the space, and how they’re, working with him, really helps to to, to demystify it and helps to break down silos and figure out where where synergies exist, had I not had the support of the Global Health Institute that really is very innovative in how they approach health and well being, I wouldn’t have really known to thread the needle of hemp across so many different things. I mean, I’ve seen it firsthand, and some of my experiences, but really being able to think through a very complex plant and in numerous applications, and then taking the SDGs. I mean, I really think coming back to the SDGs, which is the framework I’m using to understand the plant, is where I see synergies coming together.
Again, mapping and tagging any point these I ended up finding, so I swept all 17 all 119 69 targets, found 54. There, probably there’s more or less, that’s up for debate, but a quick sweep showed 54 targets. And so I think those 54 Those are interdisciplinary, anyone and professional can find their space in this. So I think just, again, having found, and using a framework like the SDGs, where there is so much agreement around these being the golden standard that policymakers are using at national state, local levels, corporations are integrating into their ESG. Plans, nonprofits to so many groups are now incorporating the SDGs into how they think about their work. And I think here at UW, I’m going to continue to use our platform to continue having these conversations, I think the work that my colleagues are doing, for example, the same investment I want to grant was an intramural grant, here at UW too, to do this research. And at the same time another grant partner of mine received similar funding, and they, at the School of Agriculture in the School of Human Ecology are doing hemp by hand workshops. So they’re bringing people to campus. So first, there’s a virtual webinar. And then a day later, you go and you get, I got to make paper, I made some fiber, and I learned to weave with it. There was concrete making. So I think, getting it into the community and giving space to also just come and touch the plant and work with the plant and just see it demystify it that it’s not, it’s not, it’s not marijuana. Even if that were the case, I believe we should be having them, which is why I got involved in the activity of bringing in a space where people can experience it. So yes.
Update from the Event Last Week
- Mandi Lynn Kerr asked a question from Geoff Trotter. I would love to hear about how the event went last week, and if there’s anything that you’d like to highlight from it.
Geoff Trotter said ordinarily, I’d be happy to speak but you could probably tell them my voice is not normal. I ended up as a result of last week at the UN and subsequent meetings with other parties and Friday and UN entities on Friday. By the time I traveled back on Saturday, I had laryngitis. So I don’t. I’ve only just got my voice back and it doesn’t normally sound like this. I mean, I’m not the one to say whether it was a good event or not. There were many others that were 200 or so there. We live streamed for free globally. If I’m to look at what the response has been on LinkedIn, then yes, it was a resounding success. We’ve heard terms like historic, transformative, game changing, etc. And, and the good news is we have not uploaded our copy book, we’ve been invited back. And we will go back in late October. And I would love to pick up on conversations with Calum and the work that that you’re undertaking, because the events in October actually we’re gonna focus entirely on hemp and and bring the conversation that you’ve really just spoken about here to life on a global scale by bringing I think we for sure will be able to secure the president of Paraguay to come and speak at the event. And Paraguay have totally like 1,000% just going all in on hemp, and their use case is spectacular.
And I think that other UN agencies like UNCTAD, the Commission on Trade and Development, see what’s going on in developing nations like Paraguay as a bellwether for where opportunities it could be For economies not only to, to uplift, but also in countries to develop their social impact, as well as environmental impact. And, as you correctly point out, can have an impact on all 17 goals, 169 targets, and God knows how I tune in for the indicators. So I believe I know Regenesis, and we’d be very interested.
No, we didn’t get a chance to speak on Thursday. However, we would be delighted to begin working with you. We are aware of other universities around the world. As a result, I believe I am interested in this work. And I believe there is a huge opportunity to do some knowledge transfer and move things along quickly. So you should be commended, because from what I’ve seen and heard, you did an excellent job. So we’re hoping for more of the same.
Mandi Lynn Kerr thanked him and said. It was truly wonderful to hear firsthand from You really brought together so many people in, stakeholders, from local governments, to foreign governments to, all across the technology of what it requires to translate this plant into medicine into all of its uses. And so, I think, having the visibility and the lessons learned of groups like Paraguay. And again, I think that’s something as well, I mean, not even just the global standard, but at the national level with our patchwork of policies, I think there’s so much to be learned. I think about Wisconsin and our program, which is hump focus right now. How do we as we have policymakers on both sides of the aisle that would love to pass cannabis and marijuana at different levels. So medical versus recreational.
And I just feel like there’s so much to be shared around to indicate the targets that can really illustrate. We don’t have to talk about medicine, either, let’s not talk about it, let’s find where it makes sense on this wheel and these targets for Wisconsin. And then where do we have people who have already done this, at the state level at the national levels to not make the same mistakes. And what Paraguay, I thought, really resonated with Wisconsin was how they, specifically through their local farmers, really worked to catalyze the local economies and really integrate the feedback in real time as to how the process was working.
And it’s so critical, I believe, because there’s so much need for input, feedback, and collaboration across the space that the targets can truly be a place for, pick an SDG. And you could spend an entire day on a couple of those targets.
Geoff Trotter said. I mean, I think you’re right. You’re the lady who spoke from Malaysia, Jamila Ibrahim, HOAs really formed this concept around Halal hemp. And its classification, which would bypass in many, many countries, many Islamic nations around the world that have clearly given an indication that they’re not terribly friendly towards cannabis and hemp, whichever you want to call it. And so to be able to bypass that through religious channels, because she’s now working with a number of Imams around the world. And if she could bypass nations like Saudi Arabia, and Qatar and others, frankly, you’re bringing hemp derived CBD and other aspects of hemp to 1.8 billion Muslim.
That’s a game changer. That’s huge. And so I think, and we know that one of the ministers or senators from the Malaysian government, who was there, has already gone back to Malaysia, she’s already been pushing a narrative in various media channels there to really encourage the Malaysian government to just, wrap their heads around the fact that this is a path forward to to prosperity. And the sooner we do that, the better. And you remember also from Thursday, as
I pointed out, right at the beginning of the day, the conversation wasn’t about cannabis. Nor was it about him. In fact, in either case, it’s really the vehicle, the destination on this journey of the Sustainable Development Goals. It’s the uplifting of seven point a billion souls, and that’s where we have a responsibility. That’s our imperative. And so that’s, that’s, I think, how we should frame it going forward. He’s great stuff though, Kevin.
Calyn Ostrowski added and said I mean, last week I truly want to see more, more academic institutions that are doing this work, share their knowledge, and share the research that they’re doing from seed genetics to social justice reform or climate climate action. There’s there’s a lot of opportunities that are that exists for, like I was saying earlier, that kind of partner to partner, even with our our folks in Nigeria, where we have different laws where we can leverage and it’s kind of what you were saying earlier, Geoff Trotter with a bypassing different things and being creative with, with how the plant can really improve society and improve all of the SDGs.
Geoff Trotter said. I mean, the other thing that we’re also doing, pragmatically, speaking back to corporations, is embedding the SDGs as an output, back to the inputs in the business around ESG. So getting organizations to identify through environmental, social governance factors, what are the true materiality issues that they really need to be focusing on.
And by doing that, and getting to a position where they have an ESG position that they are monitoring the materiality of us, then they can begin to define their sustainability narrative, because it’s not the same thing. But once they can define their sustainability narrative, we can also map the SDGs back to that so they can really begin to report out on how they’re impacting the sustainable development goals. And that was one of the things that got the UN’s attention when we were approaching them about having this event at the UN, because the idea of having a cannabis conference in the UN was never going to happen.
So we had to find a way to sort of work through the corridors. And that’s exactly what we did. We said, well, actually, we’re not here to talk about cannabis. We’re here to talk about your Sustainable Development Goals. And we’re advocating for those and said that if you’re not prepared to open up the rooms to conversations like this, then you might ask yourself, are you still relevant? And are you still fit for purpose, which is a pretty aggressive approach. But sometimes you have to do that in order if you want to bring these conversations to life.
- How do people want to get involved with your organization or learn more? What does that look like?
Email me Calyn.Ostrowski@wisc.edu or contact the University of Wisconsin Madison’s Global Health Institute. We’ve got our website. And definitely on LinkedIn is another great place to have these conversations.
- Mandi Lynn Kerr asked a question and said. How is it impacting what’s in it for them as a community? And, I’d be interested more in what those conversations look like? What are some of those challenges? Or what are some ways that have really worked as you’ve approached, those were reserved areas, that are hesitant to open up funding for agriculture, and growing industrial hemp, because of the fear, but really, this list of benefits, so we just went over. I have another question just really quick, and then we can jump off. When we were talking about the end, Jeff had kind of mentioned the ESG or the score, the SDGs. The processor on the manufacturing side is similar to an LCA where you take the raw material or the product all the way through manufacturing, so then it’s given a greater score separately. You kind of break that down.
Geoff Trotter replied and said. I think what we’ve identified is, what we push quite frequently is that environmental, social governance and sustainability are not the same thing. It’s very possible to have a very high score in ESG, and not be sustainable at all, you only have to look at cigarette manufacturers when it comes to the SDGs, to realize that that’s the case, because they’re impacting negatively at least 10 of the 17 SDGs. So by no stretch of anyone’s imagination, you could argue they are a sustainable product. So what we are looking at is, is understanding as a business, what is impacting you from outside, that then creates your environmental social governance position, it means longer term that you’re investable because you’re mitigating risks, etc. It’s very separate to then determining, okay, now, through the work that we do, we’ve created a bunch of products and services, how then are these products and services impacting people from a sustainability perspective, and we want to be able to then show the connectivity of those given they’re separate.
And that’s essentially what we’re doing. And we think it’s important at a corporate level, if you’re in the hemp business, that you can truly show how your products or services are creating that positive impact for humanity. And what Kailyn has done is it’s excellent in in being able to identify the across the 17 goals, where those impacts could be
Ann Berhrmann commented and said. I don’t know if I can speak so clearly about this, because I’m a pediatrician by trade, I actually retired. So what my patients know, the issues for, for use of cannabis in kids is a dilemma. But that it’s interesting in Wisconsin, I just came back from visiting friends, I went to school in Kentucky, that recently, part of the reason I’m on the call is actually asked another question, and that is, they really tried to push agricultural hemp in Kentucky and it was a SAS it sadly, kind of a failure.
Because the markets weren’t there for the farmers that invested in crops, and I was actually in the north western parts of Kentucky around the Kentucky River where there’s a lot of interest in using hemp as an agricultural crop. And, what I understood from my friend who’s a farmer, is that all the pieces weren’t together. And I was wondering. I think you have the banking piece and the lone piece, but you also have to have the market piece. And I was wondering about that.
Calyn Ostrowski added and said. one of our grant partners. From the school, both the schools of human ecology and the Department of the School of Agriculture are actually working through the extension office, and have done a UW study to look at and work and interview and survey. The cultivators here in Wisconsin, and that was that was a big component of what they learned from that of, of, of cultivators wanting to know, beyond how do we industrialize hemp for other things? What are those usages? What are those end users applications? And where is the market for that? Where do we find it? Where do we get access to it, especially here in Wisconsin that’s trying to catch up with its program.
John Carpenter commented and said. First a compliment. The University of Constant has a fantastic tech transfer program. I’m a little familiar with it because I help the University master Med Center benchmark, which programs in the country are most adept at taking translational research and moving it into the marketplace. And so first of all, my hat has tips. I’m glad you guys are engaged in industrial hemp.
Calyn Ostrowski said continuing to just highlight the work that we’re doing here, the work that JJ is doing, not just I mean, this is such a small component of what we’re doing. We’re really driving global health here locally and globally. So I think just to continue elevating the message that health of the planet really impacts the health of humans and every thing on it, and that when it comes to him, that this planet really is something that can heal, heal across all of the systems, every constructed system, as illustrated in the SDG wheel.
