Coro Strandberg is a sustainability entrepreneur and coach. She works with businesses, governments and communities to inspire economic innovation that enhances quality of life and protects the environment. A Canadian leader in values-based business practices and market sustainability, Strandberg finds enterprising ways to direct capital and organize business operations, locally and globally, to achieve integrated financial, social and environmental returns.

Strandberg launched her consulting practice in 2003. Early work included development of the Victoria Values-Based Business Network, which today has over one hundred local business members who help one another advance on the sustainability path. During this time she helped seed the thinking behind Dockside Green , a 15-acre site on former industrial land that is being redeveloped as Victoria’s greenest project with residential, hotel, retail and office buildings.

Current projects include strategic planning for the Sustainability Purchasing Network; the design of a Community Investment Fund for pension funds to support community economic and First Nations development; and advice to a number of businesses on CSR strategy and to the 2010 Olympic and Paralympic Winter Games on leveraging opportunities for transformative community change.

In addition she regularly speaks, facilitates groups and writes on leading trends in corporate social responsibility, socially responsible investment, community investing, sustainable finance and sustainable enterprise development.

While Chair and long-time board member of Canada’s largest credit union, Vancity Credit Union, Strandberg was instrumental in the organization becoming a world leader in corporate social responsibility.

From early days Strandberg’s actions were inspired by a belief in the power of social and environmental enterprise and venture philanthropy.

She was a founding trustee of Ethical Funds Inc., the first family of socially-screened mutual funds in Canada. Later she championed Vancity’s regional economic development efforts which spawned the Vancity Capital Corporation, a $25 million company that invests in economic development, green economy, non-profit enterprise and co-operatives. In addition, Strandberg's vision inspired the creation of the Vancity Community Foundation, an over $10 million foundation providing grants, loans and technical assistance to support community economic development. She also spearheaded the creation of the Shared World Term Deposit where the investments are channeled to support micro-businesses in third world countries, helping families escape from poverty.

In 1996/7, Strandberg was the lead board member on the design and release of Canada’s first independently verified corporate social responsibility audit for Vancity. In 2002, Vancity commissioned her to conduct an international study of long-term trends in corporate social responsibility.

As Social Policy Director and Green Economy Policy Advisor for the BC Government from 1995 to 2000, Strandberg designed government-wide sustainable development and green economy strategies, helped amend the BC Company Act to allow minority shareholder resolutions and led the creation of a $10 million community economic development program.

She has also worked for local government from 1990 to 1993 as the first Social Planner for the City of Surrey, Canada’s fastest growing municipality at that time. Key achievements there included the creation of an Affordable Housing Fund and background efforts to launch the Surrey Foundation.

Strandberg sits on the Boards of Directors of Vancity Capital Corporation and the North-South Institute, organizations concerned with advancing sustainability, reducing poverty and restoring the environment regionally and internationally. She is also a Faculty Advisor for SustainAbility, a global independent sustainability think tank and strategy consultancy, and is a member of the Conference Board of Canada’s Editorial Board of the Corporate Social Responsibility Review. In 2007 she became an Associate of the Centre for Sustainable Community Development.

Strandberg has been a nominee of Vancouver’s Influential Women in Business Award and the Women of Distinction Award in recognition of her efforts to advance business sustainability.

Contact Coro Strandberg.

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