Law reform and tougher legal penalties to stop greenwashing are critical, according to an intellectual property expert from The Australian National University.
“Greenwashing is corporate spin which involves making misleading or deceptive claims that a company’s products orservices are environmentally sustainable or friendly,” said Dr Matthew Rimmer, an ARC Future Fellow and Associate Professor at the ANU College of Law. “Such conduct is putting consumers at a disadvantage and giving some businesses an unfair advantage...”
Dr Rimmer said that there is a need to update and reform advertising law, consumer law, and trademark law.
“In regards to advertising law, the Australian Advertising Standards Bureau has developed a green code, but it has not effectively enforced this code,” he said.
“The Australian Competition and Consumer Commission has established guidelines on green marketing and taken enforcement action in respect of misleading and deceptive claims about the environment and carbon offsets. However, the body needs to redouble its efforts, particularly in light of the new clean energy regime in Australia. Consumer law should be updated to provide for specific offences in order to discourage greenwashing, astroturfing and fraudulent carbon claims.”
Dr Rimmer also believes laws concerning trademark applications should be updated and that certification trademarks should have higher standards of transparency and accountability.
“In regards to domain names the Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) is about to auction the top level domain dot eco. There is a need to ensure that the winning bid is truly driven by community concerns for environmental sustainability, and has a clear plan to address the problem of greenwashing,” said Dr Rimmer.
Dr Rimmer added that the issue also raised concerns for freedom of speech.
“There needs to be greater protection for environmental campaigns and spoofs —such as Greenpeace’s protest with the characters of Ken and Barbie against Mattel's packaging; the Twitter spoof account @BPGlobalPR; and The Yes Men’s protest against the United States Chamber of Commerce. Big companies should not be able to use intellectual property rights to stifle political speech and artistic expression.”
