Our first blog in this series covered the primary reason why the Desert Vipers have chosen to put sustainability at the heart of its business operations. The world is in a climate emergency and environmental change is an existential threat to our sport. We also believe that societal changes and challenges and associated economic challenges threaten cricket’s long-term financial viability if they are not addressed. So, put simply, given our clean slate this decision was just the right thing for a cricket team and a new business to do.

We also felt that sustainability is not just a trend. Instead, sustainability (or “ESG” - Environmental, Social and Governance - a framework to understand and measure how sustainably an organisation is operating) is becoming incorporated into almost every business strategy from SMEs to major corporations in most parts of the world. Where it isn’t, we expect it to be before too long. In general, sports businesses and governing bodies can do much more to minimise environmental impacts and to show greater regard for the way they manage resources, look after their people, and create a positive influence in communities and fan bases.

Potentially, sport has a unique power in creating change because of the passion that humans have for their favourite teams and athletes. This is particularly true for cricket, which is impacted by climate change more than any other outdoor sport. Recently, climate has been a topic of discussion in the cricket press as players at the men’s World Cup have detailed the challenges they faced in performance owing to environmental factors. We want to be part of the solution, not an addition to the problem.

Our decision is also borne out of our belief that ESG concerns are increasingly important to business and can play a positive part in impacting our bottom line over time. “Purpose” is becoming increasingly important in sponsorship investments by brands. Businesses use investments in sport to increase awareness of their brands, tell their stories in a context that has meaning to fans, and to connect with those fans and ultimately sell them products and services. Various quantitative studies show that a clear majority of sports fans have an increased interest in brands who have shown themselves to be socially responsible. According to an Amnesty International survey of 10 000 people aged 18-25 in 22 countries around the world, climate change is their most pressing concern; the most important issue facing the world. We realised that if we can “walk the walk”, we have the credibility to help brands tell their own sustainability stories, or to enable brands to show how their product or service is assisting the Desert Vipers in achieving our own sustainability goals. In fact, some commentators on the sport industry are predicting a step change in how brands will consider purchasing decisions. In Forbes, Jonquil Hackenburg - CEO at Eunomia Research & Consulting, wrote:

“It’s no longer a case of whoever pays the most money gets the biggest billboard or the most lucrative logo placement. We’re starting to see brands unwilling to work with (and fans unwilling to support) organisations who are seen as untrustworthy when it comes to climate change, diversity, and inequality. For sports brands who don’t prioritise ESG, the game could almost be up.”

While this is not something that we have heard directly from a brand in such stark terms to date, we do see this as being an inevitable direction of travel as the corporate world faces up to its responsibilities ahead of global commitments on climate made in the Paris Agreement - where nations agreed to limit the rise in global temperatures to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels (a target which, by the way, the world is likely to miss sooner rather than later). It is the reason why the Desert Vipers have created a commercial programme around sustainability that sits alongside and is complementary to our team partnership programme.

However, It is not just revenue where we see sustainability as playing a crucial role in our business. Here are a few other ways that we have identified that we will see a positive impact on our business, that we may delve deeper into in future blogs:

  • Creation of cost savings
  • “Futureproofing” our business / increasing business resilience in anticipation of future regulation by government
  • Optimisation of human resources
  • Creation of a transferable brand and business positioning for future owned assets in sport
  • Increasing the overall value of the Desert Vipers franchise as ESG considerations become increasingly important to investors

So we made our decision based on these factors combined, but where to start? Playing our part from an environmental perspective seemed like the obvious place. Working on the basis that “you can’t manage what you can’t measure”, the first initiative that we undertook was to measure our carbon emissions footprint for the first twelve months of our operations.

While the author of this blog has always kept a keen interest on the topic of sustainability in sport, I have no background or qualifications in sustainability or even remotely related disciplines. Not many sports businesses do - although this is changing quickly. We needed expert advice and so one of the first things that the Desert Vipers did was to partner with the Environmental Change Institute at Oxford University. Ben Hardy-Jones is currently on placement with the team and is providing advice on our work in sustainability. Congratulations to him on his recent graduation and achieving his MSc.

Perhaps the most important thing for a sports team to do, should it have the resources to do so, is appoint an agency to assist with measurement, strategy and reporting. There are free tools out there. However, since reporting on emissions is a fundamental requirement of the United Nations Sport For Climate Action Framework, of which the Desert Vipers are today the only Dubai-based member, the prospect of doing so accurately without expert help filled me with dread! Choosing the right agency is crucial. For us, we wanted to work with people who understood sport. Not because our industry is so nuanced that is hard to understand (although talking the same language helps) but because advice on sport relevant aspects of carbon emission calculations are not always intuitive. Who knew that pitch fertiliser was so carbon heavy? For this reason we partnered with Carbon Happy World, led by Gary Adlen who had close ties to Liverpool Football Club and the development of “The Red Way”, a programme that we admire. (And because they are nice people)!

So began a journey for the Desert Vipers in understanding more about the Greenhouse Gas Protocol (GHG Protocol), the Corporate Sustainability Reporting Directive (CSRD) and Scope 1, 2 and 3 carbon emissions. In order not to expose ignorance and to provide meaningful value to readers of this blog, for the next edition we have asked Carbon Happy World and Ben Hardy-Jones to demyth some of these concepts and to share their thoughts on the exercise we have undertaken and the challenges that face the Desert Vipers. The output of our work together has been vital to shape our strategic framework for sustainabilityand has already informed nascent emission reduction initiatives by exposing the low-hanging fruit. Here though are my top three takeaways from having gone through the process:

1: Carbon emissions measurement is a time consuming and labour intensive process

Getting to a point where data collection from a myriad of suppliers, employees and other stakeholders is not going to be anything but extremely hard work. When you get started you will need your finance team, operations team, commercial teams and other colleagues to assist your responsible person or sustainability team to gather and input data into a spreadsheet or platform to enable you to make an accurate calculation. You will be reliant on third party suppliers who will not necessarily be able to provide you with the data that you need and responding to ad hoc data requests is not necessarily top of every suppliers’ to do list. You will need to make estimations where data isn’t available and ideally you will have an agency to help you do all of this work otherwise you are likely to give up. Because it is hard.

2: Air travel emissions jump off the page

Because the ILT20 takes place in Dubai, most of our players and staff need to fly to travel to and from the event. The executive staff travel to and from Dubai over the course of the year. This means that travel accounts for a whopping 70% of our carbon emissions. I dread to think what the emissions number must be for a major tournament that involves a significant number of internal flights on top of this. We have to fly to do business and play cricket, but clearly minimising flying, being smart with routes or the types of aeroplane that we fly in can play a part in reducing our footprint. My favourite statistic that I learnt from the exercise is that a business class flight accounts for approximately 3x the emissions of an economy class flight. Therein opportunity and sleepless flights lie…

3: Some air conditioning coolants are far worse for the environment than others

I never thought I’d write about something like this as a career sports exec but it's true. It is an indication of the level of detail required to do a good job on carbon emissions calculation and reduction. It is also an indication of the fact that we all need to change our focus and behaviour if we are to make a meaningful difference in the sports sector - particularly if we expect our fans to listen to us talk about this vital issue.

I’d love to hear thoughts and feedback on anything that we have covered in this blog and can be reached at matt@thedesertvipers.com. Next time it’s over to the experts, but not before our Dubai Sustainability Spotlight, which this week features the DP World and The European Tour.

Dubai Sustainability Spotlight – The DP World Tour Championship

Hats off to our friends at the DP World Tour for an amazing DP World Tour Championship held last weekend. The event showcased the “Earth Lounge” on the 16th hole which was powered solely by solar panels and hydrogen generators that produced zero carbon emissions. There was a ban on single use plastic water bottles in favour of “water walls” that dispensed water to attendees and waste company Averda set a target for 75% recycling of all event waste. Like the Desert Vipers, the DP World Tour has set a target to reduce carbon emissions by 50% by 2030. Their net zero target year is 2034. Amazing work guys!