Short Eco friendly quotes inspiring sustainability can be a very powerful motivational tool to boost your sustainability efforts.
Some of them may seem like a punch in the stomach and hit us hard on some of our habits!
These short sustainability quotes are here to remind us that our planet is in desperate need of our help.
If you are looking for just a few of the best short environment friendly quotes mentioned in this article, we have 23 of them in the short video below. Otherwise, keep on reading, I’m sure we have some that you may never have heard of in our large collection of 225 nature friendly quotes!
Always remember that after getting the right inspiration, the most important thing is to take action! Lead by example on sustainability and as Mahatma Gandhi said: “Be the change that you wish to see in the world“.
Are you ready? Let’s go with the best eco friendly captions!
225 Eco-Friendly Quotes
Here are the best eco-friendly quotes to inspire your motivation while pursuing sustainability in your life.
Sustainable Lifestyle Quotes
The pursuit of a sustainable lifestyle should be a common goal for humanity, let’s keep in mind those powerful eco friendly messages to help us in our path to sustainability!
We can make the difference
“If you think you are too small to be effective, you have never been in bed with a mosquito.”
African Proverb
Make conscious purchases
“Buy less, choose well, make it last.”
Vivienne Westwood
People’s mindset should naturally focus on sustainability
“I don’t want to protect the environment. I want to create a world where the environment doesn’t need protecting.”
Anonymous
Reduce your consumption
“The most environmentally friendly product is the one you didn’t buy.”
Joshua Becker
We need an unshakable commitment
“Being green is more than just buying ‘eco’. It is an unshakable commitment to a sustainable lifestyle.”
Jennifer Nini
We are one with nature
“We are not above nature, we are a part of nature.”
Jennifer Nini
Sometimes, even a simple thing like having green grass in your backyard can help us immediately feel this deep connection with nature.
Green desires
“All I want is to stand in a field and to smell green, to taste air, to feel the earth, without all this concrete hating me.”
Phillip Pulfrey
Reuse products to reduce waste
“I only feel angry when I see waste. When I see people throwing away things we could use.”
Mother Teresa
Sustainability is about doing the right thing
“Sustainability is no longer about doing less harm. It’s about doing more good.”
Jochen Zeitz
Prefer a plant based diet
“Eat food. Not too much. Mostly plants.”
Michael Pollan
Planting trees is a priority
“Even if I knew that tomorrow the world would go to pieces, I would still plant my apple tree.”
Martin Luther King Jr
Violence against the environment should be condemned
“An act of violence against nature should be judged as severely as that against society or another person.”
Dr. Michael W.Fox
Spend your money wisely
“Every time you spend money you’re casting a vote for the kind of world you want.”
Anna Lappé
Planting trees is an act of love
“He that plants trees loves others beside himself.”
Thomas Fuller
Being in nature is happiness
“I felt my lungs inflate with the onrush of scenery – air, mountains, trees, people. I thought, ‘This is what it means to be happy.”
Sylvia Plath
We can work all together with simple actions towards a bigger goal
“I like to envision the whole world as a jigsaw puzzle … If you look at the whole picture, it is overwhelming and terrifying, but if you work on your little part of the jigsaw and know that people all over the world are working on their little bits, that’s what will give you hope.”
Jane Goodall
Share your ideas to change the world
“If you want to become an instrument of change, gather people in your community and host a regular conversation. The only way to succeed is to connect people, share inspiration and support one another.”
Deepak Chopra
We should conserve the soil
“If you want to eat food, prevent soil erosion, dude.”
Anonymous
Nature is a giver
“In every walk with nature, one receives far more than he seeks.”
John Muir
Sustainability is not just a buzz word
“It angers me when sustainability gets used as a buzz word. For 90 percent of the world, sustainability is a matter of survival.”
Cameron Sinclair
Take care of the land or you will suffer the consequences
“Look after the land and the land will look after you, destroy the land and it will destroy you.”
Aboriginal Proverb
Nature is the answer
“Look deep into nature, and then you will understand everything better.”
Albert Einstein
We should reevaluate our livestyle
“Modern society will find no solution to the ecological problem unless it takes a serious look at its lifestyle.”
Pope John Paul II
Nature is the key to satisfaction
“Nature holds the key to our aesthetic, intellectual, cognitive and even spiritual satisfaction.”
Dr. Edward O. Wilson
We should control our appetites
“Nature provides a free lunch, but only if we control our appetites.”
William Ruckelshaus
Nature is so beautiful
“Nothing is more beautiful than the loveliness of the woods before sunrise.”
George Washington Carver
Keep the link with nature
“One of the first conditions of happiness is that the link between man and nature shall not be broken.”
Leo Tolstoy
Permaculture revolution
“Permaculture is a revolution disguised as gardening.”
Mike Feingold
Redefining the meaning of the word “success”
“Reducing our levels of consumption will not be a sacrifice but a bonus if we simply redefine the meaning of the word ‘success.”
David Wann
Sustainability is a long process
“Sustainability takes forever, and that’s the point.”
Willem McDonough
The activist takes action
“The activist is not the man who says the river is dirty. The activist is the man who cleans up the river.”
Ross Perot
Our planet is worth fighting for
“The Earth is a fine place and worth fighting for.”
Ernest Hemingway
Food is not only in supermarkets, get local
“The first supermarket supposedly appeared on the American landscape in 1946. That is not very long ago. Until then, where was all the food? Dear folks, the food was in homes, gardens, local fields, and forests. It was near kitchens, near tables, near bedsides. It was in the pantry, the cellar, the backyard.”
Joel Salatin
Apathy is dangerous
“The greatest danger to our future is apathy.”
Jane Goodall
Focus more on the wonders of the universe
“The more clearly we can focus our attention on the wonders and realities of the universe about us, the less taste we shall have for destruction.”
Rachel Carson
The planet does not need more “successful people“
“The planet does not need more successful people. The planet desperately needs more peacemakers, healers, restorers, storytellers and lovers of all kinds.”
Dalai Lama
We should already do our part instead of waiting for government action
“The strongest governments on earth cannot clean up pollution by themselves. They must rely on each ordinary person, like you and me, on our choices, and on our will.”
Chai Jing
Throwing “away” doesn’t really exist
“There is no such thing as “away”. When we throw something away it must go somewhere.”
Annie Leonard
Nature is the true luxury
“To me, a lush carpet of pine needles or spongy grass is more welcome than the most luxurious Persian rug.”
Helen Keller
Everybody should care a lot to make the difference
“Unless someone like you cares a whole awful lot, nothing is going to get better. It’s not.”
Dr. Seuss
Reconnect the children with nature
“Unless we are willing to encourage our children to reconnect with and appreciate the natural world, we can’t expect them to help protect and care for it.”
David Suzuki
Nature knows more
“Until man duplicates a blade of grass, nature can laugh at his so-called scientific knowledge.”
Thomas Edison
Don’t wait to take action
“The greatest threat to our planet is the belief that someone else will save it.”
Robert Swan
Use things for longer
“Use it up, wear it out, make it do, or do without.”
New England Proverb
We will never have enough of nature
“We can never have enough of Nature.”
Henry David Thoreau
Sustainability doesn’t come from unlimited consumption
“We can’t just consume our way to a more sustainable world.”
Jennifer Nini
Zero waste
“We don’t need a handful of people doing zero waste perfectly. We need millions of people doing it imperfectly.”
Anne Marie Bonneau
The importance of fresh water
“We never know the worth of water till the well is dry.”
Thomas Fuller
Progress at the expense of nature is vandalism
“When we destroy something created by man, we call it vandalism. When we destroy something created by nature, we call it progress.”
Ed Begley Jr.
Recycling is the right thing!
“When you put the whole thing together, recycling is the right thing to do.”
Pam Shoemaker
Everything you do has an impact on the world
“You cannot get through a single day without having an impact on the world around you. What you do makes a difference and you have to decide what kind of a difference you want to make.”
Jane Goodall
Hold yourself accountable
“You have to hold yourself accountable for your actions, and that’s how we’re going to protect the Earth.”
Julia Butterfly Hill
Do something!
“Anything else you’re interested in is not going to happen if you can’t breathe the air and drink the water. Don’t sit this one out. Do something. You are by accident of fate alive at an absolutely critical moment in the history of our planet.”
Carl Sagan
Enjoy the wilderness
“Away, away, from men and towns, To the wildwood and the downs, To the silent wilderness, Where the soul need not repress its music.” Percy Bysshe Shelley
Think about the future generations
“Because we don’t think about future generations, they will never forget us.”
Henrik Tikkanen
Consume less, share more
“Consume less; share better.”
Hervé Kempf
Cut the plastic
“Do something drastic… cut the plastic! “
Anonymous
Each one of us matters
“Each one of us matters, has a role to play, and makes a difference. Each one of us must take responsibility for our own lives, and above all, show respect and love for living things around us, especially each other.”
Jane Goodall
Everything depends on our ability to sustainably inhabit this earth
“Everything depends on our ability to sustainably inhabit this earth, and true sustainability will require us all to change our way of thinking on how we take from the earth and how we give back.”
Deb Haaland
A simple life is not a step backwards
“Going back to a simpler life based on living by sufficiency rather than excess is not a step backwards.”
Yvon Chouinard
Reduce, repair, recycle, compost or redesign
“If it can’t be reduced, reused, repaired, rebuilt, refurbished, refinished, resold, recycled, or composted, then it should be restricted, designed or removed from production.”
Pete Seeger
Value food and cheer more than money
“If more of us valued food and cheer and song above hoarded gold, it would be a merrier world.”
J. R. R. Tolkien
Humanity has the future of the world in its hands
“It is one world. And it’s in our care. For the first time in the history of humanity, for the first time in 500 million years, one species has the future in the palm of its hands.”
David Attenborough
Nature is the greatest source of excitement
“It seems to me that the natural world is the greatest source of excitement; the greatest source of visual beauty; the greatest source of intellectual interest. It is the greatest source of so much in life that makes life worth living.”
David Attenborough
Doing nothing is the biggest mistake
“Nobody made a greater mistake than he who did nothing because he could do only a little.”
Edmund Burke
The allarm is going off
“Our planet’s alarm is going off, and it is time to wake up and take action!”
Leonardo DiCaprio
Refuse what you don’t need
“Refuse what you do not need; reduce what you do need; reuse what you consume; recycle what you cannot refuse, reduce, or reuse; and rot (compost) the rest.”
Bea Johnson
You are nature, you are the planet
“You are not helping the planet, you are not helping nature, you are the planet, you are nature, you are helping yourself.”
Bangambiki Habyarimana
Sacrifice something today and get the gratitude of future generations
“The ultimate test of man’s conscience may be his willingness to sacrifice something today for future generations whose words of thanks will not be heard.”
Gaylord Nelson
We are all crew on spaceship Earth
“There are no passengers on spaceship Earth. We are all crew.”
Marshall McLuhan
None can live without water
“Thousands have lived without love, not one without water.”
W. H. Auden
Time spent in nature is never wasted
“Time spent among trees is never time wasted.”
Anonymous
Treat the planet like your home
“Treat the Earth as though we intend to stay here”
Crispin Tickell
Leave this world better than you found it
“Try to leave this world a little better than you found it, and when your turn comes to die you can die happy in feeling that at any rate you have not wasted your time but have done your best.”
Robert Baden Powell
Start making environmentally conscious lifestyle choices
“We can sit back, do nothing and watch our planet be destroyed. Or we can take action, become advocates and start making lifestyle choices which are kinder to people and the planet.”
Kira Simpson
Be content with what you have
“We have to cultivate contentment with what we have. We really don’t need much. When you know this, the mind settles down. Cultivate generosity. Delight in giving. Learn to live lightly. In this way, we can begin to transform what is negative into what is positive. This is how we start to grow up.”
Jetsunma Tenzin Palmo
Sustainability Quotes: Environment & Waste
Those are popular remarkable sustainability quotes about the environment & waste management. Because inspiring change and conservation of our planet and its biodiversity should be a top priority for everybody. Those eco friendly quotes can help!
It’s not just one plastic straw
“It’s only one straw”, said 8 billion people.”
Anonymous
Damage to the planet is the result of ignorance
“Most of the damage we cause to the planet is the result of our own ignorance.”
Yvon Chouinard
Man should go back to respect nature’s demands
“All life forms obey nature’s demands, except man, who has found ways of ignoring them.”
Eugene M. Poirot
Climate change is happening fast, but people perceive it in slow motion
“By the clock of geology, this climate shift is unfolding at a dizzying, perhaps unprecedented pace, but by time scales relevant to people, it’s happening in slow motion.”
Andrew Revkin
Conservation is a state of harmony
“Conservation is a state of harmony between men and land.”
Aldo Leopold
Earth provides for man’s needs but not its greeds
“Earth provides enough to satisfy every man’s need, but not every man’s greed.”
Mahatma Gandhi
Contact with dangerous chemicals
“For the first time in the history of the world, every human being is now subjected to contact with dangerous chemicals, from the moment of conception until death.”
Rachel Carson
Gambling the future of the planet for an hamburger
“Forests and meat animals compete for the same land. The prodigious appetite of the affluent nations for meat means that agribusiness can pay more than those who want to preserve or restore the forest. We are, quite literally, gambling with the future of our planet… for the sake of hamburgers.”
Peter Singer
How long can we go on like this?
“How long can men thrive between walls of brick, walking on asphalt pavements, breathing the fumes of coal and of oil, growing, working, dying, with hardly a thought of wind, and sky, and fields of grain, seeing only machine-made beauty, the mineral-like quality of life?”
Charles A. Lindbergh
All things are bound together
“Humankind has not woven the web of life. We are but one thread within it. Whatever we do to the web, we do to ourselves. All things are bound together. All things connect.”
Chief Seattle
Climate change is a moral issue
“I don’t really consider climate change a political issue, I consider it to be a moral issue.”
Al Gore
Climate change is rather the everything change
“I think calling it climate change is rather limiting. I would rather call it the everything change.”
Margaret Atwood
No amount of money can save us from the destruction of ecosystems
“If we pollute the air, water and soil that keep us alive and well, and destroy the biodiversity that allows natural systems to function, no amount of money will save us.”
David Suzuki
Climate change is already happening
“If you’re asking when climate change is going to ‘happen’, you’re really asking when’s it going to happen to ‘me’ because it’s already happened to many other people.”
Eric Roston
Today you can murder land for profit and nobody will call the cops
“In America today you can murder land for private profit. You can leave the corpse for all to see, and nobody calls the cops.”
Paul Brooks
Wildlife preservation
“In wildness is the preservation of the world.”
Henry David Thoreau
Unfortunately we have to fight our own government to save the planet
“It is horrifying that we have to fight our own government to save the environment.”
Ansel Adams
Land is a fountain of energy
“Land is not merely soil, it is a fountain of energy flowing through a circuit of soils, plants and animals.”
Aldo Leopold
We will realise that we can’t eat money
“Only when the last tree has died and the last river been poisoned and the last fish been caught will we realise we cannot eat money.”
Cree Indian Proverb
Protect nature to protect humankind
“Plans to protect air and water, wilderness and wildlife are in fact plans to protect man.”
Stewart Udall
Plastic will be the main ingrediend of our grandchildren’s diet
“Plastic will be the main ingredient of all our grandchildren’s recipes.”
Anthony T. Hincks
If we love the land we should conserve it
“The Earth will not continue to offer its harvest, except with faithful stewardship. We cannot say we love the land and then take steps to destroy it for use by future generations.”
John Paul II
The environment is where we all have mutual interest
“The environment is where we all meet; where we all have a mutual interest; it is the one thing all of us share.”
Lady Bird Johnson
Land is security
“The farther we get away from the land, the greater our insecurity.”
Henry Ford
The environment sustains all life
“The natural environment sustains the life of all beings universally.”
Dalai Lama
The heart of man away from nature becomes hard
“The old Lakota was wise. He knew that man’s heart, away from nature, becomes hard; he knew that lack of respect for growing, living things soon led to lack of respect for humans too.”
Luther Standing Bear
Destruction of habitat is the biggest threat
“The single biggest threat to our planet is the destruction of habitat and along the way loss of precious wildlife. We need to reach a balance where people, habitat, and wildlife can co-exist – if we don’t everyone loses … one day.”
Steve Irwin
Waste is a design defect
“Waste is a design flaw.”
Kate Kreba
Use land with love and respect
“We abuse land because we regard it as a commodity belonging to us. When we see land as a community to which we belong, we may begin to use it with love and respect.”
Aldo Leopold
We can’t live without the blanet, but it can live without us
“What mankind must know is that human beings cannot live without Mother Earth, but the planet can live without humans.”
Evo Morales
Human civilisation
“What’s the difference between a 2° world and a 4° world? Human civilisation.”
John Schellnhuber
Soil is like the soul
“When the soil disappears, the soul disappears.”
Ymber Delecto
Humans and the environment are linked
“Where the quality of life goes down for the environment, the quality of life goes down for humans.”
George Holland
A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself
“A nation that destroys its soils destroys itself. Forests are the lungs of our land, purifying the air and giving fresh strength to our people.”
Franklin D. Roosevelt
Better alive than dead
“Every creature is better alive than dead, men and moose and pine trees, and he who understands it aright will rather preserve its life than destroy it.”
Henry David Thoreau
Climate change is a challenge to rise to
“Global warming is not a conqueror to kneel before… but a challenge to rise to. A challenge we must rise to.”
Joe Lieberman
Global warming will not end by Earth finding shade under the trees
“Global warming will not end by Earth finding shade under the trees but under our hands joined together”
Agona Apell
The importance of insects for the environment
“If all mankind were to disappear, the world would regenerate back to the rich state of equilibrium that existed ten thousand years ago. If insects were to vanish, the environment would collapse into chaos.”
Edward O Wilson
We can solve our waste problem
“If civilization has risen from the Stone Age, it can rise again from the Wastepaper Age.”
Jacques Barzun
Nature is art
“It is not reasonable that art should win the place of honour over our great and powerful mother nature. We have so overloaded the beauty and richness of her works by our inventions that we have quite smothered her.”
Michel de Montaigne
Nature is sacred beauty
“Nature bears witness to sacred beauty.”
Lailah Gifty Akita
Nature is an artist
“Nature is painting for us, day after day, pictures of infinite beauty.”
John Ruskin
Nature feeds us all
“Nurture nature and nature nurtures us all.”
Paul Wheaton
One planet
“One planet, one experiment.”
E. O. Wilson
Planting trees is a solution
“Planting and growing increasing quantities of trees is the scientific solution to Earth’s environmental dilemma.”
Richard Barbe Baker
Plastic is the most destructive weapon
“Plastic is the most destructive weapon than a nuclear bomb or an atom bomb, its impact shall remain for centuries on the future generation”
Sir P. S. Jagadeesh Kumar
Progress is a measure of the speed we destroy our ecosystem
“Progress is measured by the speed at which we destroy the conditions that sustain life.”
George Monbiot
Earth has rights too
“Sooner or later, we will have to recognize that the Earth has rights, too, to live without pollution.”
Evo Morales
Humans change the environment for themselves
“The difference between animals and humans is that animals change themselves for the environment, but humans change the environment for themselves.”
Ayn Rand
Earth is our common home
“The Earth is what we all have in common.”
Wendell Berry
The environment sustains all life
The natural environment sustains the life of all beings universally.”
Dalai Lama
Get everybody involved for the environment
“The only way forward, if we are going to improve the quality of the environment, is to get everybody involved.”
Richard Rogers
Be a good guest, live sustainably
“We have forgotten how to be good guests, how to walk lightly on the earth as its other creatures do.”
Barbara Ward
Earth has reserves of strength
“Those who contemplate the beauty of the earth find reserves of strength that will endure as long as life lasts.”
Rachel Carson
We should obey to nature
“We cannot command Nature except by obeying her.”
Francis Bacon
We are borrowing Earth from our children
“We do not inherit the Earth from our ancestors; we borrow it from our children.”
Native American Proverb
We have to care for the environment
“We have a duty to care for the environment.”
Lailah Gifty Akita
What we do to the world is a reflection of what we do to ourselves
“What we are doing to the forests of the world is but a mirror reflection of what we are doing to ourselves and to one another.”
Chris Maser
A house without a planet is useless
“What’s the use of a fine house if you haven’t got a tolerable planet to put it on.”
Henry David Thoreau
Motivational Quotes Inspiring Change
We all want to change something in our life or in the world, the most effective way to do it is to take action. Those popular motivational sustainable quotes convey an important message: if you want to see a change and move towards sustainability for our planet, we should be the first ones to lead by example.
Giving our own contribution, even if small, is the most powerful tool we have to create the necessary and lasting change we all desire for our environment!
Nothing is easy at first
“All things are difficult before they are easy.”
Thomas Fuller
Beauty is everywhere
"As I walk with beauty, As I walk, as I walk, The universe is walking with me, In beauty it walks before me, In beauty it walks behind me, In beauty it walks below me, In beauty it walks above me, Beauty is on every side." Traditional Navajo Prayer
Do what you can and stay motivated
“Do not let what you cannot do interfere with what you can do.”
John Wooden
Don’t wait to take action
“Do not wait for extraordinary circumstances to do good action; try to use ordinary situations.”
Jean Paul Richter
Small bits of good can overwelm the world
“Do your little bit of good where you are; it’s those little bits of good put together that overwhelm the world.”
Archbishop Desmond Tutu
Ignore the unfair critics, you will finally win
“First they ignore you, then they ridicule you, then they fight you, then you win.”
Mahatma Gandhi
You can improve the world now!
“How wonderful it is that nobody needs to wait a single moment before starting to improve the world.”
Anne Frank
Do something about it!
“I always wondered why somebody doesn’t do something about that. Then I realized I was somebody.”
Lily Tomlin
I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do
“I am only one, but I am one. I cannot do everything, but I can do something. And I will not let what I cannot do interfere with what I can do.”
Edward Everett Hale
Act now or you may not have an house
“If your house is on fire, you don’t comfort yourself with the thought that houses have been catching fire for thousands of years. You don’t sit idly back and think, ‘Oh well, that is the way of nature.’ You get going, immediately. And you don’t spring into action because of an idealistic notion that houses deserve to be saved. You do it because if you don’t, you won’t have a place to live.”
Bill Nye
A small group of committed citizens can change the world
“Never doubt that a small group of thoughtful, committed citizens can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has.”
Margaret Mead
Experience nature, protect the environment
“No one will protect what they don’t care about, and no one will care about what they have never experienced.”
David Attenborough
Simplify!
“Our life is frittered away by detail…Simplify, simplify, simplify! Simplicity of life and elevation of purpose.”
Henry Thoreau
Rise your awareness
“Problems cannot be solved at the same level of awareness that created them.”
Albert Einstein
Small acts can change the world
“Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.”
Howard Zinn
Better to do a small thing than just planning something large without action
“Small deeds done are better than great deeds planned.”
Peter Marshall
Eliminate the unnecessary
“The ability to simplify means to eliminate the unnecessary so that the necessary may speak.”
Hans Hofmann
Best things in life
“The best things in life aren’t things.”
Art Buchwald
Opportunity is in every danger
“The optimist sees opportunity in every danger; the pessimist sees danger in every opportunity.”
Winston Churchill
Human ambition should adapt to nature’s requirements
“The universe is not required to be in perfect harmony with human ambition.”
Carl Sagan
Change the world with your example
“The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.”
Paulo Coelho
There must be more to life
“There must be more to life than having everything!”
Maurice Sendak
The importance of small acts
“We don’t have to engage in grand, heroic actions to participate in change. Small acts, when multiplied by millions of people, can transform the world.”
Howard Zinn
Be part of the solution
“Be part of the solution, not part of the pollution.”
Anonymous
Be the change!
“Be the change you wish to see in the world.”
Mahatma Gandhi
Work for future generations
“Our ancestors did great work for humanity. What will we do for the next generations?”
Lailah Gifty Akita
Progress is impossible without change
“Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot change their minds cannot change anything.”
George Bernard Shaw
Human beings take precedence
“Real human beings take precedence over partisan interests; however, legitimate the latter may be.”
Pope Francis
Create the future
“The best way to predict the future is to create it.”
Peter Drucker
The importance of the exponential function
“The greatest shortcoming of the human race is our inability to understand the exponential function.”
Albert A. Bartlett
Don’t pretend that the problem doesn’t exist
“There is a tendency at every important but difficult crossroad to pretend that it’s not really there.”
Bill McKibben
Do something
“To do good, you actually have to do something.”
Yvon Chouinard
Know the path that lead to the present and use this knowledge wisely
“We can chart our future clearly and wisely only when we know the path which has led to the present.”
Adlai E. Stevenson
Business Sustainability Quotes: Inspiring Eco Friendly Leadership
Businesses are essential players to achieve sustainable development, and eco friendly quotes for business can be a very powerful tool to be leveraged. For business leaders is therefore very important to motivate employees to give their best in achieving the ambitious sustainability goals of the company.
Those top business sustainability quotes will help your leadership to instigate the mindset shift we need in order to reach the necessary sustainable development goals.
In addition, given the growing environmental emphasis coming from the consumers, investors and governments, pursuing sustainability in business will be crucial for the corporation’s success in the coming decade.
Here are the top inspiring eco friendly sustainability quotes business leaders need to use!
Indefinite growth on a finite planet
“Anyone who believes in indefinite growth on a physically finite planet is either mad or an economist.”
David Attenborough
The growth ideology
“Growth for the sake of growth is the ideology of the cancer cell.”
Edward Abbey
Live on the interest, not the capital of nature
“If civilization is to survive, it must live on the interest, not the capital, of nature.”
Ronald Wright
Respect the Earth
“If the Earth was an apartment, we wouldn’t be getting our security deposit back.”
Jim Shubert
Get customers to think in an eco friendly way about their purchases
“If we want to move towards a low-polluting, sustainable society, we need to get consumers to think about their purchases.”
David Suzuki
Don’t get possessed by your possessions
“In our rich consumers’ civilization, we spin cocoons around ourselves and get possessed by our possessions.”
Max Lerner
Don’t manufacture objects with limited use and that can’t be recycled
“It cannot be right to manufacture billions of objects that are used for a matter of minutes, and then are with us for centuries.”
Roz Savage
The nonsense of single use plastic
“It’s pretty amazing that our society has reached a point where the effort necessary to extract oil from the ground, ship it to a refinery, turn it into plastic, shape it appropriately, truck it to a store, buy it and bring it home, is considered to be less effort than what it takes to just wash the spoon when you’re done with it.”
Anonymous
Renewable energy
“I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. What a source of power! I hope we don’t have to wait until oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”
Thomas Edison
Growth by itself can’t solve the ecological problem
“Nature shrinks as capital grows. The growth of the market cannot solve the very crisis it creates.”
Vandana Shiva
Becoming carbon neutral is a relatively small effort
“Overall, becoming a carbon-neutral country would involve changes in our behaviour, but these are modest compared with the changes that will be forced upon us if we do nothing.”
Caroline Lucas
Don’t pollute
“People ‘over-produce’ pollution because they are not paying for the costs of dealing with it.”
Ha-Joon Chang
Sustainable development
“Sustainable development is that which meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
Gro Harlem Brundtland
If we can’t conserve the environment we will not be able to sustain ourselves
“The environment and the economy are really both two sides of the same coin. If we cannot sustain the environment, we cannot sustain ourselves.”
Wangari Maathai
Sustainability rule: align with natural forces
“The first rule of sustainability is to align with natural forces, or at least not try to defy them.”
Paul Hawken
The 21st century challenge
“The great challenge of the twenty-first century is to raise people everywhere to a decent standard of living while preserving as much of the rest of life as possible.”
Edward O. Wilson
Not producing useless things is the most sustainable way
“The most sustainable way is to not make things. The second most sustainable way is to make something very useful, to solve a problem that hasn’t been solved.”
Thomas Sigsgaard
Less can be more
“There is a great need for the introduction of new values in our society, where bigger is not necessarily better, where slower can be faster, and where less can be more.”
Gaylord Nelson
Sustainability is the greatest luxury
“There is no greater luxury than sustainability.”
Anonymous
Wealth is not in bank accounts but in nature
“When the last tree is cut, the last fish is caught, the last river is polluted and when to breathe the air is sickening, you will realize, too late, that wealth is not in bank accounts and that you can’t eat money.”
Alanis Obomsawin
Look after the planet and it will look after us
“21st Century choice: Look after our planet, and it will look after us, or don’t and face the consequences”
Phil Harding
Be a statesman, not a politician
“A politician thinks of the next election. A statesman of the next generation.”
James Freeman Clarke
We must pay our debt with nature
“All must pay the debt of nature.”
Annie Proulx
Good business is being a good human being
“Being a good human being is good business.”
Paul Hawken
Concentrate your efforts in creating a better and sustainable future
“Building a world where we meet our own needs without denying future generations a healthy society is not impossible, as some would assert. The question is where societies choose to put their creative efforts.”
Christopher Flavin
Sustainable development offers the best chance
“Climate change is destroying our path to sustainability. Ours is a world of looming challenges and increasingly limited resources. Sustainable development offers the best chance to adjust our course.”
Ban Ki-moon
Climate protection creates sustainability and jobs
“Climate protection creates sustainability and jobs in the real economy – in construction, in the production of heavy machinery and in systems engineering.”
Sigmar Gabriel
Environmentally friendly cars
“Environmentally friendly cars will soon cease to be an option … they will become a necessity.”
Fujio Cho
What nuclear fusion could give us
“I would like nuclear fusion to become a practical power source. It would provide an inexhaustible supply of energy, without pollution or global warming.”
Stephen Hawking
Indeed nuclear fusion would significantly change the pros and cons of nuclear energy, making it extremely advantageous in almost every aspect.
The new heroes will be the ones improving sustainability
“In the 21st century, I think the heroes will be the people who will improve the quality of life, fight poverty and introduce more sustainability.”
Bertrand Piccard
Love of nature is a common language
“Like music and art, love of nature is a common language that can transcend political or social boundaries.”
Jimmy Carter
Sustainability fuels innovation
“Looking at the world through a sustainability lens not only helps us ‘future proof’ our supply chain, it also fuels innovation and drives brand growth.”
Paul Polman
We can solve complex problems created by ourselves
“No matter how complex global problems may seem, it is we ourselves who have given rise to them. They cannot be beyond our power to resolve.”
Daisaku Ikeda
Turn sustainable development into reality
“Our biggest challenge in this new century is to take an idea that seems abstract ‘sustainable development’ and turn it into a reality for all the world’s people.”
Kofi Annan
Ownership and sustainable development
“Ownership is a sine qua non of sustainable development.”
James Wolfensohn
Sustainability and social reputation
“Since most corporate competitors have the same problems with sustainability and social reputation, it’s worth trying to solve them together.”
Simon Mainwaring
Sustainability should be a design challenge
“Sustainability can’t be like some sort of a moral sacrifice or political dilemma or a philanthropical cause. It has to be a design challenge.”
Bjarke Ingels
Sustainability should be a way of life and business
“Sustainability has to be a way of life to be a way of business.”
Anand Mahindra
Sustainability is a choice
“Sustainability is a political choice, not a technical one. It’s not a question of whether we can be sustainable, but whether we choose to be”
Gary Lawrence
Sustainability is ecology, economy and equity
“Sustainability is about ecology, economy, and equity.”
Ralph Bicknese
Sustainability is here to stay
“Sustainability is here to stay, or we may not be”
Niall Fitzgerald
We are all responsible to nourish our planet
“Sustainability is important because we all are responsible to nourish our planet.”
Denise Morrison
Sustainability will determine success
“Sustainability is the key to our survival on this planet and will also determine success on all levels.”
Shari Arison
Sustainable business is good business
“Sustainability makes good business sense, and we’re all on the same team at the end of the day. That’s the truth about the human condition.”
Paul Polman
Companies that understand sustainable development will dominate
“Sustainable development is a fundamental break that’s going to reshuffle the entire deck. There are companies today that are going to dominate in the future simply because they understand that.”
Francois Henri Pinault
Sustainable development is more
“Sustainable Development is more than meeting the needs of today and future generations; to my understanding, this definition better fits the sex industry.”
M. F. Moonzajer
Green energy is the future
“The future is green energy, sustainability, renewable energy.”
Arnold Schwarzenegger
The bedrock of our eco friendly enterprise
“The principle of common but differentiated responsibilities is the bedrock of our enterprise for a sustainable world.”
Narendra Modi
Science should help to live with nature
“The proper use of science is not to conquer nature but to live in it.”
Barry Commoner
The sustainability revolution
“The sustainability revolution will, hopefully, be the third major social and economic turning point in human history, following the Neolithic Revolution – moving from hunter-gathering to farming – and the Industrial Revolution.”
Prince Charles
There must be a better way
“There must be a better way to make the things we want, a way that doesn’t spoil the sky, or the rain or the land”
Paul McCartney
Economy and environment should go hand in hand
“We learned that economic growth and environmental protection can and should go hand in hand.”
Christopher Dodd
A new way of thinking
“We shall require a substantially new manner of thinking if mankind is to survive.”
Albert Einstein
The environmental attitude
“We should bring in an environmental attitude, and I think luxury should automatically be about sustainability and quality.”
Jochen Zeitz
Sustainability is a matter of survival for your business
“When sustainability is viewed as being a matter of survival for your business, I believe you can create massive change.”
Cameron Sinclair
Environmental sustainability is the cornerstone of cohesion
“Without environmental sustainability, economic stability and social cohesion cannot be achieved.”
Phil Harding
Build a new model of change
“You never change things by fighting the existing reality. To change something, build a new model that makes the existing model obsolete.”
R. Buckminster Fuller
Conclusion
Ecosystems are under tremendous pressure due to unsustainable human activities and if we don’t act now to move towards sustainable development, zero waste and eco friendly living, we may have to pay the consequences sooner than we think!
Luckily, many businesses are more and more considering sustainability as a top priority. The powerful eco quotes about sustainability in this article can help to inspire and lead the necessary change in business and our daily life.
An easy way to get started is to learn about the 6 Rs of sustainability and how simple actions can help you have a more sustainable life.
I hope that those eco-friendly quotes on sustainability switched your motivation ON, inspiring you to take action towards a more sustainable life!
If you are looking for more inspiration and you are in the fashion business, you can also check the best sustainable and ethical fashion quotes here. Because the fashion industry is also generating a lot of waste that we could easily avoid by just being more conscious and eco-friendly in our purchases.
If you need to motivate your business to digitally evolve, then our digital transformation quotes can be a very helpful tool.