THE UNILEVER
SUSTAINABLE LIVING PLAN
COUNCIL
The Unilever Sustainable Living Plan Council provides the business with specialist external
advice on corporate responsibility and sustainability. It meets twice a year with Unilever’s
senior leaders and programme managers to discuss issues such as climate change,
sustainable sourcing and how to encourage consumers to adopt more sustainable practices.
Helio Mattar
Helio is President of the Akatu Institute in Brazil
which he idealized and co-founded in 2001. The Akatu
Institute is an NGO whose mission is to encourage consumers
to consider social and environmental impacts of consumption
when making their consumption decisions.
Prior to founding Akatu, Helio held executive positions for
more than 20 years in Brazilian and multinational
corporations as well as in his own business. He was
Secretary of Industrial and Trade Policy in the Federal
Government of Brazil from 1999-2000.
In 1998, he was one of the founders of the
Ethos Institute for Business and Social Responsibility
in Brazil, of which he is a member of the Board of Directors.
He is also a member of the World Economic Forum’s
Sustainable Consumption Council as well as several
Boards of companies and social organisations.
Malini Mehra
Founder and CEO of the Centre for Social Markets, a
non-profit organisation promoting corporate responsibility,
civic engagement and leadership, Malini is a political
scientist and gender specialist by training.
She has worked as an adviser and policy maker for a range
of organisations, including the UN and the UK government’s
Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs,
where she established the
UK’s Sustainable Development Dialogues
with emerging markets.
In 2009, she was nominated as a Young Global Leader
by the World Economic Forum.
Jonathon Porritt
Co-founder of Forum for the Future, a
sustainable development charity in the UK, Jonathon is a
leading environmentalist, writer, broadcaster and
commentator on sustainable development.
He is co-director of The Prince of Wales’s Business and
Sustainability Programme which runs seminars for senior
executives around the world and is involved in the work of
many companies, NGOs and charities as non-executive
director, patron, chair or special adviser.
From 2000-2009 Jonathon chaired the UK’s
Sustainable Development Commission, the government’s
principal source of independent advice on sustainable development.
Yolanda Kakabadse
Yolanda served as Minister of Environment for
the Republic of Ecuador from 1998 until 2000.
She was the NGO Liaison Officer for the United Nations
Conference for Environment and Development (the Rio Earth
Summit) in 1992, coordinating the participation of civil society
organizations in the conference. Yolanda was the President
of the World Conservation Union (IUCN) from 1996-2004.
In 1979 she was appointed Executive Director of Fundacion
Natura in Quito, where she worked until 1990. In 1993 Yolanda
founded Fundacion Futuro Latinoamericano, served as
Executive President until 2007, and is now its Senior Adviser.
She chaired the Scientific and Technology Advisory Panel of
the Global Environment Facility (STAP / GEF) from 2005 to 2008.
Yolanda has been the President of WWF International since January 2010.
Afshan Khan
Afshan has been Director of Emergency Programmes in UNICEF
since August 2014, leading strategic and coordinated support in
mobilizing UNICEF’s humanitarian response globally.
From 2012 to 2014, she served as President and Chief Executive
Officer (CEO) of Women for Women International (WfWI).
Prior to joining WfWI, Afshan had a career spanning more than 25
years with the United Nations, mainly with UNICEF. She was
Director of UNICEF's Public-Sector Alliances and Resource
Mobilization from 2008 to 2012, and Associate Director for the
Eastern and Southern Africa from 2006 to 2008.
She also served as UNICEF Country Representative in Jamaica,
and worked in Eastern Zaire, Mozambique and Kenya. Afshan
also worked for the Secretary-General’s Office and the United
Nations Development Group (UNDG).
Paul Gilding
Paul is an environmentalist, author and campaigner
on issues such as clean seas and human rights.
Between 1989 and 1994 he was Executive Director
of Greenpeace Australia and then Greenpeace
International.
In 1995 he founded Ecos Corporation, a ground-breaking
consultancy tackling sustainability issues at companies
including DuPont, Diageo and ANZ Bank.
At Ecos, Paul built the start-up Easy Being Green to drive
mass consumer action on energy efficiency via carbon trading.
It delivered energy efficient lighting into over 600,000
households and established domestic energy efficiency as
a mainstream consumer and policy opportunity in Australia.
Paul continues to advise companies and is a Fellow at Cambridge
University’s Institute for Sustainability Leadership (CISL).
He is a member of the Global Core Faculty of the Prince of
Wales’s Business and Sustainability Programme run by CISL
and is Chairman of its Australian programme where he lectures
and facilitates senior executive seminars and special programmes.