Green Jobs: Resources for Jobs & Careers in Sustainable Products
A lot of folks ask us about resources for finding jobs and career opportunities in the $300 billion "Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability" market.
A lot of folks ask us about resources for finding jobs and career opportunities in the $300 billion LOHAS market, i.e., the "Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability" market for natural, organic, eco-friendly, and socially and environmentally responsible products and services. There are a lot of great companies and NGOs in the LOHAS market, from organic food to renewable energy and from yoga to green building. In fact, with significant growth in demand for natural, organic and sustainable products, according to the Organic Trade Association, the organic food industry is creating jobs at a much higher rate than the conventional food industry.
Here are some good resources below for finding jobs in the natural and organic foods and sustainable products industry, and for social and environmental mission based organizations.
Of course, if you identify companies you'd like to work for, check their websites. Often, the larger companies, such as Whole Foods Market, UNFI, Pacific Natural Foods, Earthbound Farm, and other brand leaders will have job postings on their own websites. Do some research of your favorite brands.
We welcome your comments and suggestions to add to the list.
Hope this helps get you started. Happy green job hunting!
Green Job Resources
Green Dream Jobs. You can search by level and region. Awesome resource presented by our friends at SustainableBusiness.com
Luke's Circle is a great resource for sales, marketing, management and executive level jobs in the Denver/Boulder region, created by our friend and colleague Luke Vernon. www.lukescircle.com
GreenBiz has a great sustainable jobs board. http://jobs.greenbiz.com
Just Means job listings have a social mission and NGO focus. http://www.justmeans.com/alljobs
Natural and Organic Industry Careers and Resources. A good compendium of industry resources and job opportunities. http://www.naturalindustryjobs.com
Food Force posts career opportunities with natural, organic, specialty and conventional food companies and brand leaders. http://www.foodforce.com
The Green Jobs Network "empowers people seeking careers in sustainability and environmental responsibility to find jobs, career resources, and build their professional network." http://www.greenjobs.net
Naturally Boulder is another resource for job listings in the Boulder/Denver region. https://www.naturallyboulder.org/resources/jobs/
World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms. Wanting a Peace Corps-like volunteer experience, but on an organic farm somewhere around the world where you can learn about organic agriculture? Feeling young and adventurous? Check out WWOOF. http://www.wwoof.org
Green Career Guide job thread. http://greencareerguide.jobthread.com
California Certified Organic Farmers, an excellent organization for organic producers, posts job listings. http://www.ccof.org/classifieds.php#emp
ReWork: Founded in 2011 by alumni of the Unreasonable Institute in Boulder, ReWork helps people find careers in values-based, socially responsible and sustainable businesses. http://rework.jobs/talent
Project NOSH: Project NOSH covers the world of entrepreneurial food companies and services that are expanding rapidly due to interest in Natural, Organic, Sustainable, and Healthy (NOSH) products and businesses. Project NOSH helps food and beverage companies to find the right employees, and develop business success. http://www.projectnosh.com/jobs
VeganJobs.com is a free global vegan job and resume hub operated by vegans for vegans and plant-based/vegan-oriented businesses and organizations. https://veganjobs.com/
Food+Tech Jobs: Search for tech, business, design, sales, marketing, operations and PR jobs at leading food companies. https://jobs.foodtechconnect.com/
Food Industry Executive launched its job board in April 2018, and while it is still building steam, it should prove to be a good resource for senior level career opportunities in the food business. http://foodindustryexecutive.com/jobs/
Green Jobs Network contains more than 100 environmental and social impact jobs. If you apply for one of these opportunities, please indicate that you learned about it from Green Jobs Network. https://mailchi.mp/f56a682687be/gjn-july2020
Jobganic: Are you organic, natural, and eco-conscious driven? Looking for jobs opportunities that give you greater satisfaction and that fit your healthy lifestyle? Let recruiters at leading and emerging companies discover you at Jobganic. https://jobganic.com/
SENPA: The Job Board for Natural Products Retailers and Manufacturers. Post a Job. Find a Job. List Your Resume. Find a Candidate. All Natural Products. All in One Place. https://jobs.senpa.org/
One Step Closer: This network of purpose-driven, values-aligned CEOs in the natural products industry offers a job board. Find a job or post a job. https://jobs.osc2.org/jobs/f7222645-9802-4378-a7dd-0ffab0308480
Naturally Network: Search or post jobs on the board at Naturally Network, the natural and organic products ecosystem. https://jobs.naturallynetwork.org/
Green Jobs: Resources for Jobs & Careers in Sustainable Products
A lot of folks ask us about resources for finding jobs and career opportunities in the $300 billion "Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability" market.
A lot of folks ask us about resources for finding jobs and career opportunities in the $300 billion LOHAS market, i.e., the "Lifestyles of Health and Sustainability" market for natural, organic, eco-friendly, and socially and environmentally responsible products and services. There are a lot of great companies and NGOs in the LOHAS market, from organic food to renewable energy and from yoga to green building. In fact, with significant growth in demand for natural, organic and sustainable products, according to the Organic Trade Association, the organic food industry is creating jobs at a much higher rate than the conventional food industry.
Here are some good resources below for finding jobs in the natural and organic foods and sustainable products industry, and for social and environmental mission based organizations.
Of course, if you identify companies you'd like to work for, check their websites. Often, the larger companies, such as Whole Foods Market, UNFI, Pacific Natural Foods, Earthbound Farm, and other brand leaders will have job postings on their own websites. Do some research of your favorite brands.
We welcome your comments and suggestions to add to the list.
Hope this helps get you started. Happy green job hunting!
Green Job Resources
Green Dream Jobs. You can search by level and region. Awesome resource presented by our friends at SustainableBusiness.com
Luke's Circle is a great resource for sales, marketing, management and executive level jobs in the Denver/Boulder region, created by our friend and colleague Luke Vernon. www.lukescircle.com
GreenBiz has a great sustainable jobs board. http://jobs.greenbiz.com
Just Means job listings have a social mission and NGO focus. http://www.justmeans.com/alljobs
Natural and Organic Industry Careers and Resources. A good compendium of industry resources and job opportunities. http://www.naturalindustryjobs.com
Food Force posts career opportunities with natural, organic, specialty and conventional food companies and brand leaders. http://www.foodforce.com
The Green Jobs Network "empowers people seeking careers in sustainability and environmental responsibility to find jobs, career resources, and build their professional network." http://www.greenjobs.net
Naturally Boulder is another resource for job listings in the Boulder/Denver region. https://www.naturallyboulder.org/resources/jobs/
World Wide Opportunities on Organic Farms. Wanting a Peace Corps-like volunteer experience, but on an organic farm somewhere around the world where you can learn about organic agriculture? Feeling young and adventurous? Check out WWOOF. http://www.wwoof.org
Green Career Guide job thread. http://greencareerguide.jobthread.com
California Certified Organic Farmers, an excellent organization for organic producers, posts job listings. http://www.ccof.org/classifieds.php#emp
ReWork: Founded in 2011 by alumni of the Unreasonable Institute in Boulder, ReWork helps people find careers in values-based, socially responsible and sustainable businesses. http://rework.jobs/talent
Project NOSH: Project NOSH covers the world of entrepreneurial food companies and services that are expanding rapidly due to interest in Natural, Organic, Sustainable, and Healthy (NOSH) products and businesses. Project NOSH helps food and beverage companies to find the right employees, and develop business success. http://www.projectnosh.com/jobs
VeganJobs.com is a free global vegan job and resume hub operated by vegans for vegans and plant-based/vegan-oriented businesses and organizations. https://veganjobs.com/
Food+Tech Jobs: Search for tech, business, design, sales, marketing, operations and PR jobs at leading food companies. https://jobs.foodtechconnect.com/
Food Industry Executive launched its job board in April 2018, and while it is still building steam, it should prove to be a good resource for senior level career opportunities in the food business. http://foodindustryexecutive.com/jobs/
Green Jobs Network contains more than 100 environmental and social impact jobs. If you apply for one of these opportunities, please indicate that you learned about it from Green Jobs Network. https://mailchi.mp/f56a682687be/gjn-july2020
Jobganic: Are you organic, natural, and eco-conscious driven? Looking for jobs opportunities that give you greater satisfaction and that fit your healthy lifestyle? Let recruiters at leading and emerging companies discover you at Jobganic. https://jobganic.com/
SENPA: The Job Board for Natural Products Retailers and Manufacturers. Post a Job. Find a Job. List Your Resume. Find a Candidate. All Natural Products. All in One Place. https://jobs.senpa.org/
One Step Closer: This network of purpose-driven, values-aligned CEOs in the natural products industry offers a job board. Find a job or post a job. https://jobs.osc2.org/jobs/f7222645-9802-4378-a7dd-0ffab0308480
Appetite for Organic Tops $35 Billion
The organic products industry grew to be a $35-billion business in 2013, reported the Organic Trade Association (OTA) in May 2014.
The organic products industry grew to be a $35-billion business in 2013, reported the Organic Trade Association (OTA) in May 2014. The reported 11.5% increase from 2012 is the fastest growth rate in the last five years. The OTA expects this growth will continue over the next two years. “Consumers are making the correlation between what we eat and our health, and that knowledge is spurring heightened consumer interest in organic products,” said Laura Batcha, executive director and CEO of OTA.
Organic products are comprised of foods, flowers, fiber, household products and pet food. Organic food sales, which accounts for about 92% of total organic sales, were $32.3 billion in 2013. Organic food sales broke the $30 billion mark in 2012 and, according to the OTA, now accounts for more than 4% of the $760 billion in annual food sales in the United States. While total foods sales have averaged an annual average growth of 3%, the growth rate of organic food sales has grown an average of 10% every year since 2010.
Although continued growth is expected in the sale of organic products, there is still confusion among consumers about what organic means. The message of organic can be lost next to the presence of “natural” products and the long debate around GMOs, cautioned the OTA.
“The entire organic industry needs to rally around helping consumers better understand and appreciate all the values that certified organic brings to the table,” said Batcha. “Consumer education is critical to grow the organic industry,” she added.
Health Conundrum: Pesticides in Tea
If tea is not organically grown, toxic synthetic pesticide residues can remain on conventionally grown tea leaves until the first time they touch water.
Source: Wikimedia Commons
When companies sell non-organic tea produced with pesticides, what are consumers really sipping?
Tea, an ancient plant first discovered in China, is today arguably the most popular beverage in the world. Millions of people from every corner of the world drink tea primarily for its many health benefits and soothing, energetic and/or medicinal qualities.
Yet, many consumers may not know that tea leaves are primarily dried and not washed after they are harvested. Why is that important? If the tea is not organically grown, toxic synthetic pesticide residues can – and sometimes do – remain on conventionally grown tea leaves until the first time they touch water – in your cup.
Residues Exceed Limits
Organizations including Greenpeace and CBC News conducted independent testing on tea leaves, and found that 59% of samples tested contained pesticide residues in excess of EU government limits. Testing also found that 67% of tea leaves sampled in India contained residues of the pesticide DDT, banned in India since 1989 and in the US since 1972. Some teas were found to contain more than one pesticide, and one tea product tested by CBC, the Canadian Broadcast Corporation, contained 22 different pesticides.
“Some of the pesticides found – including endosulfan and monocrotophos — are in the process of being banned from use in some countries because of dangers to the environment and to workers,” CBC said in an article on March 8, 2014. Endosulfan has been banned globally under the Stockholm Convention due to its particularly toxic properties.
Additionally, Greenpeace in 2013 randomly tested 18 tea products from China – the world’s largest tea producer and one of the world’s largest users of pesticides – and found that “a whopping 12 of the 18 samples tested contained at least one pesticide banned [in China] for use on tea.”
Even teas carrying “natural” claims may not be immune to pesticide residues if they have been conventionally grown using synthetic pesticides, reports Vani Hari, editor and publisher of Food Babe, a blog dedicated to promoting healthy lifestyles and investigating food companies and their products.
Don’t Panic – Drink Organic!
So what’s a tea lover who wants to avoid pesticide residues to do? Friends of the Earth suggests drinking tea that is organically produced without the use of toxic, synthetic insecticides, herbicides or fertilizers.
One tea maker, Belight Tea of Phoenix, AZ, offered this advice to tea drinkers on its blog:
“Generally speaking, white tea tends to have the least pesticide residues; black tea the most. That has to do with picking time: the longer the leaves are on the bush, the more they are exposed to, whether intentionally or inadvertently.”
Another organic tea company adds, “From the outset, we’ve been committed to 100% organic cultivation,” said Linda Appel Lipsius, Co-Founder and CEO of Denver-based Teatulia Organic Teas. Teatulia sources its teas from its own 3,000-acre, USDA Certified Organic and Rainforest Alliance Certified tea garden in Northern Bangladesh. “Transparency is key where possible,” she said. “Since we are the farmers, organic tea produced without the use of toxic, synthetic pesticides is something we have always been able to guarantee.“
Working for Healthy People, Healthy Planet and Sustainable Business
The gulf coast is one of the richest nurseries of our major fisheries, and an eco-system beyond compare. It is delicate. And it is being devastated by the spill.
When I was 15 years old and between my sophomore and junior years of high school, I had the tremendous opportunity to study marine biology and oceanography at the college level at Louisiana State University in Baton Rouge. In a 12-week program for high schoolers, I was awarded a scholarship by the National Science Foundation. My parents packed me in a bus at Port Authority in New York, and off I went for the first time away from home. It was then, on a field trip with my fellow program students, that I discovered my commitment to the environment. We were visiting a state fisheries research station on an uninhabited barrier island protecting Louisiana’s marshlands from the Gulf of Mexico. It was a spectacular place. After dinner we were all goofing off and went out for a swim at night in the gulf. It was while we were in the water that a group of a dozen wild horses galloped down the beach, right in front of our eyes on a moonlit night.
This recollection has come back to me very strongly in the wake of the massive oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico that continues to pour out at this moment. The gulf coast is one of the richest nurseries of our major fisheries, and an eco-system beyond compare. It is delicate. And it is being devastated by the spill.
The dead zone in the Gulf of Mexico was already an issue. Threatening to kill the area’s $3 billion fisheries industry, the dead zone is caused by synthetic nitrogen fertilizer runoff from conventional agriculture that travels down the Mississippi River and empties into the gulf. Algae feed on the cheap nitrogen and deplete the waters of oxygen, killing all sea life in the region.
Organic agriculture is a solution to the synthetic nitrogen runoff problem, since these chemicals are prohibited under certified organic standards. Additionally, organic agriculture uses on average 30% less energy inputs and is less reliant on fossil fuels. Additionally, healthy organic soils tie up more carbon, keeping it out of the atmosphere and thus helping to reduce agriculture’s impact on global warming. (Agriculture contributes more than 20% of greenhouse gases toward global warming.)
In today’s news, I read about new research conducted by the University of Montreal and published in the journal Pediatrics. In the study, which followed 1,139 children and interviews with parents, researchers found a strong link between children’s attention deficit disorder (ADHD) and exposure to commonly used pesticides on fruits and vegetables. The researchers found toxic, synthetic organophosphate pesticide residues in the urine of 94% of the kids tested. In 2008, an Emory University study found that when kids switched to organically grown fruits and vegetables in the diet, urine levels of the pesticides dropped to undetectable levels.
There is more substantial data out there that links pesticide use to childhood autism, obesity and early onset diabetes. Endocrine disruptors in pesticides and plastic packaging threaten the metabolism and development of our kids—and also all of us are exposed to the same chemicals. It’s just that the kids soak up more per body weight and are much more impacted by these chemicals in their childhood development.
At Compass Natural, we are working to help communicate the benefits of an economic system that accounts for the significant external costs to our health and environment. If you saw such a system in place, then we would also see the true value of natural, organic and sustainable products and businesses, which help keep these costly toxic chemicals out of our bodies, homes and environment. It would put polluting, toxic industries at a competitive disadvantage.
Speaking of which, I hope BP, Halliburton and the other companies involved in the oil spill, that were pointing fingers of blame at each other in congressional hearings, pay through the nose to account somewhat for this oil spill. I don’t care if they go bankrupt over it; it would be a lesson to others. But no amount of money is going to be able to prevent the impact of the environmental destruction already done. Now there’s an external cost that needs to be accounted for.