Consumer tastes need to change further in order to make the business case for a green economy, but they are already evolving, says Roger Martin, dean of management at the University of Toronto. “I think the prosperity impact of environmental challenges will be absolutely dwarfed by the attitudinal changes, absolutely dwarfed,” Mr. Martin said yesterday.

A total 62 percent of active investors say global warming could affect their investment decisions, following the UK’s warmest 12-month period on record. Some 14 percent of 1,000 active investors polled by the Association of Investment Companies (AIC) said climate change would definitely affect their investment decisions and 48 percent said it might do.

Annabel Brodie-Smith, communications director at the AIC, said: “With 2007 predicted to be the warmest year ever, it’s obvious that global warming has become an issue for active investors.”

Companies in Hungary are beginning to see the benefits of social responsibility, according to Kincső Adriány, from the Hungarian Business Leaders’ Forum Corporate responsibility in Hungary is “getting there”, says Kincső Adriány, executive director of the Hungarian Business Leaders’ Forum. Levels of practice and understanding are broadly comparable to those in the Czech Republic, Poland and Slovakia, but reaching western European standards could take “ten, 20, even 25 years”.

After squabbling over prices for decades, the nation’s big-box retail chains are ready to battle in a new arena: the environment.

The global market in carbon trading tripled last year to $30bn (£15bn) but its role in the battle against climate change could be hit by worries about the effectiveness of unregulated carbon offset projects, the World Bank warned yesterday.

Selling carbon sequestration credits early in the growth of a forest lets forest stewards realize some money more quickly, rather than waiting for decades for the harvest.