FORT LAUDERDALE, FL - Bruce Nelson, chairman and CEO of Office Depot will address business leaders and professors from around the world as part of the World Resources Institute's 2003 BELL Conference which opens today at Florida Atlantic University's Fort Lauderdale Campus.

"The theme of this year's Bell Conference - Ecosystems and Enterprise: Perspectives on Education for Sustainable Business - is particularly appropriate for us as we continue to balance our desire to be a good corporate citizen with the demands of running a profitable business," said Nelson. "Office Depot's approach to sustainability is reflected not just in our business, but in our values."

More than 200 business educators and corporate professionals will attend this year's Business-Environment-Learning-Leadership (BELL) Conference. Attendees of the 3-day conference will take part in panel discussions on issues of sustainability, the latest research on corporate accountability, and innovative environmentally sound technologies.

"It's important to have today's business leaders support the concept of environmental education for the business leaders of tomorrow," said Jonathan Lash, president of the World Resources Institute (WRI). "Stated sustainability commitments by companies like Office Depot should encourage business educators to add environmental content to their core curriculum."

The conference exposes business schools to new tools and ideas designed to integrate social and environmental curricula into traditional business tracks that will train thousands of future business leaders. Ecosystems and Enterprise is also the latest installment of BELL's Executive Education program, sharing ways to harness the power of business to create profitable solutions to environmental and development challenges.

WRI launched the BELL program in 1991 to fill a void in business education. In 1990, no business school in America offered an environment class. Today, the BELL network includes business professors and programs from most of the top business schools across North America and has spawned a series of environment programs with business schools throughout China and Latin America.

The BELL program (http://bell.wri.org) is a one-of-a-kind effort that focuses on greening management courses through curriculum resources, MBA benchmarking, and field experience. The annual BELL conferences act as a platform for exposing professors to new tools and methods and the sharing of green curricula. BELL's biennial report, Beyond Grey Pinstripes 2003 (http://www.beyondgreypinstripes.org), co-produced with the Aspen Institute, evaluates how well MBA programs train their students to manage for sustainability. A partnership with Environmental Enterprise Corps (EEC) allows hundreds of BELL students to work with entrepreneurs in Latin America to gain first hand field experience in sustainable enterprise.

The 2003 BELL conference is co-hosted by the Council for Sustainable Florida (CSF), Florida Department of Environmental Protection, Educational Alliance for a Sustainable Florida (EASF), and Florida Atlantic University College of Business.

The World Resources Institute (http://www.wri.org/wri) is an environmental research and policy organization that creates solutions to protect the Earth and improve people's lives.

World Resources Institute

World Resources Institute

The World Resources Institute (WRI) is an environmental think tank that goes beyond research to find practical ways to protect the earth and improve people's lives. Our mission is to move human society to live in ways that protect Earth's environment and its capacity to provide for the needs and aspirations of current and future generations. Because people are inspired by ideas, empowered by knowledge, and moved to change by greater understanding, WRI provides—and helps other institutions provide—objective information and practical proposals for policy and institutional change that will foster environmentally sound, socially equitable development. WRI organizes its work around four key goals:

People & Ecosystems: Reverse rapid degradation of ecosystems and assure their capacity to provide humans with needed goods and services.

Access: Guarantee public access to information and decisions regarding natural resources and the environment.

Climate Protection: Protect the global climate system from further harm due to emissions of greenhouse gases and help humanity and the natural world adapt to unavoidable climate change.

Markets & Enterprise: Harness markets and enterprise to expand economic opportunity and protect the environment.

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