Florence Kollie Raja is the founder and director of Ethical Era and the creator of the 2030 Positive Planet Agenda, ‘Mapping Sustainability’ concept and ‘Sustainability Metrics Standardisation Proposal’.

Florence came to the sustainability sector via her public sector work where she worked with the UK Parliament, European Parliament and Local Governments for a decade. She has a deep knowledge of the political landscape, both national and international and extensive experience working with policymakers.

Having originally trained as a ballet dancer before university studies, Raja has a strong passion for the Arts Sector and sits on various arts and creative industries related boards with a deep understanding of the performing arts.

Prior to Ethical Era, Florence spent five years researching and testing sustainability concepts in fashion at a start up level which led her to explore all factors relating to sustainability and climate change with a specialisation in sustainable fashion. 

Raja is also a founder of a Sustainable Fashion Platform, Ethical Era which will be launched in 2020. 

 

 

 You are a trained ballet dancer, previously worked in Finance, ex politician and now the Director of Ethical Era - can you kindly share your journey with us 

 

I have had an uncommon and most wonderful life. I think it is hard to plan life in the context of ‘the journey’. We all make plans and then life just happens. I am of mixed cultural background; Liberian/Guinean/Russian/Ukrainian. Arts and education were always very important within our household. I studied the traditional subjects at school but was blessed to grow up in the surroundings of art and culture. My parents both had conventional jobs but were both artists; my mother a classical pianist by training and my father a jazz trumpeter. Though my mother tutored me on the piano originally, I gravitated towards ballet. The arts opened every single door for me in my life- it landed me both academic and music scholarships at secondary school level and laid every foundation, integrity and authenticity of everything I have achieved during the course of a career that has spanned 6 sectors.

 

Whilst still studying at school, at the tender age of 16, I joined a visionary ballet company called Ballet Black, part time. I danced with the company and continued with my education both A Levels and University studies behind the scenes. 

 

I was the baby of the ballet company and it taught me so much so early on. Only in hindsight, I now realise I was one of the first POC ballerinas in the UK and that Ballet Black (UK) alongside Dance Theatre of Harlem (US) laid the foundations for future ethnic ballerinas to follow. I did not realise how revolutionary or important our work was – all I wanted to do is dance and did not think of my skin colour or body shape. Now I look back with awe at what we started and what we contributed to with the visionary artistic directors who founded these companies. Now you have ‘bronze/brown’ ballet pointe shoes vs just pink. What a change in the arts sector.  

When I finished university, I decided sadly not to continue with dance as there were no opportunities for mixed race/black dancers at the time beyond Ballet Black so I hung up my pointe shoes and retired at 21. 

 

My subject at university was politics as a major with economics and international relations minors which left it open ended as to a future career I could pursue. From that point on the arts world became a distant memory as I worked in Asset Management for the best part of a decade. 

During this same period of working in finance I accidently stumbled into politics. I ran a community campaign on environmental issues in the local area I lived in and it seems that at a very young age I stood up to the corporate might and prevented a few money grabbing companies which had no consideration for the environment or community from exploiting the community. It was honestly not the plan but I hate injustice and when I decide to do something boy do I go for it. There are no half measures in my books. This attitude landed me on the UK Parliamentary candidates list. 

 

Thereafter I worked extensively in grassroots level and community projects within schools/ elderly communities/environment/planning you name it. I was called upon to run for local elections at that point and rose up the ranks over a couple of years due to my reputation at grassroots level to run for UK Parliament and for European Parliament. It was quite surreal as by day I was working in Business Development within Asset Management and in the evenings and weekends I was moonlighting as a politician. None of my work colleagues at the time knew that I had two jobs. I kept the two worlds quite separate.

 

Post having children I found neither the politics work nor the asset management work accommodating to the new chapter in my life of motherhood. I then started a brand when I was at home with my son. It was an Ethical womenswear brand called Buqa Life focused on making fashion inclusive and connecting with artisans to give them access to the fashion market. Over the next couple of years, I focused on my two children and on sustainable fashion/ethics research and design experimentation which led me to the world of sustainability and climate change as all the pieces of the environmental/humanitarian issue fell into place in my work and in my mind. It was very much so an awakening piecing together politics, economics and the world of industry all relating to planet and people. 

 

Since my children have become older, I have now been able to start capitalising on the lifetime of work up to this point. I realised that I have an expertise across finance, arts, fashion, politics, tech, sustainability and more and in this light, I decided to work full time for myself and one of my most recent ventures of many has been ETHICAL ERA- a sustainability collaborative intelligence platform. I also realised that sustainability applies to every single sector be it fashion, finance or farming and at this point I decided to use my expertise of policy/sustainability for all the sectors I have access to. Sometimes my work within these sectors are separate to sustainability and focused on that sector individually sometimes the work is sustainability orientated.

 

Working for myself has allowed me to re-access my creativity and to work in a format that suits me, my family and mostly to use my multi- talents rather than being pigeon holed to only use one skill set at a time -when I can deliver 20 to the world. It allows me to be the truest version of myself and that person is a strange juxtaposition of artist, advocate, policymaker, sustainability specialist, AI enthusiast, finance specialist, teacher and well more. I think that in this day and age having one career is a very dated concept. 

 

   You are a mother, wife and entrepreneur, how do you juggle motherhood and your career?

 

After I had my children I restructured my whole life to accommodate the change. I felt the world and the institutions at which I previously worked were not accommodating to family life or what’s best for people and wellbeing generally and so I jumped ship and became an entrepreneur working for myself in various capacities. I have no answer as to how one can juggle when one stays within the institutional framework vs setting something up of one’s own. I felt it was impossible to work for others and that the institutions I worked for were aggressive towards motherhood/parenting. You are in a trap of working like you have no children and to parent like you have no work.

 

Working for oneself does not mean one works less - in fact your hours will be longer but when those days come when your kids are ill or when the 8 week summer holidays hit there is no panic as to where to send the kids. The kids stay with me and I work from home. It isn’t easy but at least I feel like I am working by ‘my rules’ of what I feel is best for me and my family. 

Bringing up the citizens of tomorrow is a job and a job that should be respected and rewarded by state and society. 

 

 

The Ethical Era is about creating and tracking a Sustainability Future, how would you define sustainability? 

 

Considerate to planet and people. Directly and indirectly in the supply chain/ infrastructure of a company/institution.

Sustainability also belongs to the fourth industrial revolution concept - in that it IS the future.

If your business/industry/sector is not building in sustainability and tech/AI you are not future ready. 

The bigger reality is that ‘future’ is in fact already here. 

 

 

   Why is creating a sustainable Future so important Now more than ever? 

 

Simply put- as per the scientific information detailed in the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report- we have a decade to save our planet and 2020 is the most important year in human history to begin this work.

 

 

    A lot of people find ‘sustainability’ quite daunting - what would you say to them. 

 

I would say ignore the activism and political side of sustainability. Sustainability is not all marches, placards and opposition to the powers that be. Without a doubt we have a big job to dismantle a world and framework that is built on exploitation and abuse of both planet and people however this isn’t all that sustainability is about. Sustainability is about looking inside your heart and conscience and asking oneself what kind of world we want to be part of in the future and indeed whether we will even have a world if we continue on the current projectory. 

Our generation have been tasked with something most formidable in that we are the first generation to realise the effects and dangers of the limits we have taken our planet to and we are also the last generation that can change it. That can feel impossible when you look at it at such a grand scale. Especially let’s say as a mother and working woman sitting at home thinking what can I ‘one overworked woman’ possibly do. But we have to look at it this way that when 7 billion people say ‘I cannot’ then we are seriously in trouble. My message is a little simpler. 

One needs to 

• ·       Not look away- become comfortable with the uncomfortable. This will put pressure on institutions when all eyes are on them.
• ·       Consider our responsibility to our children and to the future generations. 
• ·       Think globally but act locally. Tackle things within your own jurisdiction. In your home, your own company your own industry. 

 

Also note many of the solutions and innovations already exist we just need to convince institutions, orgs and companies to adopt them. 

 

The most dangerous phrase in the world is- We’ve always done it that way. This is what we need to challenge and change. 

 

   What can I do to access the world of sustainable fashion?

 

·         Explore sustainable fashion and sustainable fashion methodologies. SME Slow Fashion like Florian London UK is a good way to start. Florian London UK are strong on the ethics of the labour by utilising ethical manufacturers and producing at low volumes.

·         Explore Vintage Fashion- like William Vintage (used by the Duchess of Sussex and Amal Clooney).

·         Explore Second Hand Fashion- central London charity shops are as good as vintage stores.

·         Buy less. Buy quality. Go got style vs fashion. Fashion says ‘me too’ style states ‘only me’. 

·         Explore Sustainable Fashion designers- 

·         Explore sustainability at the mainstream companies who are trying - buying their pieces will encourage them to do more- Zara ‘Join Life’, H&M ‘Conscious’, Gap ‘For Good’, M&S ‘Responsibly sourced cotton ranges’ etc. It is to be noted that these ranges still fall short on humanitarian and environmental ethics however this is often the price point for the majority of the public so we must work to convert these companies to sustainable models and encourage them to slow down on the volume and speed of production. 

·         Explore renting - HURR (pop up currently at Selfridges), My Wardrobe HQ (pop up currently at Liberty) and Modern Closet are my favourites. Hoping that Rent the Runway makes its way across to the UK too.

·         Follow sustainable fashion/ sustainability advocates on Instagram to learn more

·         Buy a ‘GuppyFriend Bag’ for your washing machine. They cost approx. £30 but trap all of the micro plastic from your washing machine from your synthetic clothes like polyester, acrylic, nylon etc. As much of the plastic in the ocean is from our clothes and from our washing machines vs the obvious plastic. Micro plastic is showcasing to be present in our food in our rain and far more. So trapping this micro plastic in our washing machines is very key. 

·         Note charity shops are excellent to shop at but are not an option for buying a lot yourself to then send things to charity shops yourself. Charity shops only sell on just under 20% of the donated clothes they receive. The other 80% is shipped off to other countries to landfills or to be sold on- where it has disrupted local artisan trade and other issues.

 

I would also encourage women to:

 

·         Learn about sustainability because it will be very important to your business and sector in the coming years so better to be ahead of the curve personally and professionally.

·         Develop your sustainability policy for your business to future proof your work. 

·         Watch The True Cost movie on Netflix to understand the human cost to girls/women globally of how fashion is made.

·         Read Fashionopolis by Dana Thomas.

·         Reconnect to nature and the world around you to understand its value.

·         Write to/email your MP. It is their job to address your constituent concerns. You voted them into power in your area to represent you in the UK Parliament and you have the right to write to them regularly about your concerns about the planet and what actions policymakers are taken to address these concerns. Individual MP letters are far more effective than petitions. Ask your MP why approximately 91% of recyclable waste is not recycled. Challenge them on this. We are making an effort as citizens so why is the government not building an infrastructure to recycle these items for us. 

·         Use your Instagram account to speak about the sustainability issues as and when you can.

·         Consider bringing up sustainability as something to explore at the companies you work at. 

·         Learn to consume other things beyond fashion like art and culture- go to the ballet, opera, art galleries. Fashion is a defining part of our identity with great beauty and joy attached to it. 

However, unless it is your actual business then it should only be one part of a much larger picture of one’s life. What shines is the woman- the clothes just accentuate the woman. 

 

 

How can women empower other women?

 

If anyone follows my Instagram account, they will find that I am renowned for my positivity however, on this subject sadly I think I will have to be truthful. Women can empower women by not tearing each other down.

 

Women can also therefore empower women by actually supporting each other. Simple. 

 

When women authentically support each other magic happens. 

 

It is also really easy to support women you know well and are comfortable with however test yourself to support that absolutely ravishing, successful woman, who turns heads and shines bright who happens to walk into your social circle next with an open heart. She probably thought the same thing about you when you walked into the room. 

 

You can learn more about the work of ETHICAL ERA at www.ethicalera.co.uk or contact Florence Kollie Raja at enquries@ethicalera.co.uk