Founding & Vision

Sustainability was a key motivation for Justus to found fast forward classical and one of the most important reasons for Dorothea to join him. We understand sustainability holistically with its three dimensions: ecological, social and economic. We are therefore actively committed to our vision of an environmentally friendly, diverse and inclusive classical music industry.

Declarations

As a first step, we held ourselves accountable by signing the declarations by Culture4Climate and Music Declares Emergency. While Music Declares Emergency focuses on the reduction of greenhouse gases in the music industry and thus the ecological aspect of sustainability, Culture4Climate refers to the United Nations' 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, which 17 goals (Social Development Goals, SDGs) also include sustainability in the social and economic sense. With this holistic approach, cultural professionals should not only work towards a lower carbon footprint but also for a higher social impact. However, it is important that this declaration does not become more important than that of Music Declares Emergency, because the slogan says it all: No Music On A Dead Planet. All efforts for a sustainable and diverse society are useless if there is no society left because of the climate catastrophe (a criticism of the equivalence of the three aspects that is often overlooked).

Qualification

Sustainability is becoming increasingly important in the classical music industry as well, and more and more information can be found on the subject. Nevertheless, it was important for us to understand the topic fundamentally and approach it strategically. Based on this, as well as her previous involvement with and passion for sustainability, Dorothea began training to become a certified sustainability manager in culture, media and education at the Institut für Zukunftskultur in March 2023. The content of the training included fact checks on climate change, law and policy, as well as a detailed insight into strategic sustainability management and how to support a cultural organisation in such a process.

Dorothea successfully completed the training in June 2023. For the final exam, she and five other people from the field of popular music looked at social sustainability at festivals and how it can be measured. In November 2023 the group received a scholarship for the project, which will be used to further develop the idea and test it in summer 2024.

This training qualifies Dorothea to support and accompany cultural organisations in their sustainability process. No matter how far along a company is in such a process, it makes sense to systematise it in order to implement measures efficiently and to be able to demonstrate progress and potential for improvement. If you are interested or have any questions about strategic sustainability management, please do not hesitate to contact Dorothea.

CO2 accounting

In order to get an overview of the environmental impact of fast forward classical, we are currently working on calculating our carbon footprint. We are collecting data on all our activities that cause greenhouse gas emissions in order to subsequently measure our environmental footprint and get a status quo of our work. This accounting will show us areas where we need to improve and reduce our emissions. Of course, we already strive to work in a low-emission way: we avoid air travel whenever possible, cycle to our paperless office in the ecologically and socially engaged Werkhof in Hamburg Ottensen and both of us eat a vegetarian diet. But there are always so-called hotspots that you can work on, and we hope to be able to identify and improve these with a CO2 balance sheet.

Sustainability strategy

Based on our current carbon footprint, we want to develop a sustainability strategy for fast forward classical in order to reduce our emissions and to be able to manage our goals. However, sustainability is not only purely ecological; we also have to act accordingly in economic and social terms. Be it an account with an ethical bank or a diverse artist roster, there are many fields of action in and measures with which one can make a difference. We will publish our sustainability strategy here as soon as it is ready.

Network

Together you are less alone - this is also, or especially, true for sustainability. We welcome partners who support gender-equal and diverse representation on and off stage, question their own environmental impact and promote inclusion. Here, too, we are already working on collaborations to accelerate the extensive goal of a sustainable cultural industry, more on that later.