Therefore, this means the path to a sustainable future will be different depending on the specific country, industry or business.

In Australia, creating a sustainable future will involve challenges, but more importantly it will also include a vast array of opportunities for us to develop economic and technological advantages.

This extraordinary opportunity to transform our way of life and economy and develop economic and technological advantages is why we need to elevate and continue the conversation about these issues, and why now more than ever all parts of the Australian community need be pulling in the same direction.

For this reason, the Australian Financial Review and Westpac Institutional Bank recently brought together six of the nation’s leading CEOs to consider what a sustainable future looks like for their organisations and industries.

The insights from this discussion were fascinating. Those present provided a range of new perspectives on the broad challenge ahead of us — which admittedly is a daunting one. However, it was clear these CEOs have also been thinking deeply about how to drive sustainability in their respective fields.

As one noted, the transition to achieve sustainability isn’t straightforward, but most business leaders already know off the top of their head what would make the biggest difference in their industry. Challenges almost always come with opportunities.

For example, we have challenges in finding ways to reduce emissions from aviation, but we also have an opportunity to develop a sustainable aviation fuel industry that could create thousands of new, highly skilled jobs.

We have to find ways to reduce emissions in agriculture, but we have some of the most skilled and innovative farmers in the world who have for decades been at the forefront of dealing with changing climactic conditions.

We need to support our farmers and their focus on sustainability, not only for our own food security but also to further enhance the value of our offering into our target agricultural export markets.

One shared global challenge is how to mine the critical minerals we need in a low-carbon manner — but in Australia we are fortunate to have huge deposits of many minerals that are critical to renewable energy projects and batteries that will be in high demand, along with some of the most technically advanced mining methods.

If we are smart and timely in our efforts, there will be myriad new opportunities to explore how to value-add in processing. I think the opportunities are particularly promising in rare earths.

Geopolitical tensions will continue to pose challenges to the sustainability of our supply chains — but the AUKUS initiative will provide a host of unique opportunities in manufacturing, engineering, and ancillary disciplines such as cybersecurity.

The roundtable also noted that Australia has benefitted from the fact that we have stable governments and our institutions are underpinned by the rule of law. This fact is often overlooked but it will be vital in ensuring the path we chart reflects the will of the country as a whole, free from suppression of views and debate.

There’s no shortage of challenges. But there’s also an abundance of good ideas and goodwill from both business and government.

Policy decisions should always remain the purview of those democratically elected. But the challenge of sustainability is so vast, so different across industries and so important to our future that governments cannot be expected to find all the answers on their own.

Australia has a history of close co-operation when we need it most. We saw this during the COVID-19 pandemic, when governments, business, unions and civil society all worked toward getting us through those times as safely as possible.

If we take the same approach to sustainability, we will increase our chances of making it a significant net positive for our economy and our way of life.

This doesn’t mean there won’t be differences and disagreements — but it’s time that we at least agree that our collective priority should be on how to create a better, more prosperous and sustainable future.

For Westpac, Australia’s first bank and first company, despite the often gloomy forecasts, we see the next 27 years as presenting even more opportunity to have a positive impact on business and the community than we’ve seen in the past 206 years. The future is bright and we will continue to play our part.

Anthony Miller is Chief Executive, Westpac Institutional Bank.