Pooran Desai
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Pooran Desai is a social entrepreneur, author, advisor and founder of sustainability-focused digital platform One Planet.
One Planet aims to reveal and develop the interconnections between our health, economy, climate, society and natural world, to create resilient and regenerative communities.
Desai studied medical sciences and neuroscience at Oxford and Cambridge Universities respectively, before co-founding environmental organisation Bioregional in 1994.
The organisation established enterprises in sustainable forestry, organic farming and recycling. They also created Beddington Zero fossil Energy Development (BedZED) in south London, the world's first zero carbon urban village.
Desai also coined the term One Planet Living, a vision of the world where we live happily within Earth's resources. He leads the initiative which works across all sectors including $30 billion dollars of zero carbon real estate in 30 countries.
The ten guiding principles of One Planet Living served as the basis for the UN Sustainable Development Goals.