Quietly, chocolate companies have been snapping up little makers of organic and fair trade chocolate; Cadbury, PLC (NYSE: CBY) started the trend by buying Green and Black's in 2005, and then Hershey (NYSE: HSY) jumped on the bandwagon, buying Dagoba Organic Chocolate in 2006.

Since then, fairly traded and organic chocolate bars have become more and more popular among consumers; while exact numbers are hard to find, organic chocolate sales have more than quadrupled since 2000 and were $94 million in 2007. Fair trade chocolate sales have been nearly doubling on a year-over-year basis since 2000.

Looking at global warming, water scarcity, increasing pollution and population, and declining natural resources, it is easy to fall into the trap of thinking that these problems are too large and intractable, no matter how much money and effort we throw at them. Stuart Hall's Capitalism at the Crossroads: Aligning Business, Earth and Humanity, with a foreword by recent Noble Peace Prize recipient Al Gore, provides reason for cautious optimism. Just as concentrated human creativity and large-scale changes in behavior helped address holes in the ozone layer, so Hall provides a framework for how multinational corporations, not governments, can lead the efforts to guild a "sustainable global network," each word being equally important.

Hall is well known for his efforts to help businesses develop products and policies to serve the needs of the 4 billion people in the world who live at "the base of the pyramid." Rather than think of the 80% of the global population who live in the developing world as "the poor," Hall provides numerous examples of how businesses can use the developing world as a lab to develop clean technologies using sustainable practices, then scale those results up to the middle of the pyramid.

Now that "going green" has entered mainstream corporate thinking. Hall offers us plans to move "beyond green." It is not enough for the developed world merely to moderate its carbon footprint. We must rethink how we use the world's natural rsources to meet our needs in ways that do not make it impossible for future generations to meet theirs. Investors will want to read this book to learn which companies are on the leading edge of developing profitable sustainable technologies to create long-term value for the triple bottom line: social, environmental and economic.

The Canadian division of consumer electronics retailer Best Buy (NYSE: BBY) will be partnering with recycling company Greentec to offer customers a way to recycle used electronics by bringing them to Best Buy locations throughout Canada.

The new service will be offered at no cost to consumers and is already functioning in all 48 Canadian Best Buy locations as of late last week. Customers are able to bring in electronics like MP3 players, cellular phones, portable DVD and CD players, batteries and ink cartridges, among other items.

Although Best Buy already accepts some of these items for recycling in its U.S. stores, it would be wise to implement a standard recycling program in all Best Buy locations worldwide. If it can do this, the company will have another trump card in its pocket to shine over the competition. Yes, you're being looked at now, Circuit City (NYSE: CC).

Best Buy is making it incredibly easy to get rid of all that outdated and worn electronics gear in a world that increasingly wants to see more eco-sustainability from manufacturers, retailers and consumers. The recycling of batteries alone is a huge step forward, but all the nasty chemicals that can be released into the environment from discarded electronics make recycling a requirement. Once again, Best Buy appears to be leading another area sensitive to consumers.

Welcome to the 30th installment of The Wal-Mart Weekly, a column dedicated to bringing you insight, wit, facts, results, opinions and just a bit of everything else when it comes down to a very hot topic these days: Wal-Mart.

Last week, I brought you a two part series on what Wal-Mart Stores, Inc. (NYSE: WMT) needs to focus on in order to restore the consistent growth it has enjoyed for well over a decade now. Here is part 1 and part 2.

This week, I'll be looking at a burgeoning opportunity with the retailer that is getting some pretty decent traction in the press, but is being lost on the Wal-Mart customer. That is, the retailer's growth in the last 18 months as a "green-friendly" corporate citizen, which has the chance to make a significant impact on the global environment. As usual, it seems this message is not being trumpeted from every voice within Wal-Mart to every Wal-Mart customer. It should be, though.

The practice of architecture is more and more about sustainability every day. Sustainability is in vogue in every industry. I have been watching the dialog about yet another new dollar coin with mixed reactions. Since I am a designer as well as an investor I could not resist the opportunity to create something new. Once again the government has missed the boat. The new dollar should be made out of recycled material.

I think there should be a hard cardboard center with presidents' images and they should make it in cool colors. Then there should be a one millimeter outer ring of recycled metal that is the same from coin to coin and protects the cardboard core. This solution would be less expensive to make, lighter in weight, a little larger to distinguish from other coins, visually more interesting, and environmentally friendly.

Now if I can just think of a way to make the dollar sustainable from a value standpoint. That's much harder as we all know. But, I will let you know if I come up with anything. In the mean time maybe I'll mock-up my coin design and submit them to the government for review. And if they don't like the idea, then I will make them anyway and sell them as art. Then each will be worth more than a dollar! Hey maybe I'm on to something here?

Check out my other posts for BloggingStocks here.

Sheldon Liber is the CEO of a small private investment company and the vice president for design and research at an architecture & planning firm.

Starbucks Corporation (NASDAQ:SBUX) paid way, way more per pound for its coffee in 2006, the company will announce this morning -- more than any other major coffee company (according to Starbucks' own claims, anyway). In 2005 and 2006, the average commodity market price paid for coffee was $1.04 per pound; and, it's certain, far less for The Procter & Gamble Company (NYSE:PG)'s Folgers brand or Kraft Foods Inc. (NYSE:KFT)'s Maxwell House tinned coffee.

Starbucks (the company reports with obvious pleasure) paid a premium price of $1.42 per pound in 2006, up from $1.28 per pound in 2005. In doing so, the company believes it allows coffee farmers to make a profit, and gives them a "sustainable livelihood." The company also reported it had increased its percentage of coffee purchased under purchasing guidelines developed with Conservation International -- C.A.F.E. Practices -- to 53% of its total, or 155 million pounds.

This, while certainly grand, is not an indication that Starbucks is perfect. I'm certainly a fan of sustainability, even if it's trumpeted loud and proud by the corporation which practices it. In late 2006, Starbucks was roundly decried for objecting to Ethiopia's attempt to secure trademark protection for its Sidamo and Harar beans.

It's great that Starbucks is moving in the direction of better trade practices and more fair treatment of hundreds of thousands of farmers in third-world countries around the globe. However, the company needs to go all the way. I'll be chatting later today with Dub Hay, senior vice president coffee, Starbucks Coffee & Global Procurement -- and hopefully, finding out what the company will do to reduce the double-standard impression.

Investing in organics has been a hot trend in the past few years. Demand for organic products is so high that some companies, like Stonyfield Farms, can't find enough organic milk to deliver on its organic yogurt orders. Organic farmers are doing well and news that even Wal-Mart would offer organic produce has inspired headlines that queried, will organics soon be everywhere?

In a word, no. And what's more, it's looking like betting on organics is bad for you, financially. Whole Foods Market, Inc. (NASDAQ:WFMI), long the darling of healthy-minded investors, isn't growing fast enough. The stock is down 27% since last week. This, coupled with news that Wal-Mart might be struggling with its organics goals, has us all wondering if we should just embrace pesticides after all.

As Alyce Lomax points out and we've mentioned a number of times here on BloggingStocks, the true irony about all this is that truly faithful organics fans are almost angrily opposed to large, industrial farms. So that, by embracing this positive, healthy movement -- by making organic Rice Krispies, of all things -- in the blindly optimistic American way, which is by standardizing, industrializing, making really really big ... American businesses are perverting everything that is organic. [The Onion made hilarious fun of this trend in a satire here.] It's just not "sustainable" if it's done in tons for the Kellogg Company (NYSE:K). As BusinessWeek says so eloquently, it's "the organic paradox: The movement's adherents have succeeded beyond their wildest dreams, but success has imperiled their ideals."

Not only have ideals been imperiled, but also: profit. See here's the thing.

I have been feeling guilty about not posting in a while but I have been traveling and just came upon something worthy and a terminal that is convenient at the same time. Warren Buffett of Berkshire Hathaway (NYSE:BRK.A) has made big news recently having purchasing an Israeli metal working company named Iscar, his first outside the United States. My day has been spent with Jonathan Medved of Israel Seed Capital, that most notably just sold Shopping.com (another Israeli Company) to eBay, Inc. (NASDAQ:EBAY)...so what now?

It turns out that a company called GNRY Green Energy has started generating substantial amounts of power utilizing steam generators for industrial use primarily associated with food processing plants. GNRY has taken equipment readily available in the United States and waste product from trees in Israel, and instead of disposing of them in landfills is using them as fuel. By utilizing existing technology, looking backwards -- wood is an ancient fuel -- and extending its usefulness in a way not previously used in these types of factories, they are moving forward by salvaging waste to reduce energy consumption at the plants and conserve precious land.