Personal Blog of Ellen MacArthur

I walked through the town of Newport on the Isle of Wight today, really fancying an apple. I would have thought that in a high street that would be quite a straightforward thing to find, but it appears not. I was even tempted by an apple logo on a clothes shop!

It made me realise just how much things have changed in the modern towns of today, in that you can’t always find the essentials.

Maybe I don’t know Newport well enough, but it would appear as if I needed a car to get my apple this lunchtime.

I settled for some dried apple instead!

Ellen

I was asked to speak at the Eco Island conference last week in Cowes on the Isle of Wight. The eco-island project is at the core of the Council’s sustainable community strategy, and is something that personally I am hugely excited about!  There must have been over 300 people there, who all seemed motivated by the island’s plans. These plans include everything from energy to food production, to improving open spaces and increasing people’s contentment in living here. There were some great speakers including Professor Bill Wakeham of Southampton University, Professor Sir Ghillean Prance, Scientific Director of The Eden Project, Eugene Dreyer from Sir Terry Farrell’s architecture practice who are designing a new vision for the island and Tony Galloni, Head of Marketing for Sustainable Energy Solutions at E.ON.

When it comes to making a difference, we have the most amazing opportunity. Not only, like other councils, in that the door of sustainability needs to be pushed open and kept open, but also because the island’s geographical boundaries, being surrounded by water, mean that it is a perfect place to try this initiative as measuring what goes on and off the island is so much easier. I believe that the island can be a shining example to other regions, but there is a terrifically long way to go, and the challenge is simply colossal.

I feel though that if you are trying to understand the solution to a problem, you need to break things down and look at things on a smaller scale. You need to understand the big picture, but so many of the changes you make will be small and incremental. Just hopefully millions of them at the same time!

When I spoke at the conference I used the sailing journey analogy of being out there and simply having to manage your resources. Being aware of and on top of the reserves that you have and looking after them and never wasting them. Our island could be an incredible example for this, we have huge food production, but most is exported. We have incredible amenity value in our beaches and open ground which we need to preserve. In effect we need to leave the island in a better state than when we all arrived here, looking after the place, and managing its resources not draining any other area of the country or world.

I really hope that the Isle of Wight people will get behind this project, and that the island will change as we do to be a happier, and more sustainable place to live. 

Ellen

Last night Katie (our media manager), Joss (our editorial/web content manager) and Fiona (our sustainability manager) and I headed off on the bus to a meeting to launch an event called ‘The Big Green Picnic’ which will be held on the Isle of Wight on the 24th and 25th May.

The event is being organised by the Isle of Wight Council and is about getting people from all over the island to come for a fun, family event which will help to inform them about what the island has to offer and how to live in a more sustainable and less wasteful way. It’s also a great opportunity for the Council to talk about what they are doing at their end!

What was nice about yesterday evening was that it was about discussing and learning and brainstorming. There are evidently all sorts of people here who are already working towards making the island more sustainable and who are really excited about being part of a bigger campaign.

There was a real range of people there, from people importing ecologically friendly products, to organic T-shirts made in carbon neutral factories in India. It’s really great stuff.

Lynn Clarke, the Community Liaison Officer at Island Waste, whom we met on our visit there (see earlier blog) was saying that she had already been involved with events trying to get people to be more conscious of their waste, and these dated back 10 years! It would seem that the Island had a carbon footprint analysis done in 1999, which provides a great and probably rare comparison!

We also met Zoë Moore who has been instrumental in setting up sustainable practices at Vestas and has helped them to gain a range of accreditations and awards. She has also found funds for a project getting solar panels on schools, both here and in India through a sort of twinning arrangement. Well done, Zoë!

Joe Duckworth and David Pugh at the Council spoke well and came across as very committed. The mere fact that they are getting the picnic off the ground and running is fantastic. It’s good to see that a large part of the effort is in making the island a better place generally. So all in all, a really interesting event - and more importantly, an event with a lot of enthusiasm and commitment about it!

Let’s go!