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Sustainable Consumption and ProductionChris Church is actively involved in work on Sustainable Consumption and Production (SCP). Much of this work is done through ANPED, an NGO network and the Civil Society Platform for SCP (see www.scp-centre.org/ for details) Why is this an issue?The need to focus on Sustainable Consumption and Production has been with us for nearly 20 years. The Agenda 21 document from the 1992 UN Earth Summit stresses that this is an issue for all: unsustainable consumption and production is the "major cause of continuing global environmental deterioration", especially in richer high-consuming nations. Four key points summarise this work:
"Strong" and "Weak" sustainable consumption There are two approaches to Sustainable Consumption (this is based on work by Chris' colleague Sylvia Lorek (a search will reveal many of her publications). One is about choosing products and services that are less resource-consuming, less burdening for the environment, or less destructive for those people actually producing them (fair trade aspects). This relates to much work on behaviour change and eco-efficiency and can be seen as "Weak Sustainable Consumption". The second is about
actually reducing levels of consumption. This is often seen as problematic
politically, but this will be necessary to avoid serious problems
for the Earth and its inhabitants. This is "Strong Sustainable
Consumption". A PowerPoint presentation that summarises some of this and looks at the links to local action can be downloaded here. |
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Any comments about
the website should be addressed to <webmanager@suscom.org> This page last updated 21st June 2009 © Chris Church 2005-2009 |