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Category: Eco Heroes

ECO HERO: ROB ELLIOTT

Greta Jonyniate | 23.11.11

A quiet observer of life, Rob Elliott is nevertheless ardently committed to promoting a way of living that reconnects us to the natural world, our unique and precious support. Communicating mainly through his writing and informal talks, he has published two books, The Food Maze and How To Eat (Like There’s No Tomorrow). His more general observations are posted on his blog Food Life and All That. The B&B he runs with his partner, Sally, has a strong educational element, leading by example to endorse localised economies as one effective answer to the hugely destructive global industrial food system, the biggest contributor to carbon emissions.

1. What inspires you?

What inspires me is the person who is prepared to stand up and say, “No, this is not how it is meant to be, and I will not accept it.” Where I am seeing this most frequently today is amongst the younger people – that is to say, anyone under the age of about 40. This fearless generation, who took on the challenges of skateboarding, snowboarding, hip-hop and street dance and made them into art forms, is the frontline of a new renaissance, not simply facing up to authoritarianism but calling for a radical rethink of how the human species conducts itself.

2. What makes you angry?

In considering this question, it was difficult to decide which makes me angrier: the deceit with which this modern world is imbued, or the gullibility of those who accept the deceit as truth. I settled for the former, in the belief that trust is one of our fundamental human default instincts, built up from the earliest days of human cooperation. Thus I conclude that it is deceit that makes me angry, particularly when such deceit is perpetrated by governments, corporations, banks or religious authority motivated by greed and self-interest. Deceit of this nature has taken us to war, undermined our health, destabilised societies, robbed us of most of the attributes that define a decent human being, ravaged nature and exploited, despoiled and polluted the planet to the point of collapse.

3. If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you’d change?

If I were Prime Minister, I would respect the ethos of democracy. The first thing I would change would be the way government is funded, in order to put people before profit and deliver the transformation urgently required to return society to equilibrium. In order to escape from the shackles of the corporatocracy, I would find the courage to tax banks and corporations, close the tax haven loopholes and channel the money thus raised into generating an economy based on social prosperity without corporate growth – beginning with food. I would make it clear that changing the way we produce food in order to deliver fresh, seasonal, uncontaminated and unadulterated real food would be the bedrock for all the other positive changes we need in society.

4. Can individuals really make a difference?

As someone once said, “If you think you are too small to be effective, you have never been in bed with a mosquito.” It is folly to think one voice will not be heard. Throw a small pebble into a pond and you see the splash and ripples. Keep throwing pebbles one by one and the ripples join up. So it is with us. I might be one voice of change, but if one other person open to change accepts what I say, we become two voices. Two voices will become many voices. Before long, you can’t hear your own voice for the din, and you find yourself occupying a patch of ground outside St Paul’s with a few hundred others. Individuals always make a difference, because they talk to other individuals who also want to make a difference. A new journey begins with a single step, and change begins with a single voice.

5. What is your personal mission?

I dislike the word ‘mission,’ as it has evangelical associations that I personally find uncomfortable. I am certainly not here to impose my views on other people. If there is one thing that motivates me, however, it is the pursuit of truth. Since being tested for food intolerances some years ago, I began to find out about the truth behind the global food industry, prompting my first book, The Food Maze. This was written from a personal viewpoint in order to create something of a ‘primer’ for those in confusion about food issues. My deliberate attempt to create something accessible and non-academic has worked, in that I receive a lot of positive feedback from readers who claim that the book has changed their relationship with food for the better. The task I have now set myself, if I can put it like that, is to do everything I can to disseminate the truths I have learned to as many people as possible because, in understanding the truth, we can uncover the lies we are told about everything from climate change to what we should feed our pets. By the time I reach the end of my days, I hope I will have added something positive to the change that I believe will happen in that time.

6. What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside, or starting a revolution on the outside?

The problem with revolution is that it almost invariably goes wrong, replacing one reviled ideology with another. Revolutions need leaders, and leaders all too easily slip under the narcotic influence of power. For lasting and meaningful change, a renaissance is required, and this can come only from the inside, from the soul of a society.

7. What’s the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

I have been fortunate in having been brought up in a family environment in which food was a central theme, and I have thus enjoyed many memorable family meals. There is, however, one meal that stands out in my memory. In 2001, I was on holiday in Kraków with my partner, Sally, and my Polish mother. This was only the second time my mother had been in her old home town since the end of World War II, and the only time I had been there with her. Two years after an acrimonious divorce, it was with a deep sense of contentment that I explored this ancient capital city with my mother and my new partner. On our first day there, we had lunch in a modest family-run restaurant offering traditional Polish dishes just like my mother used to cook when I was growing up. It was, quite simply, a meal I will never forget.

8. Can you describe a typical work day?

I run a B&B with Sally, and so a typical work day usually involves looking after guests. Thus our day might start around 7.00am, when we get up to begin preparations for breakfast. There are a number of elements to this as regards what is put on the tables (e.g. freshly baked bread, fresh butter, fruit, milk and preserves), which Sally takes care of, while I take care of the cooked breakfast. We eat after our breakfast duties are over and we have said goodbye to any guests leaving that morning, which is usually between 10.00 and 10.30. After that, there may be rooms to change, linen to wash and dry or shopping to get, all of which Sally and I treat as joint chores.
Once I have time to myself, I will check the computer for new enquiries or any other emails I need to deal with, many of which will be ongoing conversations with people or organisations with whom I am in communication. On a good day, I will perhaps have time to write a blog posting for our blog www.foodandlife.co.uk or add something to a new book I am trying to find the time to write. I do my best to spend some time on Twitter, as this is also a way of talking to some interesting people.
Around 6.30 to 7.00, I will reappear in the kitchen to prepare an evening meal for the two of us. Once we sit down to eat, we can switch off for a while. If there is something worthwhile on TV (e.g. a stimulating documentary, or Doc Martin!), we will watch that. Alternatively, I might go back to the computer if I am in the mood to write. Currently, I am taking time out to watch the BBC News, as I am fascinated by the present speed of change and, after that, I will read and research until about 11.30, then off to bed.

9. How do you define success?

In tackling this slippery issue, one thing is certain: success cannot truly be measured using the false flags of received wisdom. It is ‘so last-century’ to believe that personal success should be measured in terms of material gain or career progress, and that national success can only be measured by Gross Domestic Product. True success is far more elusive, but I would say that a successful person is one who makes a positive contribution to the lives of others whilst maintaining a set of principles that leaves that person unwilling to conduct their own lives in a way that causes harm to others, to other creatures and to the natural world that ultimately protects us all.

10. What’s the best advice anyone has ever given you?

The best advice I have ever received came not from my father, mentor, favourite teacher or best friend, but from a snippet of graffiti written on the inside wall of a public toilet in Anglesey. Some wit had started the ball rolling by putting up a quotation from the classics, and the idea had caught on, so the wall was covered in quotations from Shakespeare, lines from Keats and Walter Scott, pithy aphorisms and Buddhist philosophy. Amongst these was the following exhortation: “Trust no one, question everything.” I have lived by that maxim ever since.

11. What’s your favourite book or film of late?

If I had been asked which book or film has made the greatest impression on me in my life, the answer would be relatively easy, but to choose something that has become a recent favourite is trickier. However, there is one book that confirmed for me, in clarity and depth of detail, most of the suspicions I have long harboured about our modern world, and that is The Great Turning, by David Korten. Its subtitle, From Empire to Earth Community, says it all. This is a book that spells out what is wrong with the world as we know it, the myths and fables that have kept us locked into belief systems that divide us, but it is full of optimism too, as it frames for us the stories we might have been told, those that will now help to bring us together and back into the fold of nature.

12. What would you most like to happen to protect the planet?

Having spent five years researching the questions of climate change, peak oil, resource depletion and the impact of humanity on all of the above, I have come to understand that, once again, what we are told is cloaked in disinformation and half truths. More importantly, I now understand that our globalised industrial food system is profit-motivated just like any other industrial system. Its impact is phenomenal, however, because of its sheer size.
It sucks in everything from the manufacture of machinery, artificial fertilisers and pesticides to the growing of monoculture cash crops, to the processing of those cash crops into artificial foodstuffs, to the retailing of those artificial products in giant big box retailers. It takes in along the way, fuel to run the machinery and the transport systems, to say nothing of all the heating, lighting, chilling and air conditioning in the warehouses and retail outlets, the generation of waste and the processes involved in dealing with that waste. Altogether, this system is generating something like 60% of our carbon emissions.
So, what I would most like to see is a change in the way we produce our food worldwide. It is time to dispel the myth of ‘feeding the world’ and replace it with the understanding that we must all regain the right to feed ourselves, by growing nutritionally efficacious foods in small-scale, truly sustainable ways. Changing the way we feed ourselves is the one thing that each of us can do without hardship, and it will make the biggest contribution to protecting the planet.

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ECO HERO: TRISTRAM STUART

Greta Jonyniate | 17.11.11

Tristram Stuart, organiser of Feeding the 5000 event, award-winning campaigner and author Facts and figures on Waste – the issue in UK and globally, top tips to avoid waste and solutions.

1. What inspires you?

The Uighur people in western China: they live in a land of scarce resources and waste practically nothing.

2. What makes you angry?

Chopping down the Amazon rainforest to grow crops to feed livestock to create more food which is then wasted.

3. If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

I would seek an international agreement on halting the destruction of virgin forests.

4. Can individuals really make a difference?

Yes! When I was ten I wrote to McDonald's complaining about the CFCs in their packaging. A month later I got a letter back saying they were changing their policy. Obviously a total coincidence but it gave me the delusion that individuals can create change and I still suffer from that.

5. What is your personal mission?

Between now and tomorrow at 2pm, feeding 5000 people in Trafalgar Square on food that would otherwise have been wasted.

6. What's more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

I believe that you can do both. Tomorrow at Feeding the 5000 an arrary of people and organisations of every political stripe, from revolutionary environmentalists to businesses interested in improving efficiency will be united on one issue: that food waste is an injustice and must be tackled.

7. What is the best meal you've had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

In 2009, when we last put on this event I got a text at 8.30 in the morning just as I was walking into a live broadcast with the Today programme. It was from my brothers who had gone to collect the curry for Feeding the 5000, telling me how delicious it was. They were right. It was a wonderful hot meal cooked by volunteers, made entirely from food that normally would have gone to waste, and eaten by five thousand members of the public. Tomorrow lunchtime we are doing the same thing again.

8. Can you describe a typical work day? (ie. what you do within that day and who you have potential to influence etc).

Typical doesn't exist. At the beginning of this week I was picking cabbages, the week before I was discussing food waste policy at Number 10, next week I am in Barcelona for a conference as part of the European Week of Waste Reduction which Feeding the 5000 is launching here in the UK tomorrow.

9. How do you define success?

In 2009, when I watched hungry people walk into the food tent in Trafalgar Square, and come out with a big smile on their face, that was the most satisfying thing ever.

10. What's the best advice anyone's ever given you?

The Uighur man who pointed at three grains of rice at the bottom of my bowl and asked 'Clean?' showed me that our society should be capable, as Uighur society is, of regarding food waste as unacceptable.

11. What's your favourite book or film of late?

David Attenborough's film on insects in the BBC series Trials of Life. His film demonstrated the sustainable hunting practices of ant colonies: which divide up their territory so as not to deplete their resource base. Humans still haven't worked out how to do that.

12. What would you most like to happen to protect the planet?

A global land management agreement so that we stop depleting resources unnecessarily. The first thing we should do is to stop trashing the land to grow food that no-one eats.

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ECO HERO: JAMES SUTTON

Greta Jonyniate | 10.11.11

James Sutton is the founder of the revolutionary non-profit organisation pioneering the bloomtrigger project; a simple, affordable and creative way for people to protect rainforest. Bloomtrigger is a social enterprise developing a new visual model of online fundraising to enable individuals, businesses and primary school children to help protect their own part of the rainforest. The bloomtrigger project works in partnership with the CREES foundation a charity empowering forestry communities in the Peruvian Amazon to sustainably manage their forest land. Ultimately the bloomtrigger project aims to protect 1 million hectares of the rainforest worldwide.

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ECO HERO: TREWIN RESTORICK

Greta Jonyniate | 03.10.11

Trewin Restorick is the CEO of independent environmental charity Global Action Plan, which he founded in 1993. The charity runs programmes to reduce carbon emissions, energy consumption and waste with businesses, schools, community organisations and households. Global Action Plan has won a range of awards including the 2008 Ashden Award for sustainable energy for its employee behaviour change programmes and was recently shortlisted for Creating the Future Award and Third Sector Awards.

What inspires you?

I have a mind that I can’t switch off, a fundamental stubbornness and a weird desire to constantly try new things. All of these characteristics are fueled by meeting people and hearing what sustainability challenges they are facing and then trying to help them overcome them. I am constantly inspired by seeing what people and organizations have achieved to live more sustainably. The most recent example is the Litre of Light initiative in the Philippines http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-asia-pacific-14967535

What makes you angry?

Arrogance. Particularly arrogant leaders who don’t seem to care about the environmental, social or financial impact of their decisions. Be it bankers who seem totally oblivious to the devastation they have caused, political leaders focused purely on short-term electoral gain or, on a more prosaic level, the people who have destroyed my beloved home football team Plymouth Argyle. As a cyclist what makes me angry is BMW drivers who seem genetically programmed to try and kill me.

If you were Prime Minister what would be the first thing you would change?

Everything. Fundamentally I would wish to redefine the purpose of Government. I would kick out the all-consuming, short-term, narrow economic view of the world that oozes from the Treasury and create a new vision for what a prosperous UK would look like. This would be built around an economy that is low carbon and zero waste. That offers people work that is fulfilling. That creates strong resilient local communities. That narrows what I think are unacceptable levels of financial inequity. That gives young people more of a say in their future and that totally redefines the notion of wealth to incorporate skills, biodiversity, resource value and social cohesion as well as financial measures.

Can individuals really make a difference

The only way to answer this is with the quotation from Margaret Mead: "Never doubt that a small group of committed people can change the world. Indeed, it is the only thing that ever has." This holds true even though the awful band Nickelback stole the quotation for one of their lyrics. Time and again I have been amazed by what committed individuals can achieve in their community. For example we recently worked with a Sudanese volunteer in Croydon called Adam Yasir. He started the Great Green Hope campaign at Croydon College through our Greenprint 2020 initiative. Operating under the slogan ‘Tomorrow’s climate is today’s challenge,’ he has helped transform the college and has been shortlisted for ‘Volunteer of the Year’ http://www.globalactionplan.org.uk/Climate-Squads-Adam-saved-more-than-10-per-cent-at-college

What is your personal mission?

I don’t have anything as grand as a personal mission. Each day I try to do whatever I can to help Global Action Plan do more and do better – it’s as simple as that.

What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

Are they mutually exclusive? I don think they are. If you don’t change yourself then any calls for revolution are hypocritical. Remember ‘two jags’ John Prescott urging people to use their cars less. It had all the authenticity of ham flavoured cheese spread.

What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

Is it completely cheesy to say my wedding reception? We spent a lot of time ensuring that the food was local and seasonal and checking out the credentials of the supplier. The meal itself was a joyful celebration surrounded by friends and family and the food was fantastic. As part of the day we asked everybody to send us their favourite recipe and turned these into a cookbook which we gave to all the guests. Food is a really important part of my life and it seemed the right thing to do to offer a gift celebrating the best recipes of friends and family.

Can you describe a typical work day?

A typical work day is a juggling act between what I would like to do and what I need to do. The bit I like is getting out, meeting and talking to people. Last week we organised the London launch of Al Gore’s Climate Reality initiative which involved getting 200 people together to watch and discuss the new slideshow. I gave a presentation at the Business for Environment Summit on sustainable consumer goods - we held two discussion groups with a host of organisations to discuss how to implement more sustainable transport policies and I sat through a five hour DEFRA Civil Society board meeting. The need to do stuff revolves around running the charity which is focused on the constant and ever growing challenging of paying the wage bills, and working with the Management Team to ensure that we have an organisation capable of truly making an impact.

How do you define success?

Personally, success for me is seeing Global Action Plan achieve significant change. Seeing people within the organsiation flourish. Proving to myself that living more sustainably is rewarding, and hoping that my obsession with work doesn’t make me a completely useless husband and dad.

What is the best advice anybody ever gave you?

I had a somewhat maverick boss in my first ever job who told me ‘Also do what you believe to be right.’ Easy to say, hard to do.

What is your favourite book or film of late

I have recently finished ‘Just Kids’ the autobiography of Patti Smith. I loved its brutal honesty as she describes her relationship with artist Robert Mapplethorpe and her personal journey which has resulted in her being one of pop’s iconic figures.

What would you like to most happen to protect the planet

An overwhelming acceptance that the climate scientists are right and that we need to change our economy to hit carbon reduction targets.

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Stopping bad things and starting good ones

Greta Jonyniate | 21.09.11

We love Bill Mckibben’s article “Stopping bad things and starting good ones” published on the Grist this week. It is good to hear from the founder of 350.org himself about why Moving Planet project is so important and what it’s trying to achieve. Saturday’s events promise to be a colourful and creative display involving hundreds of thousands of people all around the world saying no to fossil fuels and calling on their leaders to take immediate steps to transition towards clean energy.

Stopping bad things and starting good ones

Sometimes the world asks different things of you.

A couple of weeks ago, many of us heeded the planet’s call to block a bad thing: the proposed Keystone XL pipeline from the tar sands of Alberta down to the Gulf of Mexico. All in all, 1,253 of us ended up in jail, and many more helped in other ways. That fight’s not over yet, not by a long shot. (You can keep up with developments at tarsandsaction.org).

But we’ve all got another side too, one that wants to start good things. Which is why I’m looking forward so much to Sept. 24 and Moving Planet day. All around the country and the world, people are concentrating on the kind of future we can build as we put fossil fuels in the rearview mirror.

Or, in this case, as we get rid of the rearview mirror altogether. Because Sept. 24 is largely about transportation—about all the other ways we can move our bodies and our stuff if we begin to leave the car behind.

People will be skateboarding and kayaking and marching, and most of all, they’ll be biking. In Indonesia, people will be cycling (and ferrying) for 350 hours from Bali to Bandung, collecting petitions for climate action along the way. In Sao Paolo, Brazil, thousands will march and rally for better public transportation and bike lanes. From Cairo to Quito, from Dhaka to Denver, millions of people will pound the pavement in every corner of the world, demanding action on climate change. And they’ll have three things in mind:

First, that bikes and such are a key part of the solutions we need. We know that 40 percent of commuters in Copenhagen go by bike. (In fact, there was a recent article about bike congestion in the city—now that’s a problem to have!) We’ve got to remind ourselves that simply because we’re used to getting around one way, that’s not the only way. For many Westerners, there’s a psychological unwillingess to even think about life past the car. Maybe you can’t do everything by bike, but once you start thinking differently, then buses and trains and so forth seem more plausible.

Second, in the rest of the world the psychological problem is sometimes a little different. In poor countries, bikes have been stigmatized and cars glamorized. Before everyone else follows us down the same blind path to climate ruin (and suburban sprawl), we need to peel some of that glamour off the car and stick it on the bike. The bike is one of the few tools used by rich and poor alike, and that means this is a great chance to show solidarity with the people hit hardest by climate change, to show them that they’re doing a great job already of building the solutions we all need.

And third: Bikes are fun. So are skateboards and canoes and feet and all the other ways we can move, together. And that together is vital: If you’ve never ridden a bike in a big crowd of other people, you’ve never felt the fun of being part of what feels like some powerful, galloping animal, slithering around corners and powering up hills.

Sometimes we’ve got to stop things, and sometimes we’ve got to start things. On Sept. 24, we’re moving into high gear, pushing the planet out of neutral. It’s going to be beautiful.

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ECO HERO: ELISABETH WINKLER

Greta Jonyniate | 14.09.11

Elisabeth Winkler is a journalist and green publicist. For eight years, editor of the Soil Association magazine, she campaigns for local organic solutions on her Real Food Lover blog - shortlisted for the 2009 Guild of Food Writers Awards. She co-wrote Make More of Squashes, and Make More of Beans and Peas, and is part of the No Tesco in Stokes Croft campaign in Bristol, currently morphing into the Stokes Croft people's supermarket. Elisabeth's blog Real Food Lover

What inspires you?

People. I love it when people express their wild and cooperative side. I love their inconsistencies.

What makes you angry?

Waste of natural resources including ingenuity. Given the right conditions everyone has something to contribute. I hate throwing things away and plastic bags depress me. We need to make things last and pass them on.

If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

Planning laws. Currently, it’s hard for councils to say no to corporate development. Corporates can afford appeals; councils cannot. The Localism bill will weaken the law even more. I agree with the National Trust’s latest campaign: planning is for people, not profit.

Can individuals really make a difference?
Always. An act of kindness is revolutionary.

What is your personal mission?

We can live a greener, fairer and more secure life. Let’s make it happen. Now.

What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

Good question: both. Engaged Buddhism is a model for inner awareness and outside action.

What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

I love eating in company and I am always grateful to be fed. I am intrigued by the new generation of raw food. I am a throw-it-together cook - fast cooking with real food. I want to spend my pennies on local organic produce: for health, community, respect for the animals and soil - and taste. If we get food right, we get a lot right.

Can you describe a typical work day? (ie. what you do within that day and who you have potential to influence etc)

Morning starts with addiction: coffee and computer. Working from home means I can work at my own pace, and cook. I love working at night. I promote organic food businesses and green charities. Work is my passion - I can only work for something I believe in. Any communication can be influential: email, Twitter, Facebook, blogs, a phone call - a random meeting in the street.

How do you define success?

Enough to live well and living your dream. Learning from others and sharing skills.

What’s the best advice anyone’s ever given you?

Breathe out through the mouth, in through the nose, slowly. Relaxing helps you cope with pain. Also applies to emotional pain.

What’s your favourite book or film of late?

Novels are companions, and a counterpoint to computers. I am reading D.H. Lawrence’s last novel, the Plumed Serpent, for the first time. Mexico, 1920s, an indigenous uprising against centuries of colonialism.

What would you most like to happen to protect the planet?

Balance. There is enough to go round. Forget oil wars - invest in renewable energy. Create green jobs for life. Balance.

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ECO HERO: LINDA MOSS

Greta Jonyniate | 07.09.11

Linda Moss - author of Organic Places to Stay. The reason why we love Linda is that she has been passionate about organic holidays for the last 12 years - working her socks off to produce a wonderful guide and website and never giving up - despite difficulties along the way. The outcome is a wonderful guide with truly wonderful organic places to stay. Check out her website.

1. What inspires you?

What inspires me is the dedication that drives some people to act on their own initiative and who have the courage to support something they believe in. The hard working people who run the businesses I promote on my website are all examples of this.

2. What makes you angry?

What makes me angry is the way we’ve been duped into thinking it’s okay to go into the supermarket to fill our trolleys with processed foodstuffs rather than to eat real natural food.

3. If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

If I were Prime Minister, the first thing I would change is the way our food is produced and promoted. I would make a stand against the big food companies, ban all additives and promote the idea that food should be wholesome and unadulterated.

4. Can individuals really make a difference?

Throughout history, there are examples of how an idea that starts with an individual quickly spreads to other individuals and generates a process of change. Today, we have the power of the internet so it’s much easier for individuals to communicate with each other about the differences they would like to see.

5. What is your personal mission?

My personal mission is to try to raise awareness about the importance of organic food. It is a fundamental notion that healthy food equals healthy people. It has become my life’s work to promote the principles of eating organically, not as a lifestyle choice for the few but as a basic right of access to nutritious food for all of us.

6. What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

What is most urgent today is the need for change from the inside – a renaissance in the way each and every one of us thinks that will allow us to see our way out of our current problems

7. What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

Many years ago in northern Tenerife with my husband and three young children, we were driving through Teide National Park looking for somewhere to eat when we came across a little place miles from anywhere. Not being able to speak the language, we were taken into the kitchen by the friendly owners and shown what was cooking in a huge pan. Minutes later, hunks of freshly baked bread in hand, we were served generous bowls of this traditional local stew. Made with pumpkin, cabbage, sweet potatoes, pork and beef, it was delicious. The hospitality and the simple rustic food left an impression that remains to this day.

8. Can you describe a typical work day? (ie. what you do within that day and who you have potential to influence etc.

Like most self employed people, my business is my life and a twelve hour day is normal. My day is spent is doing all the things that need to be done to keep the business going – answering emails, keeping the website up to date, marketing the site, arranging the advertising, doing the accounts, finding new listings, planning for the future, etc. In promoting the ethos of my business I have the potential to influence every person I talk to, because the subject of food and what we eat affects us all.

9. How do you define success?

While it’s important to be able to generate sufficient income to cover basic needs, true success is internal and comes from being the sort of person who can positively influence others or make a positive difference to someone else’s life.

10. What’s the best advice anyone’s ever given you?

I think the best advice came from my husband on the day he told me not to ‘work for my business’ but to ‘let it work for me’. It is all too easy to take a passionate idea, use it as the basis for setting up a business and then dedicate your life to it, lavishing it with time and effort and forgiving it for not giving the kind of returns any normal business would be expected to deliver. I now understand that it’s important when running a business to treat it as a business, without letting go of the motivation that set it up in the first place.

11. What’s your favourite book or film of late?

My favourite book is How To Eat Like There’s No Tomorrow, by Robert Elliott. Rob runs a real food B&B in Herefordshire with his partner Sally. Together they’ve created an ethos based on forsaking modern processed foods in favour of the real thing - in other words all the nutritious foods that sustained us up to the time that industry took over and processed our food into something that’s good for company profits but bad for human health. The book has been described as part memoir, part manual and part manifesto. Rob sets out a persuasive argument which suggests that changing the way we eat leads on to other changes - the changes we need to put into place to ensure humanity has a future on this planet.

12. What would you most like to happen to protect the planet?

There are many ideas about what we can do to protect the planet, but the truth is that to protect the planet from now on we have to rethink how we live our lives. What I’d like to see is a new understanding of the importance of food to our human culture, because if we can change the way we see our food, and if we can once again be connected to how it is produced, we will reconnect ourselves with the planet that supports us.

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Eco Hero: Thomas Ball

Matilda Lee | 03.08.11

Thomas Ball is a campaigner through the eye of a camera lens. He ventures to places where extraordinary things are happening and where the planet is under threat - and records the story through the most amazing photography. Thomas funds his campaigning documentary work through providing photography for ethical and sustainable corporates. If you are looking for an inspiring photographer - check out his site.

What inspires you?

My greatest inspiration comes from my late mother and the strength she showed whilst fighting cancer. She showed me that even during the darkest and toughest times one must be thankful for what they have and to cherish family and friends. When I’m caught up in the stresses and strains of work, I think of how she squeezed everything she could out of life and how much she gave to others. Her example has been a continued inspiration to me.

What makes you angry?

The perceived need for perpetual growth. I understand the economic principle behind why we’re supposed to sell more, grow more and buy more, but I am angered that we can’t seem to break the cycle. Why is a seemingly successful company deemed to be failing if they haven’t sold more than they did the year before? It’s not that I want the world to stagnate, but it maddens me that we’re on this treadmill of consumption with very few options to get off it.

If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

I would hate to be Prime Minister! I think even the most well meaning individual would find they are fighting against a wall of bureaucracy and the power of vested interests.

In saying that, if I did take up the job I would set up a large innovators fund for renewable energies. There are lots of existing funding structures for companies already, but they are complicated and can be very difficult to access. I’d want to help those with a more radical approach to have the support they need to try out their ideas, and if they work, to get their company off the ground.

I would also bring in a plastic bag levy. It’s a simple piece of legislation that can have big impact. I grew up in Ireland and I remember when the law was introduced there in 2002. It quickly cut their use by over 90%. The revenue raised by the tax could be used to fund research into more biodegradable plastics or other environmental programs.

Can individuals really make a difference?

Yes of course they can!

It obviously helps to be connected and have powerful friends who can change laws, but our actions, no matter how small, can make a difference. Simple things like recycling more, installing a water butt, composting at home and insulating your house; when millions of individuals take these small actions, they add up to make a big difference.

On top of this, we now have a plethora of social media platforms at our fingertips, that we can use to shout about what we’re doing and get others involved. Through blogs, Twitter and Facebook, we can get our viewpoints across, garner support and communicate with like minded individuals faster and easier than at any time in the past. It starts with the individual and grows from there.

What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

I think it should be a combination of both. We need organised and vocal outside pressure groups combined with strong and inspirational leaders from within. For instance, groups like UK Uncut are doing great work at getting out on the streets to vocalise their discontent at corporate tax evasion, but ultimately their cause needs help from MP’s within government who have the strength and courage to bring about legislation to actually stop it.

What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

I’ve been fortunate to eat at some very nice restaurants and have sampled many culinary delights over the years. However, the meal that sticks out in my mind the most is the one my partner cooked for us recently. It was a simple but very tasty quiche and salad. It was one of our first meals where the majority of the ingredients were produced at home. The eggs were kindly supplied by our lovely new chickens Lucy and Ella and all the vegetables came from our garden. It’s hard to beat the taste of food that you know has only traveled a few feet to your plate.

Can you describe a typical work day?

What I love about being freelance is that I rarely have a typical day at work. I thrive on the variety of my work and not knowing exactly what lies around the corner.

One day I can be doing a shoot for a magazine or newspaper, while the next I’m away producing work for one of my own documentaries. When I’m not out with my camera, I generally work from my office at home in North London where I can be found spending hours editing images, applying for funding or doing research for my next personal project.

How do you define success?

When I was younger I would probably have defined success by how much money I earned and the job I had. However, my perspectives have changed since then.

I think a sense of one’s own success should come from being comfortable in your own skin and feeling pride in how you live your life and the work you do. Without meaning to sound trite, I think managing to stay true to yourself and achieving your personal goals are much more important than worrying about how much you earn, the house you live in and the car you drive.

What’s the best advice anyone’s ever given you?

When I was indecisive about moving to London in 2006 to focus my career on photography, my boss at the time told me that “the best decisions are often the hardest to make”. It wasn’t specific advice exactly, but it’s a motto that’s stayed with me and helps me to push myself when I have an option between the easy or the difficult route.

What’s your favourite book or film of late?

My favourite book that I’ve bought recently is The Ruins of Detroit by Yves Marchand and Romain Meffre. It’s a disturbingly beautiful set of photographs documenting the decaying urban fabric of this famous American city.

I also recently saw a documentary film at the photo festival Les Rencontres d’Arles by British filmmaker Trisha Ziff called The Mexican Suitcase. It’s about the loss (and eventual rediscovery) of a set of negatives shot by photographers Robert Capa, Gerda Taro and David Seymour during the Spanish civil war. I’d highly recommend anyone with an interest in history or photography to go check it out when it comes to the UK.

More information:

Thomas Ball Photographer website

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Eco Hero: Alan Simpson

Matilda Lee | 07.07.11

Alan Simpson is a former Labour MP and now advisor to Friends of the Earth. He is all you can ask for in a campaigner: passionate, inspiring and not afraid to speak out about what he believes in. Here he tells Greenhouse why he left politics, mixing literature and love and the reasons that new nuclear has no place in Britain's energy mix

What inspires you?

The certainty that there is so much more to us (and what could be) than we realise.

What makes you angry?

Those who don't see this.

If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

I want to open society up in ways that are both accountable and sustainable, so I suppose that sacking the Treasury, and bringing in some proper economists, is the place to start. Of all the bureaucracies in parliament, the Treasury is the most closed and regressive. Sometimes my only relief came in laughing at economic ideas (taken as truths) that, even as undergraduates we knew were crap. It is a classic example of allowing bright people to race away with absurdities. Too many Treasury policy wonks have a closer personal identification with problems of puberty than poverty. It is a Department that just doesn't get out enough...and which squashes the creative thinking needed to survive the coming crises.

Can individuals really make a difference?

We are entering the Age of Interdependence. Individual actions matter, but only make a real difference when they tie together. Turning a derelict shell into our eco-home was great fun, but left the question "So what about the other 25 million homes in Britain?" There are no individual answers to climate change. We have to collectivise our visions, and inspire each other to act upon a bigger canvas.

What are your views on renewables and nuclear in the UK's energy mix?

Nuclear is to renewables what flatulence is to a social celebration. Actually, flatulence is so much better because it doesn't leave a 1000 year clean up cost. Nuclear is the only energy technology whose costs increase generation by generation, and whose risks no one will insure. The accident at Fukushima and, more importantly, the policy shifts in Germany mean that new nuclear is dead in the water. Only the (highly financed) delusions remain but none of the finance institutions will throw a penny in its lap.
In North Carolina, PV and nuclear grid costs of electricity are already the same. Across europe, PV costs will break even at varying times within the next few years. Already, there are times when Germany gets all its electricity from wind and solar; even before tidal stream, hydro, deep-geothermal and biomethane gas grids get into the renewable energy game.

The Germans are the real game changers. Their policy changes not only break from nuclear, they are breaking the power of 'Big Energy'. Renewable energy is not only helping them decentralise and democratise their energy system, but also to cut their power price rises. Germany will be completely out from nuclear before 2020. We should all follow them. Nuclear has never been economically viable and never affordable. Rather than shell out massive new public subsidies in pursuit of a death wish, we should celebrate its passing, get a life, and get out a bit more.

What do you feel your greatest impact was as an MP? And as an adviser to FOE?

My greatest impact as an MP comes down to 3 choices;
a) the legacy of the Feed-in-Tariff amendments I introduced to the Energy Act 2008, where the cross-party majority of MPs I had put together were going to vote it through, whatever objections the government had

b) the longer term 'raft' of fuel poverty measures secured by the Parliamentary Warm Homes Group that I chaired for 15 years, or

c) the value, to wider campaign movements, of having someone irreverent (and sometimes humorous) in an institution that was always too conformist and cautious.

With Friends of the Earth, I try to bring the same irreverence and optimism. Sometimes it is more appreciated.

What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

I left parliament because I thought it was intellectually 'out to lunch'. The times we live in require transformational thinking. There is no longer the luxury of a simple inside/outside choice. I left because I wanted the space to work in a different way, but I am happy to work with anyone 'inside' who is no longer prepared to wait around.

What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

There are 2 outstanding (vegetarian) meals I have had. One was a sumptuous spread of local foods whilst travelling in Guillin, western China. The other was a simple Christmas Day meal of breads and cheeses on an empty beach in the Marema (Italy). In both cases, it was with my wife and young daughter.

Can you describe a typical work day?

It begins with a clear sense of 5 things I had planned to do, gets overtaken by 10 things I hadn't planned, and ends (if I'm lucky) with 2 exciting thoughts I hadn't expected. 'Cherry on the cake' days also include lots of cuddles and bedtime stories with our daughter.

How do you define success?

Never giving up on your dreams.

What’s the best advice anyone’s ever given you?

It was advice from both my grandad and Tony Benn that all the important changes 'never come from those who wait for permission'.

What’s your favourite book or film of late?

Anyone who hasn't read The Breakwater House, by Pascale Quiviger, will never understand how far you can be transported in a single line or sentence. But you can't recommend an author that you're married to. So my choice is between Philip Pulman's Northern Lights trilogy and Doris Lessing's Canopus in Argos sequence. Pulman gets it by the breathtaking implications of its ending.

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Eco Hero: Dave Hampton

Matilda Lee | 09.06.11

Dave Hampton is the Carbon Coach, who with much wit and charm inspires individuals, businesses and communities to adopt low-carbon living. He is passionate about what he does, living and breathing green issues - as a family man, a business man and a community man. Carbon Dave's Diary, his blog about a carbon-based lifeform in distress, is guaranteed to make you smile

What inspires you?

I’m inspired by wit, humour and other ‘h’ words like humanity, humility, honesty. People that care and people that believe in justice and fairness also inspire me. I am a sports person, (I rowed for GB in the 80’s) and the idea of a ‘level playing field’ is fundamental to my psyche. I’m all for competition, but with proper referees to come down hard on cheating and without a hidden agenda. And I’m not just talking sport of course.

What makes you angry?

I can get obscenely angry about injustice, whether it’s a dodgy ref, an offical who’s been bought, or a corrupt MP. It makes me particularly angry when it’s covered up. When someone is making out to be fair and doing the right thing but underneath the surface they are ‘fixing’ the ‘game’. Or politicians who deceive the people.

If you were Prime Minister, what would be the first thing you'd change?

Ha! I’d probably resign; it’s too big a job. There is a bit of me that would love to be Prime Minister but actually I prefer to lead from within my community, encouraging people to take self-responsibility and support activism. I want people to stop demanding the Prime Minister do something sensible, and just do it!

I’d give a shock exit speech that said don’t believe a word you hear from any PM or the cabinet or anyone in Whitehall. Make up your own minds and stop looking for answers from the state - cause we ain’t got any for you.

Can individuals really make a difference?

Yes, I’d go further and say that it’s only individuals who can ever make a difference. Sounds cheesy – but all my life I’ve been confused when people don’t see that. I think that it is kind of human nature to look outside of us for solutions. Putting the blame and responsibility on others is very common. We can see lots of bad stuff out there, but most of it is a reflection of the bad stuff that’s within us. We need to pacify the terrorist within for example. It’s all about the inner game. Individuals are the only thing that can make a difference. Only we can change ourselves.

What’s more urgent: changing things from the inside or starting a revolution on the outside?

For the last 5 years or so I’d have said that changing things from the inside was more urgent. Although now I’m attracted to the idea of starting a revolution as well. Changing things from the inside is vital, but maybe isn’t working fast enough. If I could change the question, I’d say what’s more important is changing things from the inside,

but what’s more urgent in the meantime is starting some smart revolutions, peaceful revolutions and intelligent revolutions - where you’ve thought through what the political response will be. As an example, I’d point to Tamsin Omond of Climate Rush or Marina Pepper, characters from the upcoming film Just Do It. They are to die for, they’re just brilliant. Actually, to go back to question one, they are people who inspire me.

What is the best meal you’ve had in your life? Cooked by whom? Eaten with whom?

The best meal/s are the ‘picnic’ assortments Jan, my wife of 26 years, gathered together for evenings out together walking riverside (Southbank) during ‘courting’ days in 1983 with a budget bottle of Lambrusco!

Can you describe a typical work day?

Meetings with all the different departments in my company – I’ve got an HR department not very happy when I’m off sick, the managing director is a bit of a pain – but they are all me because I work for myself.

My days are incredibly varied. I’ve blurred the edges between working and living probably further than is comfortable or sensible. One of the things that made me think people needed a Carbon Coach was this idea that people can have two personas. I would chat to people who say, ‘Oh yeah, I agree with you privately, but I can’t possibly agree with you publicly as the chairman of blah, blah.’ I always thought to myself – well no, you are one person. I’ve tried to meld work rest and play into one bundle and to live in integrity with myself.

The last 12 months, there has been less demand for public speaking on climate etc. A couple of years ago I was doing well on the circuit, but much of this dried up, maybe people got fed up with the subject after ‘climate gate’ and all the stupid grandstanding and denial. Now I’m doing more carbon coaching – getting out locally, probably about once a week. The rest of the time, behind a computer screen spending too much time on Twitter and Facebook – I’m still not sure whether that is work or not - but it can unite inspire and connect people – and maybe build movements?

How do you define success?

Being able to look at myself in the mirror and liking what I see.

What’s the best advice anyone’s ever given you?

When my oldest son Tom was born 20 years ago, my boss at the time said ‘you’ll be given lots of advice on how to be a father and a parent. Listen to all of it - and ignore all of it.’ I think that was good advice. The only good advice you are going to get is from your heart.

What’s your favourite book or film of late?

I’ll plump for the works of dear departed Douglas N. Adams - The Hitch Hikers Guide to the Galaxy ‘trilogy’ but more especially Dirk Gently’s Holistic Detective Agency and The Long Dark Tea Time of the Soul. As for films, I’d go for It’s a Wonderful Life, Field of Dreams, Gladiator, and ‘Up’ perhaps. Although I actually think down is the new up.