By far, the most interesting thing I read this year was a magazine article not a book.

“Perhaps most stunningly, given all of our transgressions against them, they may even, in certain circumstances, have learned to trust us again…’It’s extraordinary,’ [marine mammal behavioralist named Toni Frohoff] said. ‘At precisely the time when you’d expect them to be the most defensive, they’re incredibly social. They’ll come right up to boats, let people touch their faces, give them massages, rub their mouths and tongues’…And yet for all of their inherent elusiveness, the gray whales of Baja baffle scientists for the opposite reason: They can’t seem to get enough of us humans.”

“A fellow mammal breaking the boundary of its domain for a long look at you is beguiling in and of itself. Such behavior becomes downright otherworldly, however, when you consider the not-so-distant history of human-whale interactions in the birthing lagoons of Baja.”

“I asked Frohoff at one point if, given both the dark past of human-whale interactions in those lagoons and what we’ve now come to know about whale intelligence, there could possibly be some element of knowing forgiveness behind their actions. She took a deep breath and widened her eyes, making it clear that she wanted to be very careful about how she answered such a question.

” ‘Those are the kinds of things that for the longest time a scientist wouldn’t dare consider,’ she said. ‘But thank goodness we’ve gone through a kind of cognitive revolution when it comes to studying the intelligence and emotion of other species. In fact, I’d say now that it is my obligation as a scientist not to discount that possibility. We do have compelling evidence of the experience of grief in cetaceans; and of joy, anger, frustration and distress and self-awareness and tool use; and of protecting not just their young but also their companions from humans and other predators. So these are reasons why something like forgiveness is a possibility. And even if it’s not that exactly, I believe it’s something. That there’s something very potent occurring here from a behavioral and a biological perspective. I mean, I’d put my career on the line and challenge anybody to say that these whales are not actively soliciting and engaging in a form of communication with humans, both through eye contact and tactile interaction and perhaps acoustically in ways that we have not yet determined. I find the reality of it far more enthralling than all our past whale mythology.’

Perhaps Seibert’s article just caught me on a day when I was worn down from my study of economic artifices like the “rational man” (although economists confess this ‘person’ is a construct, it nevertheless, continues to stand at the very center of their discipline) and financial failures like the subprime fiasco (also rooted in make-believe).  Maybe I was just vulnerable that morning to even the smallest hint of a suggestion of the possibility of transcendence. Perhaps.  But give it a read and see what you think.  It’s well worth an hour.  And maybe it will catch you in the right mood, too, ready to believe, ready to accept, ready to embrace the possibility that there is something beyond us that bring out the best in us if we will only give it a chance.

(The illustration at the top of the post is from the New York Times article, and is used with thanks.)

Tagged: whales ]]> http://blog.thefuturescompany.com/2009/12/31/christmas-collection-4/feed/ 0 thenextwavefutures whales.span.1 http://blog.thefuturescompany.com/2009/12/22/struggling-towards-sustainability/ http://blog.thefuturescompany.com/2009/12/22/struggling-towards-sustainability/#comments Tue, 22 Dec 2009 14:33:36 +0000 thenextwavefutures http://blog.thefuturescompany.com/?p=1371 ]]>

Andrew Curry writes:

Whatever the disappointments about the Copenhagen talks, it’s clear that consumers have fairly strong attitudes to sustainability issues, and these  have barely been affected by the financial crisis. That was the view of a recent report on our Henley Planning for Consumer Change [PCC] research in New Civil Engineer. Indeed, politicians seem to be lagging consumers on the question of sustainability.

The managing director of The Futures Company’s London office, Will Galgey, told NCE that “The key thing is that there hasn’t been a significant diminishing of engagement with environmental issues. In fact we see the importance of those issues continuing to rise.”

At the same time, consumers increasingly see the links between environmental behaviours and financial prudence. But not all businesses seem to have registered this.

Frank Price, sustainability director at the engineering consultancy Grontmij, argues in the article, “Some businesses may be tempted to reel in their focus on sustainability, based on a false belief that the finances needed to introduce sustainable practices could be better spent elsewhere. On the contrary, businesses that are looking to save money and reduce costs should be looking at their sustainability measures as a priority.”

The costs of not increasing the level of business sustainability are likely to be measured in business reputation. PCC data show that 79% agree that companies have a responsibility to support the communities they operate in, and businesses are identified by some distance as the group “most at fault for causing environmental damage”. At the same time, trust in businesses continues to decline. Potentially this adds up to a vicious circle in which it is difficult for businesses to increase their credibility – or a welcome opportunity to rebuild trust.

For more information about accessing Planning for Consumer Change, please contact our UK Marketing and PR Manager, Jennifer Childs. The picture at the top of the post is from Australia’s fmcg sustainability institute, and is used with thanks.

Stacey Yates writes:

This engaging advertising campaign, supposedly from the future, was commissioned by Greenpeace and revealed at Copenhagen airport last month in the run up to the 15th United Nations Climate Change Conference.

The series of posters display photographs of world leaders, manipulated to appear ten years older, saying sorry for not having done more about climate change. Some haven’t aged well. The aim: to make us – and them – think about the consequences of not taking climate change seriously enough.

I think it’s a successful campaign that resonates with what we do at the Futures Company when we ask people to position themselves in the future, and testament to photography’s immediacy in communicating a convincing truth.

From top to bottom: Obama; Brown; Lula; Sarkozy. Agency: Arc Communications/ Concept, design, creative direction: Toby Cotton/ Airport photos of the ads in situ: ©Christian Aslund/Greenpeace

Emily Pitts writes:

As the lights begin to fade on 2009, thought turns to the New Year and what hope we might have for progress on climate change in 2010. And sound the bells; it looks like hopes should be pretty high. Global commitments to climate change (that were due to take place at the Copenhagen talks in December) are now taking place early next year in Mexico, and the UK’s much-publicised 10:10 campaign that invites individuals and organisations to reduce their carbon emissions by 10% over the course of the year, officially kicks off in January. (The Futures Company has signed up).

However, there’s still a fair way to go before we can be confident of 2010’s ability to announce the dawn of a new era. Look at where the most influential global powers are on the issue, for example with Obama’s well-publicised absence from the Copenhagen talks next month. [Update 26/11: No sooner had we posted this than Obama decided to go to Copenhagen after all].  There is no doubt that he is concerned about climate change and takes it seriously. It is also equally clear that the difficulties he faces domestically from within the Senate are serious, and have led him to feel that the possibility of reaching global accord this year is unrealistic.

In spite of this, there is something undeniably depressing about a protocol to replace Kyoto being delayed. Even alone, the very symbolism of the American president’s absence from Copenhagen packs a powerful punch in the gut of the climate change movement.

This tardiness to act on climate change is increasingly at odds with public opinion. 2009 Global Monitor data shows that globally, 67% of consumers agree that climate change is the biggest single problem facing the world today – even after the financial crisis. Take also, the proliferation of grass-roots movements that are galvanising the public’s appetite for change and progress, from 10:10, to Do the Green Thing, to the Campaign against Climate Change, as well as a host of cultural interventions (the RSA’s Arts and Ecology blog is the best guide).

The chasm between the positions of politicians and the public on climate change is perilous. There are risks here for politicians as well, if they get too far out of step with what the public is both saying and doing. Even in the US, carbon emissions are now falling. Closing the gap and delivering meaningful action from the top as well as the bottom could see 2010 jubilant in realising its potential for being the year that finally delivers on climate change.

The picture is from the greenzer blog, and is used with thanks.

Andrew Curry writes:

I was fortunate enough to be invited earlier this week to the launch of the UK Green Fiscal Commission’s report in London, on shifting to taxes  on pollution – and in particular on carbon emissions – while reducing at the same time taxes on people (income tax and national insurance). The Commission proposed a substantial shift, increasing ‘environmental’ taxes from 5% to 20% of the tax base over 10 years, although the overall effect would be neutral in terms of total government revenues.

The report’s been two years in the making, directed by the environmental economist Paul Ekins, and had the support of some heavyweight commissioners, including Lord Turner, who spoke at the launch. Our former colleague Michelle Harrison, now at TNS-BMRB, was a member.

The conclusions can be spelt out in a few lines. Environmental taxes are effective in changing behaviour, and efficient to administer. They create jobs (around half a million to 2020) at only a fractional cost to economic growth, and they are also, almost certainly, essential if we are to have a hope of meeting the tough carbon reduction targets in the Climate Change Act.

Size – or at least scale – matters. In his comments Lord Turner argued that only “a radical change” would work, both because it meant that people would be able to see the reductions in their income tax bills, and so that there were sufficient long-term incentives for people and businesses to think it worth changing their behaviour and purchase decisions.

The technicalities of such taxes are fairly well understood. Their implementation is more about political will (which is why the panel also included a cross-party array of politicians). So I was also struck by the public opinion data (polling by BMRB), which was largely in line with our research into environmental and ethical attitudes, but was more positive than some would expect. 51% were in support of “green taxes”, and 32% against, but these percentages changed sharply, to 77% in favour and only 9% against, when people were asked about “green taxes” which were offset by other tax reductions.

But some deliberative research, also carried out by BMRB, identified some of the barriers. People were more likely to advocate environmental taxes if they believed that climate change will effect them personally, and there are still significant levels of scepticism in the UK. There was, unsurprisingly, little faith that overall tax bills would not increase – even before the current ‘race to the bottom’ on tax and public expenditure. And although neutrality should mean that there are likely to be as many winners as losers, most people – with an ingrained sense of pessimism about paying tax – thought they would be worse off personally after the tax shift. But fairness also mattered.

The politics of tax are notoriously difficult: “winners nod, while losers scream”. And from the window tax onwards, tax changes are littered with unintended consequences. The Treasury is generally sceptical about them. But if there is an opportunity, it is in the early days of a new government. And all of the politicians on the panel were optimistic that a new Chancellor of the Exchequer of their particular stripe would be keen on the idea – despite the risks. We’ll find out next year.

The picture is from Flickr user JustUptown, and is used under a Creative Commons licence with thanks.

Camilla Parke writes:

I must admit that I sat a little uncomfortably through the opening minutes of The End of the Line, the documentary screened on World Oceans Day, in which violent shots of blood drenched waters were interplayed with images of bloated Europeans gorging on sushi. My guilt is not misplaced; as an unquestioning consumer I have contributed to the problem journalist Charles Clover uncovers in this film: the little known damage that overfishing is doing to the world’s oceans. Significant improvements in fishing technology, huge increases in consumer demand and poorly enforced, inadequate quotas have decimated our seas. The impact on biodiversity is alarming: if overfishing continues at its current rate, scientists predict we will be out of most fish by 2048.

The plight of one endangered species in particular – Bluefin tuna – was explored in the film, and the press this week have focused on those retailer and restaurateurs that have (and have not) responded to calls to find more sustainable alternatives. A number of places are getting it right, and have been for some time – Feng Sushi in London’s Borough market has been sustainably sourcing its fish for the last 10 years. But for larger companies, the challenges are more significant.

Japanese restaurant Nobu seem unfazed by petitions from its celebrity diners to remove Bluefin from its menus, content to mention its endangered status on the menu and discretely suggests diners choose an alternative. Others are responding more proactively: Marks and Spencer has committed to only using pole and line caught tuna in its entire range of products; Pret a Manger is making a similar commitment.

Alongside the statistics, one of the most powerful learnings from the film is the fact that it is still possible to reverse the fortune of our oceans – as Clover points out, the answer is ‘not rocket science’. Although one hurdle is the inadequacy of current policy, one of the most important things we can do as consumers is to make more noise. Ask shops and restaurants how fish is sourced, and avoid those that are unsustainable. This really means thinking more and consuming less – a challenge given our love affair with eating fish. But if we don’t want to go hungry in the future, do we really have any other choice?

The photo at the top is borrowed, with thanks, from the End Of The Line website.

Courtesy of the Transition Island Blog

Andrew Curry writes:

We’ve been thinking quite a lot recently about the impact of recession on consumer behaviour, and I was asked by Radio 4’s Beyond Westminster to join a panel discussion about this, which is broadcast tomorrow (Saturday 9th – if you missed it, you can hear it on the website for another week).

The other panellists were Chris Leslie, of the New Local Government Network (and a former Labour MP), and Jeremy Leggett, who runs one of Britain’s largest solar energy companies, solarcentury, and also wrote a fine book, Half Gone, about the end of the oil economy.

It’s difficult to summarise the flavour of a fifteen minute discussion in a few lines, and I wouldn’t want to spoil the programme, but some themes seemed to emerge:

• The upwards shift in oil and energy prices is a step change not a blip (a Dutch energy consultancy recently estimated that the floor price for oil had reached $110/barrel).
• In the short term this is reducing car use, but hurting the poorest hardest, mostly through the cost of their domestic energy bills (the poorest tend not to own cars).
• In the longer term, however, the government has to make a choice between orchestrating a full-scale shift to renewable energy sources, or trying to muddle through with conventional energy (Leggett is a member of the group which wrote the recently published The Green New Deal, which linked energy innovation, climate change response, and financial reform).
• Shifting to renewables will take investment, which probably isn’t going to come from taxation but could – without going into the economic theory here – come from market incentives and from encouraging people to save more, which would be good for the long-term stability of the economy.

Some of the evidence suggests that people are ahead of the politicians here. But it will still take some political courage to act on this – a quality which seems sadly lacking from British politics at the moment.

Jo Phillips writes:

This weekend I bought 20 lettuce seedlings for a £1 from a country market. Should even a few of these grow into healthy sized lollo rosso, I reckon I will have saved a few pounds on the cost of equivalent produce at the supermarket, even taking into account the cost of compost and water. But perhaps more interesting than the potential to save money on food at a time when food costs are escalating and consumers are feeling the pinch, is the intrinsic value of homegrown produce to the grower. As Monty Don pointed out recently in his session at Hay, a person who grows food from seed wouldn’t even consider wasting it.

In his role as the new President of the Soil Association Don has been smart to encourage all growers, great and small, to consider themselves as part of a sustainable food movement. He clearly appreciates that those who have narrowed the gap between soil to plate to its minimum could, if connected to each other, be a powerful network for change. Linking small steps to big effects and harnessing the power of the collective may be a powerful way to address concerns about food security and food footprints and encourage behaviour change. And with sales of vegetable seeds overtaking those of flowers this year, the movement shows signs of burgeoning.

The greatest challenge perhaps will be in cities –people living within view of farms at least have a regular reminder of the provenance of food, but in urban spaces the mental gap is greater, and the knowledge less intuitive. But with the return of Victory Gardens in London and San Francisco, and vertical farms on the horizon, we are moving closer to the Soil Association’s vision of “a national policy of self-sufficiency in staple foods.”

© Jake Goretzki

Source: ICM/Guardian 2008

Andrew Curry writes:

One of the more interesting pieces of data to be published this month was the result of a Guardian/ICM poll which showed that a majority of UK adults thought that it was more important to deal with environmental issues than the economy. Interesting, because the notion that people always turn back to financial self-interest when times are tight is so ingrained that my first thought was that the poll must be wrong.

But maybe not. Looking at the poll through the lens of our 2007 Green Consumer Segmentation (summary here), there are high degrees of consistency. The segmentation generated five segments: two small activist groups (about 8% of the population); a larger group, ‘Positive Choosers’, representing 31% of the population, who were informed about ethical and environmental issues, and expected companies and organisations to act on them; a fourth segment, the ‘Conveniently Conscious (35%), who are environmentally and ethically informed, but don’t tend to act unless choices are framed from them; and finally a group of Onlookers (26%), who are unaware or sceptical. The point is that the top three groups are all more likely to prefer that the government tackles environmental issues – and so is some of the fourth group. From this perspective, the 52% figure seems completely plausible.

There were also strong degrees of consonance between the ICM research and our findings. For example, both pieces of research find that young people and older people had the highest levels of environmental concern (with a sag in the age cohorts between), that women had slightly higher levels of concern than men, that there was a poor correlation between socio-economic class and environmental concern, and that there were relatively few differences between different regions of the UK. With one notable exception: in the South east, Britain’s richest region, 52% say the economy matters most, compared to only 38% of Scots, perhaps more evidence to undermine the widely held idea that environmental concerns are a product of affluence.

And as it happens, the Green Consumer Segmentation has just won an Atticus award from our parent company, WPP, for being one of the best pieces of work in the area of ‘Market Research and Insights’ across the whole group worldwide last year. The Atticus competition, named for the Cretan storyteller, is designed to encourage and promote new thinking across the company. We’re delighted, obviously.