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Good News Week

It’s a bit gloomy out there at the moment: climate change, food shortages, very high oil prices, the credit crunch, impending recession – little wonder that people are beginning to look as downcast as our Prime Minister must be feeling.

Against the odds, however, last week was stuffed to the gills with good news as far as I was concerned. To start with, I spoke at a conference organised by a little office supplies company in Cheltenham (called The Commercial Group), where more than 250 other small businesses were regaled with what is one of the most inspiring case studies of a company going from almost nowhere to being a serious player in just 2 years. They also heard from the redoubtable Eugenie Harvey, of “Save the World for a Fiver” fame, who I reckon could cheer up even Jim Lovelock in his gloomiest “Death of Gaia” moments.

Then I went to open a state-of-the-art new building near Stroud, where a group of companies collectively known as The Green Shop Group are being re-housed. “If you want to change the world, you must begin from where you are”, says Roger Budgeon, Founder of The Green Shop, and the modest, unassuming inspiration behind this amazing initiative. Check it out – and if you have ever despaired at getting alternative building and DIY products, I guarantee that you’ll find them there.

At the start of the week, the 2008 Queen’s Awards for Enterprise were announced and included in the Sustainable Development category are two of the outstanding exemplars of year-on-year corporate excellence on all things sustainable (namely, Wessex Water and BT), as well as (somewhat less predictably!) Permanent Publications, publisher of the wonderful Permaculture Magazine, which was launched in the UK in 1992 with a reach of just 600 people, and now has more than 100,000 readers all over the world.

artistsimpression.jpgAnd lastly, sitting on a train checking emails, I found myself bursting out with laughter at an email from my colleagues on the South West Regional Development Agency, informing us that no less a global figure than George Bush had explicitly name-checked a big wave project the RDA is investing in off the coast of Cornwall, called Wave Hub. My cup positively overflowed at the knowledge that even George is now out there routing for renewable energy schemes in places he’s probably never even heard of!

Picture: Artists impression of the Wave Hub by www.ind-art.co.uk

Posted by JP on April 29, 2008 2:27 PM |

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