Transition Culture has moved
I no longer blog on this site. You can now find me, my general blogs, and the work I am doing researching my forthcoming book on imagination, on my new blog.
Come find me at robhopkins.net
7 Apr 2008
Spent a glorious weekend in the garden, sowing seeds, building a compost heap, digging over a new bed and generally getting everything ready for the emerging Spring. In the interests of trying different approaches alongside each other to see what works best, I made a double-dug terraced bed, a lot of work but something you only need to do once. I have been putting in some soft fruit bushes and our first seedlings, salad rocket, have just started to peep through the compost in their seed trays. When I sat down this morning though, with my lower back still feeling the exertions of my double digging, I found, via. Energy Bulletin, a wonderful film about a permaculture farm in Australia, which makes my wee plot rather pale into insignificance!
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4 Apr 2008
Use this tool when you want to have a deep exploration of an issue. It allows an open forum while keeping a focused discussion. Use this for groups of minimum 10 – maybe 100, perhaps even more. The question is important – keep it open, non-judgemental and non-directive. Set a time limit – about 1.5 hours is usually plenty. Set up five or six chairs in the centre of the room in a circle, facing inwards towards each other. Arrange further seating around this central circle, also facing inwards. Everyone starts sitting on the outer chairs.
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3 Apr 2008
From the Western Mail. April 2nd 2008. By Stepffan Rhys. Original here.
IT WOULD be cash but not – quite – as we know it.
A group of Welsh towns is pushing to have its own currency as it tries to create a micro- economy, the Western Mail can reveal today.
The aim? To strengthen links between local businesses and consumers while reducing reliance on big business.
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2 Apr 2008
‘Health and Sustainability’ was a fascinating event, in two parts, which began to explore the implications on healthcare of peak oil and climate change. The first part was an online webcast held at Plymouth University, where the four speakers gave 10 minute online presentations and then discussed the issues raised online in a chatroom format. The webcast (I refuse to use the term ‘webinar’ which was used in the publicity!) turned out to be the most popular one that the University has ever run, with about 50 people from around the world, including New Zealand and the US, logging on to take part. It demonstrated new technology at its best, and offered a tool which could greatly reduce the amount of air travel that is required for communication.
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31 Mar 2008
We rely on oil for everything from transport to aspirins. By 2006 we were using 86 million barrels of oil a day: that’s an Olympic swimming pool of oil every 15 seconds. But one day soon supplies are going to run dry and, according to Rob Hopkins, we need to prepare for that crisis now. His “Transition movement” is about building communities that can stand on their own feet in a post-oil world. To do that you need to increase “resilience”, eco-speak for a system’s ability to cope with external shocks.
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