Scientists, celebrities…what about the sociologists?

The momentum behind Climate Change is building from every angle. The scientists are beavering away at the latest carbon busting gadget, NGOs are lobbying harder than ever and not a day goes by without another celebrity committing to de-clutter and green their life.

But an article published in nature today makes a damn good point. Where are the sociologists is all of this? As the solution to Climate Change largely lies in collective action, is it not about time that the sociologists got involved? After all aren’t they the ones who are supposed to understand why society acts the way it does? Sociologists of the world, unite!

Oh and by the way the girl who wrote it is a very good friend of mine and runs the podcast show down at Nature – check it out plug plug.

Why did the squirrel cross the road?

Several of my colleagues were convinced I was making it up when I told them that as a child I used to attend The Tufty Club. Tufty was a safety-conscious red squirrel who taught the children of the Seventies how to look both ways before crossing the road and about the difference between a pelican and a zebra crossing - at the height of his popularity, over 2 million children were members of the Club.

But a recent announcement from Volvo may mean that Tufty can at last rest in peace. The car manufacturer has announced a radical goal of ensuring that nobody (yes, you read that right - nobody) is seriously injured or killed in accidents involving any of its new cars within 11 years.

It's going to achieve this through improvements and innovations in in-car technology (e.g. systems that detect pedestrians and activate the brakes, "alert controls" that let you know when you're tired by detecting irregular driving patterns and other marvellous developments), as well as through funding driver education programmes and partnering with other stakeholders, looking at how the road infrastructure can be adapted to make it safer for everyone.

What a marvellous ambition for a company. That's true product responsibility - accepting that you are accountable not just for the impacts from your manufacturing process, but also the impacts of the people who buy and use your product.

Ambitious stuff. And maybe it could only happen in Sweden. But if they pull it off, then perhaps Tufty really can fade into quiet, and well-deserved, obscurity.

You've got 22 months...

There’s always something in the Sunday papers that stands out more than anything else. This week Revealed: the hidden benefits of a private-school education”.

Two scary stats: 1) A bright baby from a poor background is liable to be overtaken by a less bright baby from a wealthy background by the age of 22 months 2) No state school in the whole of Tottenham has even sent a pupil to Oxford.

As a state school attendee the whole issue of social mobility is both fascinating and distressing. Why did I manage to stay ahead in my first 22 months and make it to Oxford while the majority of my peers fell behind?

The answer – good parenting. I had the importance of academic achievement ingrained into me at a very early age. But for others it’s not so simple. How do you help your child read when you can’t do so yourself? Or encourage them to go to university when you have to experience of higher education?

The report which stemmed the article is great for raising awareness to the issue. But before we get carried away with sharing the benefits of private education, there are a fair few other inhibiting factors that we need to overcome first.

On a completely separate note….did anyone watch Top Gear last night? Ok, so Clarkson’s idea for removing CO2 from exhausts by attaching a giant greenhouse wasn’t exactly practical but a 10 minute green feature on Top Gear?? Hats off to you Jeremy.

Let it grow

Having read this article about how much food we currently waste and got rather depressed I was inspired to read about the Secret Seed Society. For so many of us the growing of food is totally removed from our everyday lives. Wouldn't it be great if more of us could get involved the growing of our own food, or even just having a better understanding of where it all comes from.

It certainly isn't easy for many. I for one live in a flat with no garden, but just growing a few herbs on the window sill is enormously satisfying. Okay so it might not be the silver bullet to stop climate change and reduce all the waste there currently is, but it certainly is one step in the right direction.

Maybe if we had a little more of ourselves invested in the food we eat, less of it might end up in landfill. Perhaps the first stage is to sign up as a Seed Agent...

19 ways to save the UK

Once again I’m blogging about Jonathan Porritt – potentially the nation’s most outspoken environmentalist. Today he’s delivered a list to number 10 outlining the Sustainable Development Commission’s top 19 ways to help save the planet. I’m not sure why the list stopped at 19, you’d have thought they could have made it to 20, but that’s beside the point because you know what, the list is great!

Imagine a world where happiness lessons are given outside, everyone ride bikes and vegetables grow freely in our towns – it sounds like Holland!

The next steps for implementing the list aren’t specified but apparently all ideas will be ‘seriously considered’ by the Government. So keep your eye on the high street. It might not be long until the Royal Bank of Scotland becomes the ‘Royal Bank of Sustainability’. I wonder how Mr Brown would feel about that?