This document discusses using mapping tools to better support sustainable consumption initiatives. It notes that while civil society is actively working on issues related to sustainable consumption and production (SCP), efforts could be more effective through better information sharing. The document proposes developing online maps to make local SCP activities and resources more visible. This could help avoid duplication, provide advice and support, and inform policy. It highlights examples of successful local mapping projects and suggests categories that could be mapped at a London-wide or European level to showcase good practices and engage more actors in SCP work.

1. New ways of working…
Mapping local action:
supporting sustainable
consumption initiatives
Chris Church
ANPED Trustee
Director, Mapping for change

2. SCP - What is civil society doing?
Activities around the SCP agenda:
 Consumer focussed campaigning & lobbying
 Work in multi-stakeholder processes & alliances
 Engaging with communities
Issues emerging from the ‘Action Town’ programme
A range of problems to tackle

3. Consumer campaigns
Plenty of activity – needs to be more effective. We need:
 Better dissemination of examples of good practice
 To show what is effective and ‘mainstream’ this work
 To go beyond preaching to the converted
 To link to social and winder media
 To inform and impact on political campaigns.

4. But ‘just what is SCP’?
 It is the nature of ‘SCP’ that it is difficult to define
what ‘it’ is.
 We lack common principles which could be used
as a basis for joint working.
 Those who see this as their ‘single issue’ are a
very small group.
 The linking of consumption and production makes
it more complex.

5. Too big an issue?
 Most NGOs only approach this through
projects.
 Little focus on policy and global issues.
 There is a lack of capacity and of the skills
needed to address, engage with and influence
work on these issues.
 Many other priorities for NGO activity

6. A lack of leadership and support
 Any NGO looking to work on biodiversity or
waste will find networks to provide information
and support.
 This is not the case with SCP.
 ANPED has focused on this issue but is small.
EEB may promote these ideas, but mostly to
larger organisations
 So much of what smaller civil society groups
want to know about is being done by…
 …Smaller civil society groups

7. So…
If this work is to develop we need to:
 Make it easy to find what is happening
 Avoid duplication but replicate where
appropriate
 Share information
 Provide advice and support
We need innovation in our information systems

8. Lessons from on-line mapping:
Keeping it all together
 It’s almost impossible to know what’s going
on in any large city (or diffuse rural area)
 Traditional networks work for those already
engaged
 Many new ideas emerging

9. Mapping for Change
 A social enterprise set up as a partnership between
the London 21 sustainability network and University
College London
 Provide participatory mapping services to
communities, voluntary sector organisations, local
authorities and developers using a suite of innovative
tools for communication.

10. Five years ago: the London 21Green Map
The first on-line Green Map

11. The value of mapping
 Any thing that is ‘based in a place’ can be placed
on a map
 This can turn a ‘directory’ into a living resource
 Organisations can design their own maps to
record the information that they want to use and
that they want others to see
 Maps can be local, wider-ranging and / or
thematic

12. Local Mapping
We can map
 Quantitative data - measurements of the local
environment or the economy.
 Qualitative data - surveys of people’s perceptions,
the things people like, dislike or want to change.
 Ideas - or at least the places where ideas can turn into
reality: possible sites for growing food or creating new
play spaces, or sites that need to change.
 Stories and histories - records of what has happened
in an area can be linked to specific places

13. Localising this: the Hackney Wick
Community Map (and others like it)

14. So what could we map for SCP?
One part of London has mapped:
 Community Views and Facilities
 Made Here and Independent Shops
 Home improvement and repairs
 Organisations
 Reuse/Recycle facilities
 Conservation Areas
 Events
 Green Areas
 Youth Activities

15. Those categories in use

16. Mapping for SCP: one approach
A London-wide map of resources for climate and consumption
1. Climate-focused bodies (including campaign groups, transition
towns, etc.)
2. Community / resource centres
3. Renewable energy projects and energy advice centres
4. City Farms and larger community gardens / food-growing / green
spaces
5. Community health / well-being projects
6. Key ethnic minority / faith / cultural / refugee / organisations and
networks
7. Time Banks and other local economic development projects
8. Community media organisations
9. Upcoming relevant events

17. Mapping good practice across Europe
Some issues:
 Easy as local at one level
 Who chooses?
 Who maintains?

18. How does this impact on policy?
 Any interested agency can find out more
about what is really happening
 Any individual can get active more easily –
this may lead to their greater engagement in
lobbying etc.
 Policy needs infrastructure for
implementation – maps can show existing
work and also the gaps

19. Maps tells us where we should be
going…
“It is not down in any map; true places
never are”. - Herman Melville (Moby Dick)
Or maybe we don’t have the right kind of
maps… Yet…

20. Mapping for change.org.uk
Thankyou!
Chris Church chrischurch@phonecoop.coop