As a small company, the level of support we can provide is obviously limited, but we are keen to play our part. This year we have been able to make donations to the following organisations and projects:

Young People

• Catching Lives – Youth Homelessness Project, run with Thanington Neighbourhood Resource Centre
• Prince’s Trust – Team Programme for unemployed young people in East Kent

Older People

• Age UK, Herne Bay – Hazel Neville Dementia Care Unit
• Age UK, Canterbury – information, advice & guidance for older people in Canterbury and surrounding villages

Natural Environment

• Kent Wildlife Trust – supporting the creation of heath fritillary butterfly habitat at West Blean Wood.
• Hambrook Marshes Nature Reserve in Canterbury – supporting volunteer activities to restore habitats and improve amenities for local people.
• RSPB Blean Woods Nature Reserve – new coppice management for improved biodiversity (eg: heath fritillary butterflies and nightingales)

By paying a reduced car mileage allowance (5p below HMRC approved rates) and donating the difference to environmental charities, we also provide a disincentive for car use on company business. This year we donated the money to Rainforest Concern’s Choco-Andean Rainforest Corridor Project in the northwest of Ecuador.

BIG Lottery Fund has now published our report into the issues faced by communities dealing with climate change. The project involved extensive desk research, interviews and a Delphi Group with national experts from key organisations and partnerships such as the Transition Network, NCVO and WWF.

The report identified plenty of examples of innovative community-led low carbon projects, particularly around exploring community approaches to renewable energy, localising economies and developing more sustainable product lifecycles. However, it also found a need to widen and deepen community-led responses to climate change both in terms of climate change mitigation (reducing its extent by tackling CO2 emissions, for example) and adaptation (dealing with its effects).

The study also identified two key approaches to engaging people in climate change action; one focusing on ‘here and now’ issues, like jobs, skills, food, tackling injustice and improving well-being, the other on thinking about ‘our future’, how people want to live, work and bring up children.

Key recommendations for BIG and its partners included:

• Focus on approaches to improve community resilience and sustainability as much as climate change per se,
• Develop, with partners, a platform of support that would support leadership capacity and capabilities at a local level and help nurture a pipeline of future projects at scale
• Better recognise the breadth of achievement of community projects meeting multiple needs (e.g. CO2 reduction, healthy eating, employment, social care etc).

Emergent Research and Consulting is working with Greening the Gateway Kent & Medway to develop a “Green Infrastructure Business Plan”, based on the views of the community, the latest techniques in Geographical Information Systems and socio-economic analysis. A key challenge is to ensure credibility of the process by getting things moving quickly on the ground. So, we are hoping that the first projects will get started later this year. Watch this space!

The programme evaluation highlighted the potential value of this work to both communities and universities, particularly when relationships are developed on grounds of mutuality, reciprocity and trust. It noted how SECC drew on a much wider range of academic disciplines than more ‘traditional’ science, technology and engineering knowledge transfer activities. However, the evaluation also highlighted the issues both parties face in realising the potential of knowledge exchange in times of considerable financial constraint.

Some of the learning from the programme has been captured and published in a series of briefing reports available from http://www.coastalcommunities.org.uk/briefingPapers.html

For more information about the SECC programme evaluation or our evaluation services, please contact Dr. Jonathan Pratt (jonathan.pratt@emergentresearch.co.uk).

On the community side, we are working with the Big Lottery Fund to prepare a second Climate Change Scoping Study that will identify the ways in which some local communities are successfully mitigating and adapting to climate change, and consider what the barriers and enablers of community action are in this area. The results from this study will inform future national Big Lottery funding policy.

 On the business front, we are working alongside Step Ahead Research to identify key lessons and good practice for business collaboration in eco-innovation. The research will contribute to the completion of the EcoMind project by the Rochester based BSK-CIC, and identify ways in which collaborative eco-innovation can be encouraged and supported.

For more information about these projects, please contact Steve Matthews (steve.matthews@emergentresearch.co.uk ).

Co-Director, Jonathan Pratt explained how emergent can help its public, private and civil society clients:

“Our aim is to use the full gambit of social and economic research tools, as well as our experience of bringing about change, to deliver practical results “on the ground”. We can help organisations to identify business and community needs; involve stakeholders and service users in that assessment of need; and then develop new responses or improve existing services. We can also evaluate whether a service or initiative has had the desired effect.”

Jonathan’s fellow Director, Steve Matthews highlighted that Emergent wanted to be different in its approach:

“We feel that we have a lot to offer through our services to organisations that want to make a difference, but we’re also keen that we operate in a way that makes us a force for good, albeit in our own small way. Our Social and Environmental Commitment sets out how we aim to make a positive impact through, for example, charitable giving, volunteering and taking climate change seriously. We’re keen to share our own ideas and learn from others in this respect.”

Both Jonathan and Steve are encouraged by the new company’s first steps, with interesting work in the pipeline and collaborations with a number of specialist associates in the offing.