Founder Footsteps

The VALUE of nature

Swampy — Mon, 13 Oct 2008 09:16:00 GMT

The money markets are in crisis, and our world leaders are running around
like headless chickens trying to fix the problem – there is distrust
between financial institutions because they have all been tainted by greed
and easy gain – they have forgotten how to do an honest deal and so for
their own safety they are not doing any deals at all. Pouring money at
this problem may work - but, has money ever bought trust?

And what is money anyway? Where do all the billions that are wiped off the
stock market end up; a black hole? Is money real?

Well OK I did not do well in economics BUT I can’t help but wonder at the
way the world puts a value on things and how overnight the ‘value’ can be
wiped away by the ebb and flow of an invisible tide of money. Well, the
tide has turned and money levels are low. Now here’s an interesting
thought, in reality the numbers on the money traders computer screens
reflect nothing more than ‘confidence’ and we are all in a spin because of
how sure or confident traders are of a safe bet – how they feel about
their ability to second guess the potential value of shares. In the
constant pursuit of easy gain, the markets are massaged by rumour and
speculation so are these manipulated values ever real? My head hurts at
this point.

A tree is real. It will grow and provide more value than the space it
stands in. You can believe in a tree.

Our forests work hard at the ‘essential’ task of carbon management and
cleaning our ‘vital’ water and they do this for free with a multitude of
value added services gifted to other life forms that live with them. But
do we value them for what they do? If we did, our headlines would read
slightly differently.

In the news on Friday – tucked away and not in the headlines I read…The
global economy is losing more money from the disappearance of forests than
through the current banking crisis, according to an EU-commissioned study.
It puts the annual cost of forest loss at between $2 trillion and $5
trillion.

The EU study is an attempt to indicate that the loss and decline in nature
represents REAL lost value that overshadows the crisis in the financial
system. So how did this value get calculated… Well when FREE essential and
vital service providers are taken away, we have to find other ways of
getting those services – we have to create/build replacements in order to
survive and in doing this a monetary value will develop.

Speaking to BBC News on the fringes of the congress, study leader Pavan
Sukhdev emphasised that the cost of natural decline dwarfs losses on the
financial markets.

"It's not only greater but it's also continuous, it's been happening every
year, year after year," he told BBC News.
"So whereas Wall Street by various calculations has to date lost, within
the financial sector, $1-$1.5 trillion, the reality is that at today's
rate we are losing natural capital at least between $2-$5 trillion every
year."

Forest losses are real – it is not a rumour. Nature is precious, life
giving and free. Surely, to those who depend on nature to survive (that’s
all of us folks), the value is obvious and so great it would be
immeasurable – BUT if putting a monetary value on it shakes politicians
awake and into action, brilliant. If this value creates trust among world
leaders to work together in conserving our natural world, we are saved!

Lastly, some food for thought what if we traded in trees as carbon
management systems… confidence in value would be high, forests would be
protected and farmed, our respect for nature would return, environmental
science would boom, our ability to design with new materials would be
challenged, we would seek to learn more about the world that sustains us
(we may even get smarter!!) and... money would be worth the paper it’s
printed on.

£21,000 Raised and in the NEWS!

Swampy — Wed, 14 May 2008 10:53:00 GMT

Hi to All Footprint Friends,

Been a while since I’ve posted a Blog … must try harder …

All I can say at the moment is ‘WOW,’ what an amazing few days we have had.

Over the bank holiday (May 1st – 4th ) we were at the Oracle shopping centre in Reading meeting with people, painting feet and introducing the Footprint Friends web site. It was a bit surreal really, as busy shoppers rushed by laden with bags and boxes our little patch of blue tarpaulin was like a different world with people sat around painting designs on feet and hands talking about the environment. We met up with some great people who were genuinely excited to have found us at Reading. It was also a delight for us when Shirley – Climate Change Champion for the South West came to lend a hand (foot!!) and take part in our exhibition – thanks Shirley .

Then … no sooner had we packed up from Reading, we were packing the van again to head off to London Excel for the Think 08 show which was over 7-8th May.

On the first day of the show we were joined by VIP Members from Itchen College and Wildern School who were all given special permission to wander around the exhibition and interview exhibitors on film (looking forward to seeing the finished result.) There are also some photo’s in the Gallery. THEN on the evening of the 7th we all headed off to Canary Warf where Footprint Friends was the charitable beneficiary of the Think Ball and our VIP’s had the challenging task of helping with the fund raising. Two very brave VIP’s (Tom and Michelle from Wildern school) were interviewed on stage – they were simply fantastic. You can read the comments about the event in my posts which can be found under: We THINK! 2008 in London.

WE RAISED £21,000!!!!!!!!!! This money will go into the Footprint Friends Foundation which will be a fund to enable you guys to implement your best eco ideas – more information about this will follow soon.

THEN, (today) we appeared in an article in the Guardian – Check it out at: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/may/14/ethicalliving.climatechange

What’s next I ask myself… we have all started something special and with your continued support, determination, and dedication to making a difference – I think it will be amazing what we can achieve.

New Friends at DEFRA

Swampy — Fri, 12 Oct 2007 11:02:00 GMT

Hello!!

It really is amazingly rewarding to be making networks and new relationships with others equally passionate about the environment and in particular the importance of young people in the debate.

Here I am with Adam Nethersole who is the Manager at DEFRA for the Climate Change Champions programme confirming a partnership with Footprint Friends to host the social networking via our web for the appointed 2008 Climate Change Champions. This is exciting news and will bring some stimulating content to our site.

An Invitation to go back to School

Swampy — Tue, 09 Oct 2007 08:57:00 GMT

When Mrs Clarke the Head of Wykeham House School generously asked ‘Would you like to come into school on Friday and talk to our Seniors?’ It was an opportunity I could not turn down.

On the day, I had all my kit (check) had some stickers (check) I was on time (check) feeling calm…… (check) OK I admit it, I was nervous – thinking about all those bright eyes and fresh minds sat in front of me, my logic was losing it’s nerve…. I went to school once (a long time ago) …still giving a school assembly seemed not for the faint hearted.

Well the Power Point was working, the intro music was beautifully sung (not by me – a student!!), the audience was not full of scary monsters and my worry soon dissolved and I relaxed into my presentation.

For the team, making contact with a school was another milestone in our Footprint Friend journey and it reinforced for me the reasons why it’s so important for young people to have a say in the future use of our planet. Our future is in our hands.

I heard a thoughtful phrase once that has lingered in my mind…..

Our future generations do not inherit the planet from us,
We are simply borrowing the planet from our future generations.

With Footprint Friends, future generations have a vehicle to ask questions and be heard – if we, the adult lenders, ‘over borrow’ now and create an ever worsening ecological debt, who will ultimately pay the price?

Any more schools out there who would like a Footprint Friends school assembly??

All Jamboree 2007 photos are now on the site!

richard — Fri, 28 Sep 2007 16:52:00 GMT

All the Jamboree 2007 photos are now up! Phew!

Sorry it took so long but we had a few hiccups with the search facility. In order to allow you to search for your image we had to upload all the files individually. That's over 1060 photos one by one!

We also had to individually photoshop each picture so that the light was perfect and cropped to the correct size.

There is still one more change to be made next week which will allow you to search for your image, then jump straight to the page to leave comments.

I would love you to send us any photos you took at the Jamboree and they may end up on our site. feet@footprintfriends.com

Keep sending in photos of your feet in different places and we will keep adding them to the site.

Step one - December 2006 - An Inconvenient Truth

Swampy — Mon, 20 Aug 2007 11:33:00 GMT

Before I dive into this blog entry... Hi to all you Footprint Friends, It's wonderful to see the forum so active already

So... back to An Inconvenient Truth..... Well, I watched this movie with my family and we sat quietly with grim little faces - it was not quite what we were expecting.

In case you haven't seen this movie - it's a lecture style film with some disturbing findings and forecasts. Whatever you think of Al Gore - it's worth a view.... it made me think.

I couldn't stop thinking about it, it made me challenge the research, it made me question but above all it really MADE ME THINK. This is a here and now situation that affects us all.

With thinking came research - usually at 4am with our cat to keep me company. The web is an amazing resource centre for information and the deeper I went, the more I wanted to see evidence of actions, of solutions, of real joined up global leadership and of commitments to sign up to radical actions to enable radical life preserving change. I was disappointed.

Overall my web research left me feeling uneasy. I got the impression that the 'saving the planet' plan was disjointed, un ambitious and swamped by the agenda's of people in suits trying to figure out what to believe in and why. And, talk about confusing! All that scientific argument and brain baffling what if's.

I admit, I am a business woman in business to make a living (I have three businesses which I will tell you about in Step two) and I sometimes wear a suit - I am also a mother of 3 and in that role I have a duty to protect them and use all the skills and opportunity I have been blessed with to make a positive contribution to their lives.

I quickly came to an important conclusion - doing NOTHING was NOT AN OPTION. That was the easy bit - the direction and taking the first step needed more thought. Then I was introduced to a new business show called THINK (the title sounded promising) and I took STEP ONE by contacting the organisers to see what this show was about and what it was hoping to achieve.

That's all for now - I'll put Step Two up soon. In the meantime happy posting and let the world know what steps you are taking on your journey to a more sustainable future.

Karen (Swampy)