Over the last few weeks the team at BeMoreEco have been blogging about great place to go this summer for your eco holiday. Also, in co-operation, EcoTrendSpotter have also reviewed what essential eco items you made need to take with you on you eco summer holiday. Below we have detailed all the post that have been submitted.

Travel Guides by BeMoreEco

• Eco holidays for Singles
• Eco holidays for Couples
• Eco holidays for Families

Buying Guides by EcoTrendSpotter

• Essential Holiday Gadgets
• Essential items for you Eco Washbag
• Items for your Eco Beach Trip
• Eco Health Care

WRAP Recycle Week will took place between 22nd and 28th June. In support of recycle week the teams at BemoreEco and MoreEco blogged their recycling exploits each day.

Below, are all the posts that were made.

• Sun 28th June – Day Seven – The Final Day
• Sat 27th June – Day Six – Recycling at Glastonbury, Mike Skinner Crop Circles, Lunch and making plastic flowers from recycled bottles.
• Sat 27th June – Green Think Tank for Kids
• Fri 26th June – Day Five – Vision Food Hall, lunch (woops!), Miniature New York made out of recycled items video – cool!
• Thurs 25th June – Day Four – Computer waste, Garbage and dodge lunch
• Thurs 25th June – So how do I ditch my old computer?
• Wed 24th June – Day Three - Plastic recycling, lunch, and recycling centre video
• Tues 23rd June – Coco-Cola, Sussex Woman & Chalk Cliffs! – pictures and video
• Tues 23rd June – Day Two – Lunch, clothes, more recycling bins
• Mon 22nd June - Recycle Week Poem by Nils
• Mon 22nd June – Day One – Lunch, recycling bins and amusing video

Pre Recycle Week Posts

• Recycle Twitters
• Top 10 Favourite BeMoreEco recycling articles
• The BeMoreEco Pledges
• National Recycle Week Summary - make a pledge

Also as bonus if you sign up to MoreEco during June and July they will give you an extra 100 joining points. Use offer code ‘recyclenow’.

If
you fancy treating yourself to some organic goodies, now is definitely the time
to buy as for 1 week only, So Organic are offering you FREE
DELIVERY when you spend over £30*. Just choose your
products, then enter code ENAB69 in the coupon code box at
checkout and the delivery charge will be deducted. *excluding p&p to qualify.   

Offer
ends 30th
June 2009

Click here to order.

The Recycle
Warehouse is an online department
store that is championing the environment and fighting climate change.
Their object is to be the next John Lewis, except that every
item at The
Recycle Warehouse is made
from recycled materials. 

The Recycle
Warehouse was launched this
year by John Halladay.

‘By buying from us, you are relieving
pressure on the world’s diminishing resources. Our inventory includes
chairs made from recycled cardboard, shoes from recycled tyres and whole
dining services made from recycled glass and much more.’

Six months after its launch The Recycle Warehouse displays hundreds of items –

‘…about 400 at the moment, still
increasing, all of which are made predominantly or wholly from recycled
materials. We have a rule that the items must have at least 50% recycled
content but most are much higher.’

Although it is a distinction that John
doesn’t make on the website his goods fall into two categories. On
the one hand it is easy to see what some of his things originally were.
Take a footstool made from recycled tyres, the tread is clearly visible
around the edge. It’s funky and loud and a real conversation piece.

‘This is taking something which had
a defined use and subverting it into something that is functionally
completely different. On the other hand, some of our furniture or our
tableware bears no relationship to the original use to which its raw
material was put. People can make a statement – I’m a hardcore
environmentalist: look at my
wastebin, it’s made from crisp packets! But they can buy a bed
or dining table that’s made to their own design from reclaimed timber
by a professional craftsman, that doesn’t look any different to a
conventional, well-crafted piece.’

‘Our goal is to show that every day
goods can be made from recycled materials and that they are just as
good as new. As well as the quirky – bags made from chewing gum wrappers
or ringpulls, bowls made out of remoulded LP records – we have beautiful,
functional furniture that is handmade from reclaimed wood, including
oak and teak which you just can’t buy any more in a sustainable way; 
designer clothes made from recycled fabrics, that can’t be bought
in any High Street shops.’

Many of the goods on sale through The Recycle Warehouse are made by charities.

‘Doy Bags are one of the best
known manufacturers in the recycling market. Made by a women’s collective
in The Philippines, their bags are colourful and exciting, woven from
reclaimed fruit juice packs. We supply garden furniture made by a charity
in Oxford that employs people with learning disabilities, and we support
other charities in various parts of the world.’

It’s a quirky site that makes its environmental
message clear on every page and it isn’t above being dogmatic about
climate change. This isn’t just about profit. 

At The
Recycle Warehouse they have
simple principles:

• sustainability comes first,
  profit comes second;
• business has to lead the way
  in the war against climate change;
• recycling is an alternative
  to the exploitation of the world’s finite resources
• this isn’t commerce, this
  is a Crusade.

John Halladay is a Board Member of Friends
of the Earth and a local Greenpeace activist.

Ethical Junction member Bags of Change has some Weleda goodies to give away.
Buy a Bags of Change eco shopping bag via www.bagsofchange.co.uk and get a FREE full size Weleda Sea Buckthorn Creamy Body Wash (RRP £6.95) with your order. 
Plus, your new bag will get you discounts at some of the UK’s best ethical independents - saving you up to 10% off your shopping basket every time you shop.

Weleda’s
Sea Buckthorn Creamy Body Wash is a revitalising blend of
antioxidant-rich biodynamic sea buckthorn oil and oranges, mandarins
and grapefruit from pure essential oils.
Sea
buckthorn is a particularly nourishing oil and a rich source of
anti-ageing pro-vitamin A and vitamin E. Sea buckthorn encourages
cutaneous cell-renewal thereby assisting the skin’s natural
regeneration. Gentle on the skin as well as the environment.

According to online travel agent responsibletravel.com, holidaymakers’ confidence has improved over the last three months as almost a fifth
(19%) of its total customers have gone ‘late’ and spontaneously
enquired and departed within a four week period. Furthermore, over a third (37%) of customers have travelled within eight weeks of first enquiring about their holiday.

These four week late booking figures reflect a rise of almost a third (31%) compared to the same period last year and almost a fifth (20%) for eight week late bookings.

The increase comes at a time when tour operators and airlines have
already reduced capacity for the upcoming season and across the year in
general. The late availability holiday deals that are on offer are
being snapped up fast and according to Justin Francis, managing
director of responsibletravel.com, it marks a pronounced increase in consumer confidence:

“There is no doubt that times were tough over the winter and
consumer confidence was severely affected as a result. However, these
figures are a sign that holidaymakers’ confidence is definitely
improving. While it’s far too early to call an end to what might be a
long recession it’s clear that in recent weeks more people are coming
into the summer market looking to book and depart at short notice. Some
will be disappointed that they cannot get their first or even second
choice holidays as airline capacity has been reduced.”

 Those countries topping the list for late bookings are: England; Italy; Morocco; Spain; France; Turkey; Wales and Greece.

responsibletravel.com
work with over 300 tour operators across the globe, from small
specialist operators to some of the larger, more mainstream travel
providers.

See

www.responsibletravel.com/latedeals 

Vegetarian and Vegan women like to dress as glamorously as anyone else, but their strong principles of not buying leather are rarely understood by the fashion industry, until now!

NeonCollective.com is a new website advocating a fresh concept in fashion retailing, a collection of like-minded designers and manufacturers who share one core belief: looking good needn’t cost a life.

Neon Collective brings the latest shoes and handbags from the world’s leading vegan and ethical designers into one stunning collection. For the first time, women everywhere can browse and purchase the latest trends in one place – safe in the knowledge no animal-derived products, or sweatshops have been used in their production.

Founder of NeonCollective.com is Clare Childs, 33, a former
television editor of BBC2 fashion show ‘Mary Queen of Shops.’ Childs
has been vegetarian all her life and is on a personal mission to make
retailing more accountable:

“As a vegetarian I feel I’ve been
neglected by mainstream fashion. There’s no reason why women should
have to sacrifice style and glamour in order to shop ethically, so Neon
Collective finally provides a choice of luxurious accessories that are
ethically sound. It’s never been more necessary; at a recent footwear
trade-show I found not only were most exhibitors oblivious to where
their leather had come from, but they weren’t interested in how the
animals had lived or died. To me, that is unacceptable.”

All
the designer shoes and handbags at NeonCollective.com are 100%
leather-free, but Childs believes that doesn’t mean they are only
suitable for vegans:  

“Any fashionista would find our range
tempting, and our new gift vouchers will allow vegans and veggies to
show sceptics that ethical fashion can be just as cutting-edge. So if
you know a fashion-focused female, a voucher for Neon Collective is the
perfect Christmas gift.”

Our ranges include designs from
renowned vegan brands Matt & Nat, Charmone, Novacas and Cri De
Coeur. Plus we are the only UK retailer for hot labels OlsenHaus,
English Retreads and NeuAura.   For further information please contact +44 (0)1273 231619
Email: clare@neoncollective.com
Website: www.neoncollective.com

Global responsible investment research specialist EIRIS, Centre for Australian Ethical Research (CAER)
and Survival International are supporting a United Nations Principles
for Responsible Investment (UN PRI) programme to facilitate engagement
between investors and their investee companies to promote and respect
the rights of indigenous peoples around the world.

The UN PRI collaborative engagement draws on latest research from EIRIS which explores
the challenges and opportunities faced by major companies operating in
parts of the world where the rights of indigenous peoples are
threatened.¹

According
to the United Nations there are 370 million indigenous people in the
world and 5,000 distinct indigenous cultural identities in more than 70
countries. There are believed to be more than 100 uncontacted groups in the world. Although indigenous people only account for 5% of the world’s population, they account for over 15% of the world’s poor.

Companies
engaging in activities that may infringe the rights of indigenous
peoples, as enshrined within the UN Declaration on the Rights of
Indigenous Peoples, face increasing reputational risks potentially
leading to issues with access to capital, damage to brand, licence to
operate, and operational risks such as the threat of litigation and
increased regulation.

The EIRIS report Indigenous rights: risks and opportunities for investors
highlights the rights of indigenous peoples as a key human rights issue
that companies and their investors should take into account. It covers
companies operating in sectors (mining, oil & gas, agricultural
producers and forestry paper) and countries considered to be high risk
for indigenous peoples. The research also highlights key risks areas
which investors should consider when engaging with companies on
indigenous rights issues such as access to investment capital;
increased regulation; litigation and reputational risk. 

Key findings:

- Big companies at risk: 250 companies (with a total market value of GBP 1.7 trillion)
have been identified as having an exposure to indigenous rights. 17% of
companies have a high risk exposure to indigenous rights issues.

- Few companies report on indigenous rights issues: The
quality of reporting is generally poor: whilst most companies provide a
response to allegations of breaches of indigenous rights few report
voluntarily on areas of non-compliance.

- Fewer than 20% of companies have adopted a policy supporting free prior informed consent² for indigenous peoples:19%
of these companies have a corporate-wide indigenous rights policy. Only
15% of companies have a corporate-wide policy supporting free prior
informed consultation.

- Only a fifth of companies disclose employment data on indigenous people:19% of companies disclose employment data on indigenous peoples.

- Fewer than 10% of companies have a policy for involuntary resettlement:  Just over 6% of companies have a policy covering involuntary resettlement.

Given
the level of NGO and media attention to the issue of indigenous
peoples’ rights and the introduction of laws and regulation in many
countries, companies with strong commitments and effective engagement
processes will undoubtedly benefit in an environment where access to
land and resources is becoming increasingly restricted.

Stephanie
Maier, Head of Research at EIRIS said ‘Indigenous rights is a complex
issue that companies and their investors need to address and is
especially important for extractive companies as they seek to expand
and gain access to land. Our research explores the challenges and
opportunities faced by major companies operating in parts of the world
where the rights of indigenous peoples are threatened. We are very
pleased to be working with the UN PRI and Survival International on
this important area of engagement.’

Stephen Corry, Director at Survival International said ‘Investors
must use their considerable power to persuade companies to respect and
protect the rights of indigenous peoples, otherwise they risk being
charged with complicity in abuses they bankroll. As EIRIS has shown,
this vital issue is chronically under-reported by companies. The United
Nations Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples and ILO
convention 169 should be used as benchmarks for the development of
company policies on indigenous rights. Companies that fail to gain the
free, prior informed consent of indigenous communities affected by
their projects are in flagrant breach of international law.’

Bob Walker VP Sustainability at the Ethical Funds of Canada said ‘The risks from
indigenous Peoples’ opposition to specific projects is real and
material for investors. But corporations also have an enormous
opportunity to contribute to both economic and community development in
the regions where they operate.  This new research from EIRIS is a
useful addition to our toolkit for encouraging greater corporate
transparency that will undoubtedly benefit companies in an environment
where access to land and resources is coming under increasing pressure
globally.’

Click here (http://www.eiris.org/files/research%20publications/indigenousrightsjun09.pdf) to download a copy of the research report.

Press contact: mark.robertson@eiris.org +44 (0)20 7840 5741, +44 (0)7950 931313

Greenleaf Publishing invites contributions for a special issue of Greener Management International (GMI) on the topic of “THE BASE OF THE PYRAMID IN LATIN AMERICA”, to be edited by Miguel Angel Gardetti, Center for Study of Corporate Sustainability, Argentina.

Rationale

This special issue will focus on three interrelated themes concerning the the Base of the Pyramid in Latin America:

• The Base of the Pyramid (BoP) not only as a new market for products
  and services, but also as a source for the co-creation of new
  sustainable business ventures highlighting the role of local
  entrepreneurs
• The role of technology and innovation in meeting the needs of BoP customers
• The concept of sustainability within BoP strategies; considering
  the impact of economic growth and social pressures on our planet

Since the appearance of C.K. Prahalad and Stuart L. Hart’s working
paper “Strategies for the Bottom of the Pyramid: Creating Sustainable
Development” in 1999, we have come a long way in the conceptualisation
of BoP. With the objective of serving the needs of the 4 billion poor
at the base of the economic pyramid, real momentum for this agenda has
subsequently built up, with scores of companies, multilateral
institutions, NGOs and academics around the world now working actively
in this area.

In a successful BoP business strategy, incremental design changes and
cost cutbacks associated with these strategies have no place. Yet most
organisations will tend to assume very defensive stances that protect
and nurture that which has served them well in the past, even in the
face of change. That is to say, they react by increasing their commitment to existing products, processes and markets
and their actions therefore serve to maintain the status quo. However,
successful companies are often able to invest or partner in order to
achieve new competences and experience in new untapped markets. The
innovations required for the base of the pyramid are those that quickly
and suddenly eclipse current routines and knowledge – Schumpeter’s
“Disruptive Innovation”.

Moreover, from a regulatory and policy viewpoint, if entering BoP
markets reaps positive rewards both in social development and value
creation for business, what would it take to turn preliminary
individual intiatives into a global movement – to build a reality that
maintains and drives sustainable development? While some projects can
be successfully expedited by individuals or corporations, others will
require collaboration, in concert with a broader set of stakeholders.

Latin America is a key area in the advancement of the BoP concept. This is evidenced by, among other things:

1. The increased development of BoP Learning Labs in the region
2. The number of business strategies focused on the BoP. For example, the first stage of the Mapping the BoP in Latin America,
   conducted in late 2007 by the Inter-American Development Bank in
   collaboration with the Netherlands Development Organisation (SNV),
   identified 500 companies working at the BoP all over the region (with
   the potential identification of an additional 500 in a second Mapping
   stage)
3. Increased academic research in recent years
4. NGOs that promote “social entrepreneurs” have their own BoP programmes in place and encourage these entrepreneurs to implement BoP concepts through various projects

Coverage

This special issue of Greener Management International
seeks to explore as many different dimensions of the topic as possible
(while focusing specifically on Latin America), broadly grouped into
the following themes:

1. BoP and entrepreneurship (corporate and local)
• To what extent can entrepreneurship (corporate and local) support or drive BoP?
• What is the link between social entrepreneurship and BoP?
2. BoP and innovation
• What kind of “bottom-up” innovation might support BoP initiatives (and sustainable development)?
• What is the relationship between technological entrepreneurship and BoP?
3. BoP and the role of the state
• What should the role of the state be in the BoP?
• What is the message to and from policy-makers, governments, local and international funding agencies?
• What is the contribution of structural, policy-based or economic subsidies?
4. Local companies vs multinationals (or large companies vs SMEs)
• Some studies show that domestic (local) companies are the main BoP
  drivers. Is there a particular reason for that? And, along the same
  line, why do SMEs sometimes become the drivers of the BoP strategies?
  What are the institutional, strategic or managerial barriers for large
  companies?
5. Impacts of BoP strategies
• What are the (social) individual and collective impacts of BoP strategies? What could be the most suitable measuring structures?
6. Successes and failures of BoP initiatives
• Case studies are welcomed. Examples of both successful and
  unsuccessful entrepreneurial ventures are sought, preferably drawn from
  a variety of industries and geographical regions, and covering both
  small and large firms. What are the lessons learned? How do failure
  rates of BoP projects compare with those of other business start-ups?
7. Sustainability
• How can we balance poverty alleviation and stimulation of economic
  growth without stressing the ecosystem? What is the policy support, and
  how effective is it?

Contributions

The above list is by no means restrictive, and contributions on other
relevant topics will also be considered. This project is an attempt to
develop a comprehensive understanding of this field, and as such
welcomes submissions based on a variety of approaches, be they
reflective, empirical, practical or applied theoretical work. Given the
intended practical nature of these publications, contributions from
practitioners in businesses, NGOs and government are very welcome.
Theoretical papers should be between 4,000 and 6,000 words and case
studies between 2,500 and 4,000 words in length. The paper submissions
should follow editorial guidelines, which can be obtained from the Greenleaf Publishing website.

Schedule for the themed issue

The submission deadline for initial expressions of interest in the form
of abstracts of approximately 300 words is 16 October 2009. Abstracts
should ideally be sent as email attachments to the Guest Editor for the
review process (see “Contact details” below).

A selection process will then be put into motion. Contributors whose
abstracts are felt appropriate for the themed issue will then be asked
to submit full papers by early February 2010. Contributors will be
informed of the acceptance of their contributions or be invited to
submit final revised papers by 5 April 2010. It is intended that the
special issue of Greener Management International will be published in June 2010.

• Call for contributions: 18 June 2009
• Abstract submissions: 16 October 2009
• The selection of papers (abstracts) and contacting selected authors is planned to take place between 13 and 20 November 2009
• Full paper submissions: 3 February 2010
• Revised paper submissions: 5 April 2010

All papers will be peer-reviewed by an international panel of BoP experts.

The editor and the publisher plan to make this issue available at the
sixth multi-sector activity of the Argentina BoP Learning Lab (Buenos
Aires, 23 June 2010 [to be confirmed]).

Contact details

For further information,
to discuss ideas for contributions, and to submit
abstracts/manuscripts, please contact the Guest Editor:
Miguel Angel Gardetti
Center for Study of Corporate Sustainability, Head
Argentina Base of the Pyramid Learning Lab, Founder and Coordinator
Av. Córdoba 6502, 1er piso “B”
C1427BZS Buenos Aires
Argentina
Tel and Fax: +54.11.4554.9482

mag@sustentabilidad.org.ar

www.sustentabilidad.org.ar

www.basedelapiramide.org.ar

     Brief Histories of Almost Anything is the sort of book you keep coming back to again and again. It contains fifty articles (or ‘savvy slices of our global past’) covering a huge range of subjects from A Short History of Food to A Brief History of Megalomania, from The Rich History of Pan-Africanism to Britain’s ‘Adventures’ In Ireland. Each article, written by past and present co-editors of New Internationalist magazine, aims to give a whistle-stop introduction to its subject. Whilst there were one or two that didn’t particularly grab my attention, for example A Short History of Architecture wasn’t really up my street, most of the chapters were fascinating and either introduced me to completely new subjects or gave me a fresh perspective on more familiar ground.

    For myself, the most interesting part of the book covered chapters
20 to 26, Global Issues. This section challenged a lot of commonly held
misconceptions about some important topics, as well as being
entertaining. The chapters here seemed to get the tone exactly right
between being light-hearted enough to read out to friends and yet
serious enough that they stirred compassion and awareness of the
issues’ relevance to the current world situation. I would say the most
frustrating thing about the book is that there is no ‘live update’
option – I found myself several times desperate to know what this
editor or that would make of latest developments in various fields!

   
I also enjoyed the far more objective tone than you usually find on
these subjects in the mass media, as the writers (as in New
Internationalist magazine) did not scruple to criticise America and
Britain at least as much those countries criticise other nations. The
book is obviously written by writers with left-wing views, but they
seemed to be very good at not allowing these views to colour the facts
given. I found the text to be fairly impartial, and although I did not
agree with some of the points raised, arguments were put forward
convincingly and led to many discussions between myself and my husband
once the book was put down.

    One other feature of the book,
which I was sorely tempted to photocopy to carry around with me, was
the Prelude, which gave 13 lists of five themes of the twentieth
century, including unfulfilled national dreams, ridiculous wars,
nonviolent direct actions, and revolutions that raised then dashed Left
hopes. This was a wonderful way to start the book, and I would have
liked to have read further on the issues the Prelude raised.

   
Brief Histories is an essential book for, well, anyone actually. It
should certainly be a starting point for anyone who wants a broad
picture of how the world has got the state it is in today, and where it
is heading. It manages to touch on a lot of issues of global justice,
and the breakneck pace manages skilfully to lead from ancient history
to the modern world in a way that is never dull or dry. It would be an
excellent book to lend to a friend, a source of inspiration for a
writer for example, and a good springboard to find out what interests
you and what to go away and learn more about. And all this for only
£8.99!

Chris Brazier (Ed.)
ISBN 978-1-906523-00-8
New Internationalist; pb; £8.99