Last Tuesday, The Bermuda Environmental Sustainability Taskforce (BEST) formally launched their Blueprint for Environmental Sustainability - 2012.
Greenrock welcomes the blueprint as a comprehensive description of the hurdles to sustainability for Bermuda. It draws a clear picture of the challenges we face. We agree with BEST and the IUCN that "present decisions worldwide tend to weight the economic environment too heavily while not giving enough consideration to the physical environment"1. As environmental stewardship advocates, BEST is well placed to scrutinize public policies and procedures and indeed the document reflects this; it is particularly eloquent on the demands on Bermuda's land and requirements for appropriate planning.
Greenrock applaud BEST on doing an excellent job in documenting THE PROBLEM together with their suggestions on where to look for solutions. Greenrock agrees that much of the focus needs to be on Changing the Mindset, one person at a time, and we would like to share some current examples of how Greenrock act as part of THE SOLUTION.
Whilst recognizing the need to transform Government policies and procedures, Greenrock emphasises community-driven solutions, with the belief that when the people of Bermuda demonstrate the wilingness, indeed the expectation, of better stewardship the Government will follow.
Sustainable change only occurs when individuals act together for the common good of the planet; the same is true for Bermuda. We need to all work together to help make Bermuda a more sustainable place to live from an economic, social, and environmental perspective. And Greenrock’s mission is to continually help focus the community on the sustainable ideas suitable for island life in Bermuda.
Greenrock believes that leading people in clearly defined projects can resolve some of our problems as a community.
Greenrock has projects underway in areas of energy production and use; food production and consumption; and waste reduction and management.
Our Healthy Harvest, School Roadshow and Green School projects are proving successful in re-connecting people to the natural environment, and in helping develop an increased ecological awareness in young people.
Greenrock is also making headway with its Green Building Forum as a space for people who manage large built facilities and are faced with making their practices more ecologically sensible and sustainable.
In addition, Greenrock are collaborating on a number of projects that focus on specific solutions to specific environmental challenges. These include
- finding ways to support implementation of the Government's 2011 Bermuda Energy White Paper (e.g. our Net Metering initiative),
- leading a 'No Thanks!' project to reduce Bermuda's use of single-use bags, and
- our partnering with AES, the Corporation of Hamilton and BAC to erect six hydration stations in the City of Hamilton, which provide a more eco-friendly alternative to disposable bottles of water.
We are committed to the annual global Earth Hour and Earth Day events and are an active partner in the Bermuda Alliance for Sargasso Sea (BASS) in support of the Blue Halo project.
Greenrock has also started engaging the community on ways to improve event waste management practices such that large public gatherings lower their carbon footprint on the natural environment.
Finally, Greenrock has aligned itself with the community garden movement both directly through our own Healthy Harvest project, and indirectly by providing support to the recent Seed Share project initiated by Frances Eddy, the Bermuda National Trust's community garden in Warwick and the re-inspired work by the Christ Church group in their Paget community garden (video). Although Bermuda may never be able to produce the volume of food to feed its entire population, we remain convinced that community gardens offer an opportunity to lessen our dependence on overseas suppliers and act as an incubator to re-connect the Bermudian people with each other and the larger living environment.
Greenrock recognizes the challenges outlined in the BEST document are broad and varied. The skill sets required to see into the myriad of processes driving the challenges are equally broad and complex. Expanding ecological awareness and a deeper sense of connection between our people and our larger living system holds the key to addressing the issues described in the blueprint.
There are clearly a myriad of other sustainability enhancing initiatives that Greenrock— and no doubt like-minded organisations such as BEST — would love to adopt and execute if we had adequate human resources and funding. We do not, however, think that solving these issues always requires "comprehensive research, extensive and far-reaching public consultation, cost-benefit analyses and strong political will"1; sometimes the solutions can be readily adapted from other places, or make obvious sense. Greenrock is painfully aware that an idea without execution is nothing, and because of this we carefully assess ideas and only develop (or assist on) projects likely to yield the best possible return on investment.
Greenrock works with BEST and other environmental organizations on many of these solutions, and continues to look for opportunities to forge alliances and spur co-operation and efficiencies among organisations seeking to promote sustainable development in Bermuda.
