National Nest Box Week No comments yet

Our bird friends are an important part of our environment and to help them out we should all be putting up nest boxes in our gardens.
Today sees the start of National Nest Box Week and this website will give you information and tips on making, buying and positioning your boxes.

Haddington Library display No comments yet

Our very talented Events Co-ordinator Polly Cooke has been busy busy busy this week creating a fun display in our local library. We have information on some of our up and coming events, plus an ‘interactive’ notepad where anyone can leave comments and ideas on what they’d like to see us doing in the future. There’s also a box where you can leave your details if you’d like to join, or find out more information about us.
So, get down to the library and have a look and give us your feedback!

East Lothian Local Food Directory No comments yet

   Food is a huge part of our contribution to greenhouse gas emissions.  For the average one of us here in East Lothian, it’s one of the big three along with transport and housing.  But you can’t avoid it… not for long anyway! 

Producing food and getting it from where it grew into our tummies has become an incredibly complex process. At every stage, greenhouse gas emissions increase.  They add up in production of the food – more fertilisers, pesticides, movement of animals.  They add up in the processing - pasteurisation, ingredients to make the food last longer or look better. They add up in the packaging - making sure the product is immune to supermarket poisoners, making us want to buy it and not the very similar one next to it.  For most of us, what foods we choose will make more of a difference than where it comes from – beef is particularly bad (the cows break wind - they can’t help it – and that releases methane).  Weight for weight, beef has about 12 times the green house gas impact of chicken, or 57 times the impact of a potato.      

But eating local food is surely part of the solution.  Take lamb.  This country exported around 80,000 tonnes in 2006 – and imported 140,000 tonnes.  Why are we swapping sheep with each other? 

All of which is a long way round to saying that East Lothian Council has produced a directory of local food, which you can find HERE

Very tasty!

Video on climate change tipping point No comments yet

Wake Up, Freak Out – then Get a Grip is a short, animated film about climate change by Leo Murray. For a very basic view of the science (and ignoring uncertainty) it still gets the message over in a little under 11 minutes, which is a plus point for me!

Wake Up, Freak Out – then Get a Grip from Leo Murray on Vimeo.

Transport – Public Transport meeting 1 comment

A brief report on the public meeting I attended on behalf of Sustainable Haddington as part of East Lothian Council’s review on public transport. Read more »