Newsnight date confirmed

Newsnight's economics editor Paul Mason visited Pembrokeshire to interview me and fellow eco thinkers Gareth Banks from furniture maker OrangeBox, Kevin Bird from low impact campsite Trellyn, and Chris Cavanagh, now General Manager at TYF, previously MD at howies.

Paul was interested in how successful businesses balance economics, environment and society and interviewed us on ways that we had managed (or not) to integrate this into our businesses.

The feature on TYF / St Davids goes out on this Tuesday evening on BBC1 at 10.30.

Comments appreciated.

Any businesses out there who interested in the connection between biomimicry, profitability and a sustainable future will be interested in our forthcoming project with the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew.

Biomimicry Innovation Centre

As a further spin-off from TYF EcoSapiens' work with the Do Project, three of the team from BCI: Biomimicry for Creative Innovation spent three highly productive hours ysterday working with the Innovation and Comms teams from the Royal Botanic Gardens at Kew, generating ideas and opportunities to make the most of their enormous botanical knowledge and expertise through the creation of a Biomimicry Innovation Centre.

With a planned launch  in May 2010, our first steps will involve recruiting a dozen corporate clients who recognise that there are some fundamental new lessons to be learned about product design, business processes and maintaining an flexible, adaptive culture, if they're to weather the storms of price increases and resource constraints that are brewing on the horizon. Following the May launch, four businesses will be invited to 'dive deep' and explore the opportunities to increase reslience, sustainability and profitability by re-working aspects of their work, with inspiration from nature's genius.

To get a taster of the opportunities at Kew, come along to EcoBuild in London on 3 March to hear me and Michael Pawlyn speaking with Nigel Stansfield, Director of Product Innovation at Interface Flor, and ex Grimshaw architect and visionary Gerry Tate.

Drop me a line if your organisation might be interested in getting involved with the BCI / Kew project.

Food Security - feeding on good ideas

Next Friday sees the launch of a new combined research project that's been exciting us here for some time. The project's start was at the Hay on Earth food workshop in May last year, when we brought together aronud 65 leading food thinkers to consider the practical challenges of moving towards food sustainability and security at a national level.

Largely as a result of synchronicity and serendipity, one of the attendees was Dr John Fagan, who was in the process of setting up EOS - the Earth Open Source Institute. The Do Programme, borne out of the Do Lectures, was already running as a six month action learning project to investigate and develop new ways of teaching sustainability in workplaces and schools, so it was a natural extension that the idea of launching a more detailed food security project came about. We're lucky to have three enthusiastic researchers from Quebec, Chile and Wales embarking on the journey with us, supported by a great 'mastermind' group including all those you'd want - policy makers to practitioners.

Our goal is to map out the objectives needed for Wales to be self sufficient in food essentials within 20 years. If you've got an interest in sustainable food production, processing, marketing or management and would like to join in the fun, drop us a line, and help develop the project ready to for Hay in 5 months' time.

Turning thoughts into action

Here are some neat insights from Do Lectures founder and co-pilot David Hieatt. The new year is a good time for focusing on action for the year ahead. These tips might help:

The path of a Doer.

Set yourself a goal.

Set yourself a deadline.

Define success at the start.

Make a plan to make it happen.

Build a team to help you.

Get the team to sign up, head and heart, to the plan.

Understand there will be hurdles, barriers. Accept them. But defeat them.

Work each day toward getting things done. A little can do a lot.

Keep the end goal in your mind at all times.

Understand the importance of your energy. Your stubbornness. Your persistence.

Half way through a project is always the lowest point. You are neither at the start, nor at the end. Energy dips, morale is low. Have a day off.

The next day remind yourself why you started it in the first place.

Focus. Focus. Focus. But focus on the most important thing.

Tell the world what you are doing.

Tell the world your deadline.

Celebrate progress. Any progress.

Never give up.

Look back at how far you have traveled. It will surprise you.

It will also tell you that you are closer to your goal than ever before.

Keep going.

Then one day, after many, many days, you will complete your goal.

You got there in the end.

Your words and your deeds are one. Most people in life are just talkers. But you are a doer. Well done.

Out-lobby the lobbyists

There was an interesting article in today's Guardian.co.uk quoting Rajendra Pachauri's prediction that 2010 would see an increase in climate scepticism. Following hard on the heels of the largely failed COP15 talks in Copenhagen, this might seem strange, but is less so armed with these facts:

Last year the Centre for Public Integrity found that 770 companies and interest groups hired an estimated 2,340 lobbyists to influence US policies on climate change, while America's oil, gas and coal industry increased its lobbying budget by 50%.

Most of the companies that are paying lobbyists are doing so to increase returns for their shareholders - the yous and mes of the world represented by our pension funds (if we have one) and insurance companies (almost everyone has some). Most of the time, we take no time to get our voices heard by those companies or their representatives. There may have been 2340 lobbyists hired to influence policies on climate change, but that's a small number compared to the 300m or so population of the US. It's about 1/100,000th of the size. Sure, they may have knowledge and more time, and get paid for it, but that doesn't make them omnipotent.

Here's a little Do for your first week back at work: commit to writing 10 letters this year to people who provide you with products or services (Tesco, Walmart, AXA insurance etc) and ask them for information on the actions that they are taking on climate.

It's time to out-lobby the lobbyists. There are more of us.