Growing up

There's an amazing farm, Blaencamel, nestled in the hills north of Cardigan. For the last 30 years, they've been growing wonderful vegetables that sell from their farm shop and farmers's markets in central and south Wales. They grow soil too. Waste cardboard from local shops, grass cuttings, waste silage, hedge trimmings and old veggies are turned into compost in three weeks; the compost helps the soil grow. The farm is carbon negative because of this, which means they lock up more CO2 in the soil humus than their farming produces. Three decades on, they're still finding out what works, with a combination of passion, skill, learning and action. The art of Do.

Riding and rolling

2009 Do Lecture speaker Alistair Humphreys features in today's Guardian website in a neat little article about favourite rides . Inspired by those lists, I refelecte on my favourites; these are the top two:

Off-road: The red-graded Gorlech trail at Brechfa forest, halfway between Swansea and Carmarthen in West Wales. The combination of moss-covered ancient stone walls and dappled beech sunlight on the climbs contrasts beautifully with swooping downhills and some of the best berms in the country.

On-road: Still a relative novice at this, but the 1200 mile ride I did with my two eldest teenage children a couple of years back - they were 15 & 17 at the time - was one of the best holidays ever. We cycled from St Davids to the ferry port at Plymouth, took a ride over the Bay of Biscay to Santander, then cycled home. Hot, varied, fast, slow, tired, thirsty, very happy, and exceedingly fit-making.

Tickets for the Do Lectures are now on sale to corporate and individuals, priced at £2k and £1k respectively, all-in. There's good riding in West Wales too, and anyone who arrives early can come out to play.

Testing, testing

Part of our work and research at the moment is helping communities and business understand some of the questions that they will need to answer in the coming year or two. Such as how does your business or service delivery cope with a $250 / barrel oil price - at which point, food, transport, plastics, construction and many other sectors get squeezed. Why's this important? Read on for interesting information from the Guardian

Alexei Miller, chairman of the Russian energy group Gazprom, raised the stakes further when he reiterated last year's estimates of $250 a barrel. "This forecast has not become reality yet, given that the [credit] crisis gained momentum and exerted a powerful impact on the global energy market. But does this mean that our forecast was unrealistic? Not at all."