Welcome to the 2010 SSDF conference and AGM
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At this year's conference we continue to explore the role of communities in making Scotland more sustainable and are focusing on the many fantastic examples of working Green Micro-Economy around Scotland. We have also teamed up with the UN Stakeholder Forum to draw the lines to the up-coming Rio+20 Earth Summit.
The last few years have seen the worst economic conditions most of us can remember. While it is easy to simply demonise banks and bankers, loose financial controls allowed people to over borrow and over consume. It seems to me that we have been doing the same with the earth's natural systems: borrowing too much from future generations in exchange for consumption with little thought to the underlying stability of the system.
It seems obvious that we should have exercised more regulatory oversight of the banking system. Will future generations think it obvious we should have exercised more control over the exploitation of the environment?
We know that the pain of economic strife will bear not on those responsible for causing it but on those communities that are the most vulnerable. Is there an alternative to a public policy response of aggressive cuts in spending? Is the medicine more terrible than the ills it is supposed to cure?
We have an economy in trouble and an environment that is over-heating. We may just have a once in a generation opportunity to stimulate the economy and bear down on climate change, over exploitation of natural resources and habitat destruction, all at the same time. Do we have the wisdom and the vision to see it through?
I'm really looking forward to hearing the very practical insights our speakers have to offer and the opportunity to discuss with delegates just what advice they have for our political leaders. We know that our voice is heard. Stories from our last conference travelled with the Scottish delegation to Copenhagen and featured at the Scottish event during the Conference of Parties.
The fact that we are having such a timely and interesting conference this year is in no small measure thanks to the wisdom and insight of two SSDF board members who are standing down at our AGM. Clive Mitchell and James Curran have both given a great deal to SSDF over the years and I am personally very grateful to them both for their service.
Evan Williams
SSDF Chair
