The threat of climate change, dwindling oil supplies, and a twitchy global economy might appear to be vast global issues beyond our control, but the power to take them on lies at home – in our local communities.
That’s the premise of a grass-roots localisation movement that has grown around the world since it took off in the UK five years ago.
In those five years, founder of the “Transition movement” Rob Hopkins says it has not only produced countless local economic and ecological innovations, but also rekindled the sense of community all-too-often eroded over recent decades.
From setting up local currencies in London, creating a community-owned solar power station in Suffolk, to providing renewable local street-lamp gas in Worcestershire, and perfecting methods of draft-proofing Victorian buildings, each initiative is tailored to its own challenges and resources.
At the heart of the movement is the notion that cheap oil has created unsustainable and unhealthy economic anomalies that will collapse as oil supplies drop – the Peak Oil theory. According to the theory, the effects will begin to unleash not as oil supplies dry up, but as the peak production passes, leaving communities high and dry unless they have already made the “transition” to a stable localised economy, hence the name “Transition movement”.
Hopkins often uses the example of the exporting and importing of potatoes.
“Every year the UK exports 1.5 million kilos of potatoes to Germany, and every year the UK imports 1.5 kilos of potatoes from Germany. I’ve never been able to distinguish between a German potato and a British one. I’m sure Germany does nice potatoes but so does Devon. If we just kept those ourselves, there are all kinds of economic and social benefits there,” he explains.
Without the availability of cheap fuel in abundance, such a situation makes no economic sense, says Hopkins.
“It’s taken an enormous amount of cheap energy to live on a street and not know anyone who lives on the street – and I think we are all the worse for it.”
He says that their research suggests that a lot of places could ultimately supply up to about 80 per cent of food and building materials locally.
The movement has so far generated 950 registered Transition groups in 34 countries, although the UK still leads the pack. Hopkins says it is hard to translate this into total numbers of people involved. Membership of some Transition groups might number in the dozens, others in their hundreds, and events organised by Transition groups can number in the thousands and spill over into many other community initiatives and even activities of the local council.
Hopkins’ first book, published four years ago when the movement was in its infancy, sold 25,000 copies.
Last week Hopkins published his second book, called The Transition Companion, which charts the growth of the movement and the experiences accumulated over the last five years.
Read on TV personality and champion of sustainable living Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstal
TV personality and champion of sustainable living Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall writes in the foreword to the book: “Rob argues that a Transition community never will, or should, look quite the same twice – and in that flexibility lies the strength of this movement.
