today's facts & tomorrow's trends - SPREAD Sustainable Lifestyles ...

The UNESCO and UNEP youthXchange (yxc) project 14 aims to help trainers and interested
individuals understand and communicate on sustainable lifestyles. The
project website is available in nearly 20 languages and has collected over 130
examples of organisations, innovative ideas and motivated people from around
the world.
The majority of policies and tools targeting sustainable consumption specifically
aim to “green” markets and products by encouraging innovation in companies
and along supply chains. For example, UNEP initiatives have included reports on
the role of marketing and advertising for sustainability, life cycle management,
design for sustainability and resource management. UNEP has also launched
sector initiatives to promote SCP in different sectors such as construction, finance,
retail and tourism and sustainable public procurement (SPP).
In the light of the recent
economic crisis, UNEP has
developed strategies to
disseminate green growth
through a number of
initiatives, notably the Green
New Deal.
The OECD has been working
on sustainable consumption
issues and investigated
factors that shape consumer
behaviour.
Finally, in the light of the recent economic crisis, UNEP has developed strategies
to disseminate green growth through a number of initiatives, notably the
Green New Deal (UNEP 2009). Although this initiative does not overtly discuss
approaches to sustainable lifestyles there are many opportunities to support
sustainable lifestyles within the sector level strategies within the initiative. For
example, the tourism sector is closely linked to individuals and their leisure time
behaviours and thus to lifestyles. Another example is the financial sector that,
rather than focusing only on sustainable investments and ethical funds could
also focus on private saving and spending behaviours, which are also linked to
lifestyle and consumption choices.
Since 1994 the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
(OECD) has been working on sustainable consumption issues. The OECD has
produced numerous reports that address various consumption domains including
food, energy, water, waste and tourism-related travel (OECD 2002b; OECD
2002a). Recent studies, “Household Behaviour and the Environment: Reviewing
the Evidence” (OECD 2008a) and “Promoting sustainable consumption: Good
practices in OECD countries” (OECD 2008b) investigated the factors that shape
consumer behaviour and how this behaviour can be changed through the design
of targeted environmental policies to focus on waste generation and recycling;
reducing environmental impacts of personal transportation and residential energy
consumption; supporting organic food consumption; and reducing residential
water use. A common element of these reports is the need for approaches
that are adjusted to different population and consumer segments.
EU level policies
Although a number of policy strategies at the European level define sustainable
consumption and production as a priority focus area none specifically address
sustainable lifestyles. For example, the broad policy framework for the
promotion of sustainable consumption and production (SCP) in the European
Union includes the Lisbon Strategy (European Commission 2000), and the Sixth
Environmental Action Programme 2002-2012. SCP is also recognised as one of the
ten key objectives of the 2008-2010 Community Lisbon Programme and is among
the seven key challenges to be tackled within the EU Sustainable Development
Strategy (EU SDS) (Council of the European Union 2006).
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SUSTAINABLE LIFESTYLES: TODAY’S FACTS & TOMORROW’S TRENDS