We were honoured to be invited to the University of Surrey‘s Institute for Sustainability launch at The Royal Society. The Institute’s mission is to place sustainability at the top of the global agenda to ensure people AND the planet thrive. With aims to put collective well-being at the centre of new measures to define prosperity, it will seek to create a fairer, better world.
Professor Lorenzo Fioramonti, director of the new institute stated: “There’s a real opportunity to reverse the devastating impact of man-made climate change and do so in a way that means people live more fulfilling lives”.
Thought provoking guest panellists included the LSE’s Professor Lord Nicholas Stern, Sandrine Dixson-Declève (named Top 30 woman shaping green business globally) and Jo Swinson (Former LibDem leader, now director of Partners for a New Economy, an international donor collaborative that wants the economic system to generate positive environmental and social outcomes).
The University has been instrumental in supporting 100 Ways in its development. It has funded PhD researchers in 2022 and going forward into 2023, to help build the programme’s insights into sustainability and psychology (including behaviour change). It’s also supporting on digital business capabilities.
100 Ways founder Sue Skeats was also thrilled to be accompanied by the wonderful sustainability expert Dr. Tianqi Li Ph.D. CSci., our mentor from last year’s Deutsche Bank We in Social Tech/Made for Good incubator. Previous meetings had all been online, mostly between the UK and China, so it was a fabulous opportunity to meet in real life for the first time.
Everything at the event was planet-friendly, from the sustainably grown flowers and compostable lanyards to name badges, which contain flower seeds and can be planted out in the garden or window box.
What an illustrious evening, illustrious surroundings and illustrious company.
