Environmentally sustainable libraries - CILIP's sustainability initiatives.pptx
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Looking to improve your library’s sustainable environmental practices? In this opening address, CILIP President Kate Robinson explores the central role that librarians and information professionals play in helping their organisations and users work towards a more sustainable society. Kate shares highlights of CILIP’s sustainability initiatives including the new Green Libraries Partnership.
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Environmentally sustainable libraries - CILIP's sustainability initiatives.pptx
- 1. Environmental sustainability for the library, information and knowledge profession Kate Robinson, CILIP President CILIP Cymru Wales Conference 19th May 2022
- 5. Towards a common language of Sustainability Doing better for our planet and natural environment – and thereby people, as we are inextricably part of it and can neither survive nor thrive if we don’t take better care of it
- 6. A new way of thinking about Sustainability Reducing the negative Increasing the positive Measurability (eg. CO2) Hard-to-measure ‘soft’ outcomes Operations, spaces, materials What we’re about – purpose & mission Mitigation and prevention Adaptation and resilience Small, incremental changes Step changes, system change Spectating environmental damage Loss and its impact on equality
- 7. Why libraries? We believe that ideas of sustainability, the circular economy, resource sharing and mutual accountability are fundamental values which underpin the work of libraries. It’s not just about books, physical assets, premises or vehicles, although these are an important part of the mix. It’s also about some ‘library fundamentals’: • Trust • Equality • Information and evidence • Sharing economy • People and community
- 8. Our response as a professional community…
- 9. Supporting inclusive action in libraries The Green Libraries Partnership is a 3-5 year programme of sector support, investment, skills development, collaboration and networking to develop inclusive approaches to sustainability in libraries and information services • Launching a UK Green Libraries Manifesto • Building relationships with the international Green Libraries movement • Creating a Green Libraries Community of Practice • Launching an annual Green Libraries Event to share ideas and best practices • Launching a £40,000 pilot Green Libraries Grant Fund
- 10. #CILIPSGoGreen Our colleagues at CILIP in Scotland launched a pioneering initiative for their community under the banner of #CILIPSGoGreen in 2021, highlighting the tremendous contribution of libraries to the COP26 agendas of climate action and Net Zero. The CILIPS website now includes a host of resources, toolkits, downloads and video presentations highlighting the sheer range of the sector’s ongoing work in this area. https://www.cilips.org.uk/cilips-go-green/
- 11. Promoting Library Freecycle UK Library Freecycle UK is the library-only network of the Freecycle website. It enables libraries to ‘freecycle’ equipment, furnishings, even stock, completely free of charge (subject to collection!) Popular items already being freecycled through the network include a central library desk, chairs, display materials and shelving. https://www.freecycle.org/town/LibraryUK
- 12. Working with Designing Libraries CILIP is pleased to be working with a range of architects, designers and sustainability experts to re- develop the Designing Libraries website as a platform for inspiration and sourcing suppliers. http://www.designinglibraries.org.uk
- 13. Promoting the LGA Climate Change Hub Most Councils across the UK have declared a ‘Climate Emergency’ and set out their plans to achieve ‘net zero’ within the coming decade. The Green Libraries Partnership will be working with the Local Government Association (LGA) to connect the library community into this work. https://www.local.gov.uk/our-support/climate-change-hub
- 14. Connecting to the global community CILIP is a member of ENSULIB, the Environmental Sustainability section of IFLA. We will be working together with the IFLA community to learn about best practices from around the world and to share our own experiences with the global community. ENSULIB runs the annual Green Libraries Award, and we are hoping to see some fantastic nominations from UK libraries in the coming years! https://www.ifla.org/units/environment-sustainability-and-libraries/
Editor's Notes
- Good morning, and thank you Lou for that lovely introduction. I am pleased to be able to join you today for the CILIP Cymru Wales Conference. In so many ways, your theme today “Possible futures: sustainable, collaborative, progressive” captures the spirit of our profession as we look ahead to life after the challenges of the last few years. I think you are starting a conversation today that will continue across our profession in the months ahead. I’d like to use my time this morning to share with you some of the work that is going on across the CILIP Community to help position librarians, information and knowledge professionals right at the heart of our national conversations about Sustainability, the Environment and Climate.
- But first of all, I am absolutely delighted to be able to use today’s event to give you a sneak peek at a fantastic new initiative, led by CILIP on behalf of our whole community. We will shortly be launching the UK’s first cross-sector Green Libraries Partnership – a joint initiative with the British Library, Libraries Connected and sustainability experts Julies Bicycle funded by the Arts Council England. Over the coming years, the Green Libraries Partnership will work to strengthen sustainability practice in libraries across the UK and to fund innovative projects and micro-grants which enable libraries and information services to reduce their environmental impact and work with the public and other partner organisations to raise awareness of Climate Change.
- “We Are CILIP” is our ambitious new 5-year strategy and action plan, setting out how we will work together across all four nations to unite, support and empower information professionals in all sectors. The strategy sets out our vision of CILIP as “a professional community, dedicated to changing lives through quality information, services and expertise.”. It defines our mission as a membership body; “To be the leading professional membership association for people working in information, knowledge, libraries and related disciplines.” It also sets out how we will help our community to navigate today’s complex and challenging world through values-based leadership, focused on “social justice, intellectual freedom and evidence-based practice”.
- “We Are CILIP” defines the four main strategic contexts that will shape our professional community in the next 5 years – Sustainability, Digital Transformation, Equity and Social Justice and Leadership. The key thing is that all of these contexts are inter-related. Our work on sustainability must be driven by a clear focus on equity and a ‘just transition’ to Net Zero. Our digital work can help reduce our environmental impact. In all of these areas, we need to be able to move from ‘responding to other people’s priorities’ to demonstrating leadership for our users, communities and institutions.
- In order to shape a collaborative approach to Sustainability for libraries, we need to develop a common language and understanding of what ‘sustainability’ means and how librarians and information professionals are uniquely-placed to contribute to it. There are lots of words and expressions, but they are all essentially part of the same concept – that our future is inextricably linked to the future of our planet. We need to start doing better for the planet and its natural environment, which includes doing better for people. That is why the focus of the Green Libraries Partnership is “working together for people and planet”.
- Working with Julies Bicycle and other environmental specialists, we are learning that we’re right at the inflexion point of a new way of thinking about Sustainability, which we aim to capture and share through the Green Libraries Partnership. The conversation is moving away from a focus on the negative – the threat of Climate Crisis – and towards a focus on the positive outcomes for both people and planet if we can learn to be more accountable in our use of resources. We’ve rightly seen a lot of organisation focus on Carbon-counting and the commitment to Net Zero, and we hope this will continue. But alongside it we are seeing an increased emphasis on harder to measure ‘soft’ outcomes – like equity, fairness and accountability. In keeping with a lot of thinking about Sustainability in corporate sectors, we’re building on our understanding about sustainability as a product of physical spaces with a richer concept of the sustainability as a core purpose of our organisations. We’re moving away from talking about mitigating or preventing climate change, although this remains important, towards a broader understanding of the need to adapt our behaviours to live in harmony with the planet and natural environment. Due, in part, to the increasing recognition of the urgency of collaborative action, the conversation is less focused on small, incremental changes, and more on the need for wholesale system change to correct for the imbalance of consumption and production in our societies. We’re also seeing people move away from ‘spectating’ environmental damage as a separate process and towards an understanding that what we’re seeing in many natural ecosystems isn’t damage but irrevocable loss, and that this loss will disproportionately impact on people already most at risk of being marginalised in our societies and economies.
- We think that the sustainability agenda is a natural fit for the world of librarians and information professionals. I believe that libraries have always been built around the principles of sharing, accountability and equity that are so fundamental to true sustainability. Our work on sustainability will provide practical support in reducing the impact of books, physical assets, premises and vehicles, but we think this is just as much about re-stating some fundamental library values. Values like trust, universal equality, access to information, evidence-based decision-making, a fairer and more equitable economy and, right at its heart, a focus on people and community. This feels like a very ‘naturally library’ agenda for us to show leadership in.
- CILIP sees the sustainability agenda as an opportunity for our members to provide leadership in helping your organisations to become more sustainable, and to meet their sustainability goals. In order to make the most of this opportunity, we are launching a range of initiatives focused on placing librarians, information and knowledge professionals at the heart of evidence-based responses to Climate Change and Climate Action.
- The Green Libraries Partnership is a 3-5 year funded programme which will provide support, investment, training and networking opportunities for people working in libraries, information and knowledge. Our aim is to create a thriving UK community of practice to develop new ideas and approaches to sustainability. Thanks to a generous investment from the Arts Council England, we are launching a Green Libraries Grant Fund which will offer pilot grants to libraries to undertake projects that will improve their sustainability. Our ambition is to grow this into a large-scale fund in partnership with a number of agencies. At the same time, we are launching a Green Libraries Manifesto with a series of achievable but ambitious commitments to libraries to demonstrate their leadership of the green agenda for their users.
- Our colleagues at CILIP in Scotland launched a pioneering initiative for their community under the banner of #CILIPSGoGreen in 2021, highlighting the tremendous contribution of libraries to the COP26 agendas of climate action and Net Zero. I am excited to hear more about the Scottish Climate Beacons in Libraries on today’s programme!
- CILIP is a proud supporter of Library Freecycle UK, the library-only network of the Freecycle website. The network allows any library to post items for others to take away, or to post ‘wanted’ items that they are looking for. The site has already seen numerous free exchanges between libraries, including a central desk, chairs, display materials and shelving. It is completely free to join and no money changes hands – this is all about making budgets go further and re-using and repurposing library materials across the library community.
- CILIP is pleased to be supporting the ongoing maintenance and development of the popular Designing Libraries website as a platform for people to discover new sustainability projects in libraries, find suppliers and share their own work.
- Climate change and environmental sustainability are key priorities for many of the institutions that host libraries, including Local Government. Most local Councils, along with the Local Government Association, have declared a ‘Climate Emergency’ and have set out their own plans towards ‘net zero’ carbon consumption within the coming decade. The Green Libraries Partnership will be working with the LGA and a range of other partners to ensure that libraries are positioned at the heart of this work – both in terms of their own sustainability and as vital places for public engagement, activism and awareness-raising.
- Finally, CILIP is a member of ENSULIB, the Environmental Sustainability section of IFLA, which acts as a global meeting-point for librarians and information practitioners concerned about environmental sustainability and climate change. Starting with the IFLA World Library and Information Congress in Dublin, we will be working with our international partners to learn from their experiences and to share our own. ENSULIB run the annual Green Library Awards, celebrating sustainability projects large and small in libraries all over the world. We hope to see some fantastic UK nominations in the coming years!
- So as you can see, sustainability is and will be a major priority for CILIP and for our community over the lifetime of the We Are CILIP strategy. We think there is a tremendous opportunity here to show leadership, improve the relevance and visibility of our services and make a real difference to library users everywhere. We are very much at the beginning of this journey, and I congratulate CILIP Cymru Wales for incorporating this important work into your agenda for conference today. We have a lot to learn, and I am hugely looking forward to hearing about the working going on across Wales. I hope that this will be the beginning of a conversation about how the whole of our profession can rise to the challenge! Thank you.