Sustainability in Ceredigion
Ceredigion is a county in Mid Wales and in the Middle Ages it was a minor kingdom that was also for a time known as Seisyllwg. The county is mostly rural with AbOUT 80 km of coastline and is surrounded with many mountains. The sandy beaches and the Ceredigion Coast Path provide excellent views of Cardigan Bay.
The Sustainability Appraisal (SA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) focus their sustainability in Ceredigion on predominantly three areas: living with environmental limits, ensuring a strong, healthy, and just society and achieving a sustainable economy. However, two other areas they focus on sustainability within is: promoting a good governance and using sound science responsibly. These focuses are compatible with the most widely recognised and accepted definition of sustainability by Bruntland in 1992 - ‘Sustainability is development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs’
Environmental sustainability
The Sustainability Appraisal (SA) and Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) focus their sustainability in Ceredigion on predominantly 3 areas as mentioned in the introduction. One of those areas is living with environmental limits. Through this strand of the SA and SEA Ceredigion Council aim to respect the limits of the earth’s environment, resources, and biodiversity in order to improve and maintain Ceredigion’s environment and ensure that the natural resources needed for life are protected for future generations. For Ceredigion to make sure they are compelling with this strategy they have varied nature reserves and special wildlife centres to preserve and protect its natural environment. For example, Ceredigion has the Heritage Coast Path to ensure the conservation and protection of the environment around coastal areas.
Coleg Ceredigion has created its own Environmental Strategy for 2015 – 2025 so that it can meet the needs of Ceredigion’s Environmental Sustainability Strategy and become a leading green Further Education institution. Examples of some of the aims they have in place are to improve the environmental performance of its buildings, reduce its resource consumption and progress towards zero waste and to meet and try to exceed all relevant UK, European and international legislative and regulatory requirements and agreements.
Cultural sustainability
Cultural Heritage is being sustained by using growth and regeneration strategies such as promoting innovative design whilst having regard to local distinctiveness in terms of former design and material. This then allows Ceredigion to grow and expand whilst still retaining some of its original ancient Celtic heritage. For example, Ceredigion still has some of its history with St Dogmaels Abbey and Strata Florida Abbey’s Archway. Its history is also shown throughout Ceredigion Museum with permanent displays celebrating its local culture and heritage.
To sustain its culture Ceredigion is also trying to preserve the Welsh language and encourage initiatives that draw out Ceredigion’s sense of place using greater amounts of local foods, arts, crafts, and biodiversity as this also increases tourism to the area by celebrating what is unique about Ceredigion.
Environmental and cultural sustainability link together in Ceredigion’s Local Development Plan as the natural environment of past and present also represents its culture. A high quality, natural environment is important to Ceredigion’s character, identity, and heritage and this is shown by Ceredigion trying to sustain its heritage within the environment through the Coastal Heritage Path and the Marine Heritage Coast.
Economic sustainability
The economic situation in Ceredigion has been described as “A changing and difficult economic situation”. After some optimism, there has been a recession and this optimism has now been replaced with some pessimism. Some of the factors that have caused this decline include the uncertainty over the global economic status, falling house prices, significant reductions in consumer spending, rising unemployment rates and the weakening of the sterling against both the dollar and the euro. This is far from what they want to achieve, the following is one of their goals - “Build a strong, stable and sustainable economy which provides prosperity and opportunities for all”.
Ceredigion has implemented many programmes and schemes to stop this decline and boost the local economy. One of these is Coed Cymru, which is a timber production company, working in cooperation with wood land owners, wood land contractors and timber users to bring about economic benefits through sustainable wood land management. The Coed Cymru programme is funded by local authorities, Welsh local government association and the World wildlife fund. Another way of gaining economic development whilst being sustainable is the planting off bio-crops which will gain income.
The main source of income for Ceredigion is the tourist sector and therefore developing this sector has been one of the main goals for Ceredigion to boost the local economy. Improving opportunities for sustainable tourism is important to increase the number of visitors and therefore the money being spent on the economy in the area. Leisure and recreation facilities are being targeted as an area to develop along with increasing the number and quality of hotels, to offer an alternative to staying in caravans. Aberystwyth in Ceredigion has benefitted recently from its designation as a Strategic Regeneration Area, receiving £10.3 million in funding. Focus on creating a thriving and attractive town centre, improving quality of homes, enhancing transport and creating new jobs have all lead to an increase in tourism numbers.
Ceredigion is an area with outstanding natural beauty and its location enables it to offer things such as nature paths, hill climbing and nature watches to tourists. These activities are all sustainable so promoting and developing these areas is very important to Ceredigion. Developing a sustainable network that enables the movement of goods and people efficiently to the county that is economically viable helps bring income into the area. Ceredigion is facing the challenge of developing the economics of the area whilst also making sure the strategies are sustainable and not damaging to other sectors.
Social sustainability
One of the main areas of focus is carbon management, Ceredigion County Council is striving to reduce carbon emissions by introducing the employment of their first Energy and Carbon Reduction Programme Manager. Councillor Alun Williams, Cabinet Member for Carbon Management, said:
'I'm delighted by this new appointment. For many years now people in Ceredigion have shown that they place a high priority on environmental sustainability and the Council is aiming to reflect that in its policies and practices. How local councils behave can have a significant effect on carbon emissions. This appointment of an Energy and Carbon Reduction Manager demonstrates the Council's commitment to being a leading local authority in this field and to look for further ways to reduce our carbon footprint.'
They are also looking to update their carbon management plan. The plan for Ceredigion, otherwise known as the CMP, includes how the council want to reduce their carbon dioxide emissions by 15% by 2017. It also states the projected annual financial savings that will be brought about from the reduced consumption of energy. The key projects of the carbon management plan include improving the efficiency and usage of vehicles on the road, bringing biomass technologies into effect and improving street lighting, not only to make the streets of Ceredigion more appealing, but to bring more people to the area as it will be advertised as being a safer place.
Operation Energy, otherwise known as OpEn also exists within Ceredigion to promote learning to young children and adults about energy and sustainable development. It successfully does this by setting up workshops which are led by Eco Centre Wales, which work together with the County council of Ceredigion. As a small measure, each school visited by this scheme are presented with an energy monitor to make pupils engaged with sustainability as much as possible within their local area and reduce their total energy consumption, making Ceredigion even more sustainable.
Ceredigion has also created a scheme called ‘Ceredigion vision for 2021- future of sustainability in Ceredigion. As part of this scheme local authorities within Ceredigion want to improve the overall health and wellbeing of the Ceredigion community. Ceredigion has a unique and very local environment that needs to be sustained in order to carry on and further attract visitors and investors. The protection for the natural resources that Ceredigion has are very crucial in achieving a sustainable community. Ceredigion also want to make Ceredigion sustainable by carrying on the Welsh language, as this will help Ceredigion maintain and furthermore improve its identify and set it out as being somewhere different from the rest. There is also a community regeneration project which sets out to achieve the following:
- Affordable and sustainable housing
- Availability of reliable and cost effective transport.
- Improvement of local facilities including libraries and village halls.
The community regeneration project also aims to develop the efficiency of the transport systems, whereby people are then able to mobilise and participate in work as well as social and leisure activities which will in turn build on further success in the economic industry.
References
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