Challenge Europe – taking part on work of the Finnish climate advocate team

The new Finnish climate advocate team has been chosen for the Challenge Europe project and I'm one of the lucky team members. The project of the British Council brings together young professionals around Europe to work on ideas and actions to promote low carbon future.

The first meeting of the new team was absolutely great. The team consists of 15 young professionals with various backgrounds from marketing and communication to energy, meteorology and architecture. Before we started our first exercise to quickly come up with our future visions of low carbon communities and practices Tuuli Kaskinen from Demos Helsinki gave us an inspiring presentation about how drastically we need to change the course and cut down the carbon emissions. We were glad to have the documentaries John Webster joining the meeting too. He is one of the two members from the last year’s team who will support the work of our team also this year.

I got a good feeling about the project with so many active people and great support from the British Council. It is a privilege to be member of the team! The examples from last year’s projects were interesting too. For instance the team was involved with the Operaatio maa (Operation Earth) TV series presented in Finland during last winter.

Our first task is to come up with three project ideas to make an impact on the climate change debate. In September the real hands-on work starts. I look forward to an inspiring summer with great ideas to suggest when the team formally meets again after the summer holidays. The best way to come up with new ideas is to change thoughts with old and new friends, family and anyone more or less interested about the topic. So be aware, you know what will be my favourite topic this summer during the picnic lunch and evening with sauna and some barbeque.

It is not easy being a responsible consumer, or is it?

Last weekend I had a peaceful morning with the thick Sunday issue of Helsingin Sanomat, the biggest newspaper in Finland. I learned about what Finnish people are willing, and not willing, to do in their personal life to stop climate change. However, what made me write a post today was an interesting story about comparison of tomatoes. What should the environmentally and socially conscious consumer choose?

Growing tomatoes in the Finnish greenhouses during the winter season requires loads of energy and produces lots of greenhouse gases too. This is shocking news for many Finns who have used to believe that local products are always the most eco-friendly and responsible option. According to the article, if you want to be climate friendly, you should choose tomatoes produced in temperate climate like Spain. It is more energy efficient to transport the tomatoes to Finland by sea or road than to heat the greenhouses in Finland. However, questions have been raised about the working conditions of seasonal workers in many countries in Central and Southern Europe. You can find the article in Finnish here.

No doubt that we are confused in front of these questions. I think this is a good story explaining that responsible consumption is a multidimensional issue. What I would have expected in addition to comparison of fresh tomatoes is a wider point of view on the issue. If you happen to live in the cold North do you actually need fresh tomatoes year round? I don’t know if from the social point of view dried or canned tomato products are better than fresh but from climate and energy efficiency point of view it would have been nice to hear if during the winter you should favour these products instead of fresh tomatoes.

If you’d like to favour local products, seasonality is the key word. Unless you happen to live in Southern Europe this means that tomatoes and fresh veggies are enjoyed during the summer and root vegetables, apples, preserved veggies, fruits and berries chosen during the cold season.

My point is that we need to move beyond the comparisons within one product category and look at the big picture. Now that fresh tomatoes are available year round, it does not mean that the only responsible option is to choose the best tomato. Maybe it is better to choose veggies from another product category. This is what One Did It encourages you to do, think beyond mere product comparisons and question your habits a bit.