Sorry for the radio silence but I have been on holiday in Cornwall for nearly 2 weeks. Before the reality of being back at work hits me and I rejoin the day to day hustle and bustle, I just wanted to take a moment to give you a few reasons to visit The Eden Project as we just had another brilliant day there.

For anyone unaware of this place, it opened in 2000 and is the site of the largest conservatories (biomes) on earth. In essence these massive domes, see picture above, hold thousands of different plants and species themed around the Rainforest (Walker-Palin family favourite), the Mediterranean and an Outdoor ‘biome’.

It’s truly a remarkable place to visit. I last visited 5 years ago and the level of maturity of the trees now is amazing. Standing in the Rainforest biome you really could be in Brazil. It’s definitely not a place for boring tree huggers but somewhere that offers an unique day out. Go and see it for yourself, I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

• Wander through the Rainforest and Mediterranean biomes
• Activities for the kids in the Stage / The Core
• Follow the trails in the Outdoor Biome
• Stop for lunch or tea in the locally sourced choice of restaurants (great Cornish pasties!)
• Listen to live music whilst sipping an Eden ale

Let me know how you get on and please do feel free to share thoughts below with other readers of the blog.

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By now I hope that, through our involvement with ‘Start’ and with the Green Alliance ‘Green Living’ work, you are getting a taste for our passion on using the right language to discuss climate change – positive and aspirational. For us it’s simple, our common sense approach to business works equally well with these issues as it does in being the lowest cost retailer in the UK.

To be fair to the government they seem to be thinking along these lines and we welcome the behaviour change inquiry launched by the House of Lords this week.

Of course this doesn’t count for much without everyone adding in their own thoughts, so why not have your say though the Green Alliance Green Living blog and tell us what you think ?

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As you all know from previous blogs, Asda’s view on helping people to live a more environmentally friendly lifestyle is firmly rooted in encouraging positive behaviours, not penalising people for the choices they make. That’s why we want to make greener products mainstream, affordable and accessible, not as a niche, expensive option, for example.

As part of this, we have now teamed up with Prince Charles and his Start project. This project aims at encouraging people to take simple steps to conserve natural resources but in a positive way. In the Prince’s own words:

The idea behind Start came from a realisation that simply warning of rising tides, melting ice caps and collapsing fish stocks was irrelevant to ordinary, hard-pressed people. They are concerned – quite understandably – with other things, such as the economy, their health or the education of their children….Yet all the evidence shows that, in general, these same people want to do the right thing. For example, there are very few who are happy to eat unsustainably harvested fish if they know it will kill off stocks for future generations. There are few who wish to buy certain goods if they are told their production directly contributes to the destruction of the world’s rainforests and the extinction of tens of thousands of animal and plant species. However, people also want to eat delicious food whenever they choose, and want to buy goods and services that are fashionable and popular. Start, therefore, is all about demonstrating that these demands and desires are not mutually exclusive. It is about showing people that it is possible both to enjoy life and to protect nature.

We are very much behind this sentiment which is why we have stringent policies in place concerning our products sourcing.

Start is for everyone so to get involved now you can:

• Comment on their blog

• Come along to the Start garden party in royal gardens in London in September

Here are a couple of interesting articles on Start’s launch from the Press Association and the Telegraph.

This is a key project for us, so watch this space for regular updates on Start and what we are doing to support it.

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Well it turns out that we may not be that artistic after all (!) but nonetheless we offered our energy at least to a local school this week.

The Corporate Affairs Team went down to Victoria Primary School in Leeds to help carry out some renovations and general sprucing up.

The spirit of the school is very strong, as you can see from their sign above, but it is in a less affluent area of Leeds and so has its own issues to manage.

We had a brilliant day both in the knowledge that we were helping to improve the school for the kids but also as a team having the time to chat about non-work stuff.

We split into two teams. The first team, of which I was a part (spot the bright red T-shirt!), scrubbed wooden decking, sanded and painted raised beds, stained the now-dry decking and painted walls and a sand pit whilst the second team scrubbed, sanded and painted numerous picnic tables.

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Did you know that for the last 2 years we have been the sponsor of the Environmental Leadership Award through Business in the Community (BiTC)?

We do a lot of activity with BiTC but for me being on the panel of judges for this award is a real honour. The bar to even enter is very high as companies need to be BiTC members and to have achieved a minimum standard already – a Gold or Platinum level in the CR Index

I am delighted to report that Kingfisher won the award for 2010 and I had the pleasure of presenting their award alongside Sir Stuart Rose, Chairman of M&S and Philip Green, CEO of United Utilities – I’m the one on the left!

We will be sponsoring this award again in 2011 so I would encourage all companies who meet the minimum requirements to enter and good luck. To any business who doesn’t want to enter, I would recommend this BiTC guide though.

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