Community Resilience Unit

Environment Canterbury Community Resilience Unit (established November 2008) will examine the assistance needed by households, businesses and schools in order to increase sustainability outcomes for Canterbury. The unit will report back on how Environment Canterbury should be addressing these issues in the future and will develop some new programmes in order to test out the feasibility of resilience development. For further information, please contact Bill Simpson, Community Resilience Unit Manager or phone 03 3539710.

Transition communities

Transition initiatives in Canterbury are a new way of looking at responding to the challenges posed by climate change and peak oil. Canterbury transition communities include:

• Project Lyttelton

• Lincoln Envirotown Trust

• Transition Timaru

• The Christchurch Transition Forum and Sustainable Otautahi Christchurch actively contribute to the establishment and furthering of transition initiatives.

Check these websites for further information:

• Transition Towns New Zealand Aotearoa 
• Transition Aotearoa

Resources

• Sustainable Living (community group courses for a sustainable lifestyle - contact Rhys Taylor)
• The Transition Handbook: From Oil Dependency to Local Resilience (author: Rob Hopkins)