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Living With Environmental Change

Aims and objectives

Living With Environmental Change (LWEC) is an ambitious and innovative partnership of UK government departments and agencies, devolved administrations, local government and research councils. The partnership benefits from a business advisory board which draws on the expertise of business leaders from a wide variety of companies.

Together, LWEC partners can identify the most pressing economic and social challenges to do with environmental change, align their efforts to meet those challenges and co-ordinate funding for the leading multidisciplinary research and observation that the UK can offer.

The partnership has a growing international reputation and has a role in developing the UK's green economy with relevant skills, tools, knowledge and innovation.

LWEC activities contribute to better predictions and analysis of environmental change and help society to adapt to the impacts of change without causing further damage to the natural environment.

LWEC was launched in 2008 and is a 10 year partnership.

Photo: children flying a kite

Who is involved?

LWEC consists of 22 organisations that fund, carry out and use environmental research and observations. They include the UK research councils, government departments with environmental responsibilities, devolved administrations and government agencies.

Aims

The partnership aims to ensure that decision makers in government, business and society have the knowledge, foresight and tools to mitigate, adapt to and benefit from environmental change. To achieve this LWEC makes sure that:

  • Research, observations and information-gathering are designed to meet the expressed needs of policy and practice partners;
  • Partners sustain their engagement with LWEC activities so that they can shape and benefit from the outputs;
  • Outputs are easy to find and well communicated to key business, government and other audiences;
  • Funders align their efforts to get better return on investment and to avoid duplication.

Objectives - the specific issues

There are six core challenges:

  1. The climate challenge. To understand the risks of climate change and assess options for avoiding or managing such risks.
  2. The ecosystem challenge. To ensure that decision-making takes full account of impacts on the natural environment and their consequences for ecosystem sustainability, human well-being, and economic prosperity.
  3. The resources challenge. To promote human well-being, alleviate poverty and minimise waste by ensuring a sustainable supply of water, food and other biological resources.
  4. The health challenge. To understand and protect human health in a changing environment.
  5. The infrastructure challenge. To make infrastructure, the built environment and transport systems resilient to environmental change, less carbon intensive and more socially acceptable.
  6. The societal challenge. To understand the role of government, business and society in enabling all to live with environmental change.

How does LWEC work?

LWEC brings groups of partners together around different challenges to determine where there are priority knowledge, skills or communication gaps. Partners can then align resources and strategies to fill those gaps. This kind of coordinated approach increases the effectiveness of environmental research, observations and skills across the UK. Activities are co-designed, co-produced and co-delivered by a range of partners, assisted by a small directorate, to ensure outputs are used by policy makers, business and society.