June 26, 2023
May's SusSH Group Leaders' Gathering, hosted at Makers Mews in Ivybridge, centred on the theme of Saving Earth Resources, with updates on composting and sharing projects and thoughts about how to progress from here.
Attendees first heard an update about community composting. South Hams District Council (SHDC)has money available to support community compost projects, although there are a few barriers to entry in terms of organisation, logistics, funding and resources.
A Sustainable South Hams/SHDC grant application is currently in progress, aiming to cover pilots for home composting support, compost clubs, training and more.
Interested in composting? Find out more from the Devon Community Composting Network.
The Gathering was also attended by Roger Higman and Mirella Ferraz from Network of Wellbeing/ShareShed. They gave some exciting updates on the work of ShareShed, which now runs across seven locations in the South Hams, and has loaned out items more than 3000 times over six years. ShareShed's next focus is to look at skill sharing (e.g. tool sharpening and bike repairs) and a recent success has been the use of a locker in South Brent as a low cost way of extending hours available.
If your community would like to learn more, contact mirella@networkofwellbeing.org.
The extremely successful Sharefest took place in Totnes at the end of April with funding from SHDC, with events on sharing, repairing, make do and mending and much more! SusSH Compost Mentor Ben Bryant was there to discuss home and community composting, and there were plenty of other organisations and initiatives present.
Many thanks to Nadine Dommett and Makers Mews for hosting us! At the request of this meeting's attendees, our next Group Leaders' Gathering will follow on from this one, looking at Scaling Up Earth Resources. Join us on 14th June at the REconomy Centre in Totnes - find out more here.