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Oslo Declaration on Sustainable Consumption

Efforts to develop consumption systems that are markedly more efficient and effective are still largely unknown and to date there have been few practical steps toward realizing their implementation

The Challenge
The future course of the world depends on humanity's ability to provide a high quality of life for a prospective nine billion people without exhausting the Earth's resources or irreparably damaging its natural systems. It was on the basis of this recognition that the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg in 2002 called upon the international community to work toward improving global living conditions and to encourage and promote the development of a ten-year framework of programs on sustainable consumption and production (SCP) in support of regional and national initiatives to accelerate the shift towards SCP.
Sustainable consumption focuses on formulating equitable strategies that foster the highest quality of life, the efficient use of natural resources, and the effective satisfaction of human needs while simultaneously promoting equitable social development, economic competitiveness, and technological innovation.

Bridging the Implementation Gap
While there have been commendable proclamations over the past three years, actual initiatives to cultivate more sustainable modes of consumption have not materialized and there are indications that an implementation gap is becoming manifest. Environmental policy making in the world's high consumption countries continues to rely on remedial regulatory frameworks, cleaner production technologies, and (in some regions) product-oriented policies. Efforts to develop consumption systems that are markedly more efficient and effective are still largely unknown and to date there have been few practical steps toward realizing their implementation. The immediate challenge is to launch a comprehensive research effort on sustainable consumption that can be joined up with the ten-year framework of programs on SCP being developed by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) and to assist in the formulation of prompt policy implementation.

The Contribution of Research
In accordance with the commitment expressed in Agenda 21 to develop a better understanding of the role of consumption and how to bring about more sustainable consumption patterns, research has already begun to generate knowledge about how to move toward a more sustainable global future. However, these insights have been primarily related to questions of sustainable production. There has been considerably less emphasis devoted to charting the transitions that will be necessary to foster sustainable consumption and this heretofore neglected dimension still requires comprehensive investigation. Such research must systematically integrate efforts to promote improvements in quality of life, to distinguish long-term structural trends in consumption patterns, and to identify the social mechanisms and cultural aspects of consumer behavior and household decision making. The consideration of consumption in sustainability policies is also essential to prevent undermining potential improvements in production efficiency.
An expanded research effort focused on sustainable consumption can enhance understanding of how to analyze, to realize, and to govern the institutions and organizations that can facilitate sustainable consumption to close the implementation gap.

A Call for Action from the Oslo Meeting Participants
The signatories of this Declaration call upon policy makers responsible for the design of future research initiatives to develop action programs on sustainable consumption. Specific initiatives should include: Each geographic region of the world should establish within the next two years a collaborative research program focused on sustainable consumption. Each geographic region of the world should implement pilot projects designed to test research findings and to foster social experiments predicated upon novel sustainable consumption systems. Countries and regions are encouraged to establish adequate monitoring and evaluation practices to assess the effectiveness of their sustainable consumption policies, to enable continuous learning, and to ensure that initiatives are regularly updated. The WSSD ten-year framework of programs on sustainable consumption and production should provide a platform for all regional research efforts to identify opportunities for translating research into concrete policy initiatives. A collaborative program representing regional research institutions and international organizations working on sustainable consumption should be created.

To foster the objectives of this Declaration, the participants of the Oslo meeting have proposed to create a knowledge network for sustainable consumption to develop a common research agenda.

Oslo, Norway, 12 February 2005

Background to the Declaration

On 10-12 February 2005, about forty researchers from around the world met in Oslo for the final workshop of the three-year project Life Cycle Approaches to Sustainable Consumption. This initiative was led by the Japanese Society for Non-Traditional Technology (SNTT) and the Research Center for Life Cycle Assessment (AIST) and supported financially by the Japanese government. The project built on prior work in sustainable consumption and provided for an extended period of structured exchange among researchers active in the area.
Consistent with official statements during the World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD) in Johannesburg in 2002, the undersigned, all participants in the Oslo workshop (and others who have subsequently signed this Declaration), maintain that it is imperative to expand international research efforts to investigate processes of sustainable consumption. We are convinced that sustainable consumption is one of the most promising pathways for moving toward global sustainability.
Signed by:
Dutch subscribers:
4. Eric Drissen, National Institute of Public Health and the Environment, The Netherlands
36. Arnold Tukker, TNO-STB, NL
15. Wynand Bodewes, RSM Erasmus University / eShip Centre for Entrepreneurship, NL
57. Mark Goedkoop, PR?, Netherlands
74. Nel Hofstra, Erasmus University, School of Economics, the Netherlands
79. Gjalt Huppes, CML-IE, Leiden University, Netherlands
92. Bahar Keskin, BECO Group, The Netherlands
124. Carlos Montalvo, TNO-R&I, NL
128. Durk Nijdam, Netherlands
167. Sacha Silvester, Design for Sustainability, TU Delft , the Netherlands
177. Harry te Riele, Storrm CS, the Netherlands
183. Helias Udo de Haes, CML Leiden, The Netherlands
186. Regien van der Sijp, SMK (Foundation Milieukeur), The Netherlands
187. Ernst-Jan van Hattum, Foundation o2 global network, Switzerland

Participants of the Oslo workshop (in alphabetical order)
1. Adriana Budeanu, International Institute for Industrial Environmental Econfomics, Sweden
2. Karl-Werner Brand, Technical University of Munich, Germany
3. Maurie Cohen, New Jersey Institute of Technology, United States
and more then 200 other subscribers.

More then 200 supporters (individuals not present at the Oslo workshop that have signed the Declaration after its publication ? status 17 August 2005):

If you would like to be added to this list of supporters, register at www.oslodeclaration.org (Please note: The individuals indicated above have voiced their support for this Declaration on a personal basis; institutional affiliations are only for identification purposes.)

10 Annex: Outline of a Research Program on Sustainable Consumption and Production Preamble
The following research agenda is a non-exhaustive list of unresolved questions in the field of sustainable consumption. Due to the broad nature of the topic, this list includes points for disciplinary investigation, as well as issues that would more appropriately be explored by interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary teams. Although this agenda is designed to serve as a comprehensive research program, the signatories of this Declaration stress that its elements should be adopted by different sponsors as a basis for framing new initiatives.
1. Understanding consumer behaviour and practices
Numerous academic fields provide insights into consumer behaviour and consumption practices including:
* Research on the activities that individuals engage in, and the commodities and services they use;
- Research on social and behavioural factors shaping everyday life;
- Research on the influence of values, attitudes, social expectations, and cultural norms on decision making;
- Research on how choice sets available to consumers are created by different market actors including retailers and advertisers; and
- Research on how technology, design, infrastructure, and organisation influence consumer behaviour.

Some of this work investigates individual choices, such as the purchase of organic or eco-labelled products, while other related research focuses on wider lifestyle patterns. Behavioural researchers provide both policy-relevant insights into ongoing adjustments in consumption patterns and scientifically-relevant insights into how humans act and choose. Future work in this area, however, should put more emphasis on understanding the contextual and causal influences of behaviour.
Research on intended and unintended changes (rebound effects) should seek to address those factors that limit the behavioural options of individuals such as costs, time, space, information, skills, and other natural resources.
Other issues (for example social cohesion and (family) traditions) may also be relevant in this regard. Some consumer research would benefit from a better understanding of the environmental relevance and sustainability impacts of specific activities and choices as this knowledge would be useful in planning and implementing sustainable consumption. Researchers working in this area have show, for instance, that solely providing information to consumers does not lead to marked changes in behaviour. The normative intent of reducing environmental impacts generates important research questions and efforts to address them will be an effective use of resources in this area.

2. Understanding the consumption-environment connection
Environmental policy requires a better understanding of how environmental impacts are related to consumption activities and consumer choices. Based on studies available today, we know that shelter, transportation and nutrition are responsible for the largest material flows, energy expenditures, and carbon-dioxide (CO2) emissions in industrialized countries. These assessments take into account both direct emissions in households and indirect emissions connected to the production and delivery of the goods and services that these households consume. We have some insights about how socioeconomic and geographical factors influence household energy use and CO2 emissions, but substantial gaps in our knowledge remain:
- What are the environmental impacts of consumption in developed countries upon less developed trading partners?
- How are these impacts related to specific practices and choices rather than to broad activity classifications such as nutrition and leisure?
- How do the impacts associated with luxury consumption compare to those arising from consumption of less expensive, mass-market products?
- What are the environmental consequences of actually changing consumption patterns, rather
- What mechanisms and opportunities for reducing environmental impacts are obscured by current state-of-the art assessment methods?
- How problematic is consumption in developing countries, especially the practices of the new 'consumer class' emerging in some developing countries?
- What are the structures and relationships on which we can develop scenarios and model policies for a sustainable future?

3. Understanding the consumption-sustainability connection
More work is needed to investigate the non-environmental impacts of consumption on sustainability. In particular, understanding is quite limited of the social and economic impacts, the effects on communities and wider society, and the tensions and synergies between the different dimensions of sustainability. This research should extend to consideration of poverty, human and labour rights, security, welfare, and governance. To inform policy making, it will be necessary to make transparent the trade-offs between the different sustainability dimensions and to facilitate debate about how they are addressed in practice. Prior work on sustainability indicators could serve as a starting point for work on sustainability measures of particular relevance to consumption.

4. Understanding the consumption-quality of life connection
Material consumption is often equated with quality of life, or happiness, despite the fact that for developed countries empirical research provides little support for this link (or even shows the opposite tendency). Quality of life is more an outcome of less tangible considerations such as freedom, security, social embeddedness, environmental quality, health, ability to live in accordance with one?s values and ideals. Interest in sustainable consumption over the past decade has provided important insights on the role of consumption, numerous proposals for alternative views, and many moral arguments for a focus on different, more accurate descriptions of quality of life. There is, however, a paucity of empirical and experimental work on what people construe as quality of life. We know, for example, from public health researchers that some forms of consumption can become addictive?such as compulsive shopping or eating disorder?and can lead to reductions in quality of life. There is, though, insufficient understanding of how lifestyle choices, activity patterns, social factors, infrastructures, and policies affect the quality of life of different groups.

5. Envisioning sustainable futures
Researchers working on sustainable consumption need to develop more robust linkages to futures research and to formulate long-term scenarios that provide inspiring visions of the future. As such, it will likely be necessary to de-link long-term planning from shorter-term forecasting. We need to develop positive visions of how developed countries can achieve improvements in quality of life while simultaneously respecting the limited resources and assimilative capacity of natural systems. Strategies will also need to be worked out over how developing countries can provide sustainable livelihoods that combine traditional ways of life with advanced technology. This task presupposes that it will be possible to reframe current discourses about how developing countries might leapfrog to Western technologies and to pose the challenge as one in which leapfroggingcan be a basis for sustainable living.

6. Impact of sustainable consumption policies
Sustainable consumption is relevant to numerous policy spheres and a partial list would include trade and economic affairs, land-use planning, and transportation. Relevant policy instruments to reduce the environmental impacts of consumption include taxes and subsidies, regulation, education, public procurement, and local empowerment. There is yet very little understanding of how these policies affect consumption patterns and their environmental impacts or quality of life.
Because policy efforts have in the past been geared exclusively toward increasing absolute levels of consumption, there is little accumulated experience shifting consumption patterns in the direction of sustainability. While we have ex-ante (and occasionally ex-post) analyses of single policies, such evaluations rarely consider policy packages and fail to look beyond impacts on GDP and the prime policy issue at stake. Moreover, truly radical changes towards sustainable consumption patterns require long-term changes in complex production-consumption systems.
How to influence and govern for these purposes has not been addressed and further study is needed at the system level.

7. Implementation and dissemination studies and experiments
Research on sustainable consumption will likely continue to rely on field studies and collaborations with consumers, communities, and policy makers. The intent of these investigations is often to promote policy changes and to support certain normative societal developments. In addition, stakeholder involvement in the policy-making process has become increasingly common. The field of sustainable consumption has an opportunity to simultaneously further both of these streams. It is, however, unclear at present how we should study processes that are largely invisible to individuals and how it might be possible to escape potential complexity traps when involving wide arrays of stakeholders. In the face of ever-changing 'systems of provision', studies that reveal how citizens can be empowered to act effectively for their own good will allow future policies to be enacted with the crucial element of balance.
Practical experiments with small-scale systems that foster sustainable consumption patterns (strategic niche management) in priority fields such as food, shelter and mobility would likely have considerable value.