Project Overview

• Title: Sustainable Production and Consumption: The Influence of Social Norms (SPAC)
• Funding body: Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)
• Period: 02/2019 - 08/2020
• Team: Dr Stephen Onakuse (PI), Dr Gideon Fadiran (Postdoc), Judith-Ann Colgan (MSc research)

Summary

The SPAC project presents an opportunity to understand the social norms or behavioural characteristics to responsible production and consumption in Ireland. The project findings will identify areas on attitude-behavioral gaps and targets to stimulate sustainable behavioral change for attention of policy makers and the public.

Work Packages

The project will have four work packages in total. The first and last are work packages dedicated to supervision (WP1), reporting and dissemination (WP4). The second and third (WP2 and WP3) are focused on research activities carried out to fulfil project targets. More details on the work packages are provided below:

1. WP 1 accounts for supervision duty: Project Management and Co-ordination - this WP will be dedicated to supervision and follow up of the project, to maintain a good co-ordination between project participants and stakeholders. This will enable a focused work track that minimizes deviation, enforce targets, and ensures timely delivery of project deliverables and outputs. This also involves engagement with the EPA team, to provide technical and financial reporting on project progress.
2. WP2 will mainly be a qualitative and dedicated to identifying existing literature, database sources and policies relevant to sustainability of production and consumption. Consumer behavior is understood to be influenced by social norms, a key-factor that influences the direction of responsible production and consumption. Engaging identified groups in the community can present a view of consumer reaction to ‘how and why’ existing and recommended interventions and policy approaches are perceived. This contributes to improving production and consumption behavior, and ultimately, the drive towards low carbon economy and sustainable growth. It involves a questionnaire design, in-store survey and a theoretical framework development. An additional empirical study is conducted to present analytical views from the survey response data.
3. WP3 will be quantitative and dedicated to development of a computational model framework that integrates consumer behaviour in reference to observation of social norms (WP2). There will be agent representation for three key actors driving production and consumption sustainability. Namely producers, consumers and government.
4. WP4 accounts for reporting and dissemination duties- this WP will be ongoing throughout the project lifetime as UCC will engage and work closely with the EPA’s Inventory and Projection team.

Project Activities

Online Survey

• https://forms.gle/q4AMXsy384YSqecdA 

Working Developments

1. Fadiran, G. and Onakuse, S., (2019) Identifying environmental barrier to planning, consumption and waste behaviour: a case study of Irish consumers.    
2. Colgan, J., Fadiran, G., Onakuse, S., (2020). Analysis of Barriers and Drivers towards Sustainable Consumption behaviour from an Irish consumer perspective. 

Publications Presentations

1. Colgan, J., Onakuse, S., Fadiran, G., (2019). Towards sustainable production and consumption – understanding barriers and behavioural gaps. CUBS Postgrad Research Symposium 2019 1 Lapp’s Quay, Centre for Executive Education, 13 May, 2019  

Policy Briefs

1. Onakuse, S., Fadiran, G., Colgan, J., (2019). Identification of attitude-behavioural gaps and targets for policy makers and the public - to stimulate sustainable behavioural change. 
2. Fadiran, G., Colgan, J., Onakuse, S., (2020). Opinion piece: Consumer views on incentives to promote public transport use in Ireland

Communications, Media and Social

1. Onakuse, S., Fadiran, G., Colgan, J., (2019). Consumer role to stimulating sustainable growth. Linkedin article post. 11 July, 2019. 
2. Onakuse, S., (2020). Why it’s time to stop blaming governments and look at our own consumption and sustainability. 26 minutes podcast on UCC CUBS podcast, RTe radio collaboration with University College Cork, Cork University Business School Podcast: Insights. Episode 13.
3. Newsletter: SPAC Newsletter Volume 1

Disclaimer

Although every effort has been made to ensure the accuracy of the material contained in this website, complete accuracy cannot be guaranteed. Neither the Environmental Protection Agency nor the authors accept any responsibility whatsoever for loss or damage occasioned or claimed to have been occasioned, in part or in full, as a consequence of any person acting or refraining from acting, as a result of a matter contained in this website.