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A co-creation model for Singapore’s carbon conundrum

Photo credit: Twitter @OurTampinesHub

Community based problem solving

This video explores Singapore's carbon conundrum by asking the question of how to create large scale, community wide systemic changes that are required when action is lacking

from large institutional actors in government and business. In particular what can volunteers and NGOs do to affect these changes from the perspective of a concerned observer

with limited ability to directly influence decisions and behaviors?

Part I : lessons learned for collective action solutions to the common pool resource situation

The video explores the lessons from Elinor Ostrom's research on the role of institutions for solving collective action problems and how they could be a useful guide for solving coordination and collective action problems. In the first part of the video, I explore Ostrom's research for a specific class of collective action problems known as "Common pool resource" situations, the lessons learned and an actionable framework for how concerned observers could operationalize these learnings into activities and new resources

through the general process of grassroots community organizing.

Part II : Adapting the community organizing framework to Singapore's urban sustainability challenge

In the second part of the video, I then connect those lessons and how they could apply to Singapore's carbon conundrum

and the challenges of translating the lessons from rural Common pool resource problems to unique challenges of urban sustainability.

I end the video with a few sample proposals of collective action proposals which could create the systemic shift changes that need to occur

to reduce Singapore's carbon emissions, and may be able to adapt some parts of the lessons learned from Ostrom's community organizing framework.

About Singapore Green New Deal

website : https://aseangreennewdeal.wixsite.com/home

email contact : sggreennewdeal@gmail.com

Facebook group : https://www.facebook.com/groups/638397066897083/

links and references

SG Green New Deal, 2020 unpacking Singapore's carbon conundrum, Q&A for the climate crisis

https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLSgUSj_OxKwaDLYhKu7CnvR6i47TVkpYq

Channel News Asia (CNA), 2020 Carbon conundrum

https://www.channelnewsasia.com/news/video-on-demand/carbon-conundrum

Ostrom, 1990 Governing the Commons

https://www.burmalibrary.org/docs20/Ostrom-1990-governing_the_commons.pdf

Gal Oya Left Bank Rehabilitation Project, 1979

https://publications.iwmi.org/pdf/H001717.pdf

South Korea once recycled 2% of it’s food waste, now it recycles 95%

https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/04/south-korea-recycling-food-waste/

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Singapore’s carbon conundrum

Effects from and contribution to the problem lie beyond the border

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Singapore’s carbon conundrum

>95% electricity from carbon intensive NG w/o CCS
30 tons/capita imported emissions consumption
>90% of food (imports) natural capital from outside
Majority of road vehicles use petrol/diesel
Air travel one largest non-essential emissions source
AC largest energy consumption from buildings

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Community based problem solving

Channel lock for common irrigation system "huerta" in Valencia, Spain Photo credit : Kevin Fu

Collective action problems on various scales are not new and have been the subject of sociologist and economists for some time. Around the world and throughout time are stories of communities that have had varying success at coordination and cooperation in managing local resources and solving community problems cooperatively. This is a photo of one of the enduring success stories of a self-organizing community based solution in the Spanish huertas - an irrigation system that is governed and operated by the local community with little intervention from the regional Spanish government nor would it be accurate to characterize the huertas as a privatized, market-based solution. In fact there are a wide range of institutional alternatives to privatization or the state that have successfully provided solutions to collective action challenges. ��One example of a collective action problem is the Gal Oya Irrigation system in 1979

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Case study : �Gal Oya Left Bank Rehabilitation project

Rice farmer Sri Lanka Photo credit : AFP

summarize, read as much as you think is enough to present the situation, then move to the transition :

So now that we have an idea of a specific example, what are the features that define a collective action problem

Gal Oya Left Bank Rehabilitation Project, 1979�https://publications.iwmi.org/pdf/H001717.pdf

Excerpts from the report �

The Gal Oya Irrigation System, located in the south-eastern part of Sri Lanka was the largest irrigation-based settlement project in the island prior to the Mahaweli Development Project. The construction of the irrigation system began in 1948 and was completed in the early 1'950s. The reservoir, Samudraya, can stare 770,000 acre feet of water and has a command area of 120,000 acres. The Gal Oya Irrigation System has three main divisions: the Left Bank, the Right Bank, and the River Division. The Left bank (1.B) command area is the largest of the three divi=ions with abont 65,000 acres of irrigated land.' The JAB system is comprised of nearly 32 miles of main channels, 50 miles of major distributaries, and about 600 miles of field channels. The physical system of the Gal Oya Left Bank (GOLB) in the late 1970s was aptly described as a "hydrological nightmare" (Uphoff 1986); channels were silted, structures were broken, and the channel rapacity had been greatly reduced by erosion.

[...]

By 1978 the Irrigation system of the GOLB was in a very deteriorated condition. Main system management was hapha::ard and in 1982 water was regularly controlled and measured at only seven points, for the entire Left Bank system. Because of water shortages, at least one-third of the LB command area seldom or never got water in the yala (dry) season (Murray Rust et al. 1982). A survey carried out by the ARTI in GOLB revealed that the average size of the lowland per settler was only 2 acres with a range of 0.5 acre to 5.0 acres, which indicated a skewed distribution of land ownership. This was a result of several interrelated factors: mortgagint;, sharecropping, and extensive encroachments, especially in the upper reaches of the COLB. In some places, as much as 40% of settlers were non-owner operators (Ranasinghe-Perera 1984). Cooperation among farmers was minimal. Social relations among settlers, who came from different areas of the country, were often strained. Settlers generally had a low self-image. Relations between farmers and ID officials were marked by mistrust and recriminations. Fanners had no confidence in the competence or the trustworthiness of the IDS staff. For example, a farmer asked the ARTI research team in early 1980, whether it was possible to get an agency other than the ID to implement the rehabilitation project (Uphoff 1981). Many field-level officials such as Maintenance Overseers, Jalapalakas (JP) and Yayapalaka (UP) were notorious for their corruption and thuggery. The main obstacle to efficient water management, from the farmers' view point, was the local level officials, who had political and bureaucratic power behind them.

On the other hand, the ID officials, especially irrigation engineers, believed that farmers could not use water responsibly and carefully. Therefore, they argued that it was necessary to organize, eductlte, and discipline the farmers to do what the 1D asked them to do. Thus farmfrs were considered a part of the problem while the latter constituted the solution.

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How to solve a collective action problem (as a concerned observer) ?

1	Collective action failure	Everyone in the community would be better off in a different configuration, but no single individual has incentive to change or means to affect the outcome
2	Many autonomous participants	~ 100-10,000
3	No formal decision authority	You (concerned observer) do not have any formal decision authority, market power to directly influence behavior

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Community based problem solving

Elinor Ostrom at a press event in 2009 for her Nobel award. Credit John Sommers II /Reuters

Common pool resource (CPR) situation
Conditions for success
Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework
Activities and new resources
Case study : Gal Oya Sri Lanka
Risks, uncertainties

Lessons from Elinor Ostrom

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Situation : Common pool resource (CPR)

Appropriators

Common resource

Extractable value (Rent)
Rival
Open access
Large scale

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Situation : Common pool resource (CPR)

Appropriators

Common resource

Ostrom’s research aim :��Identify governance model for sustainable use of a CPR that is an alternative to privatization or a Leviathan (state) authority

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Situation : Common pool resource (CPR)

Situation

Value opportunity
Observable
Predictable rents
Boundary conditions

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Situation : Common pool resource (CPR)

Appropriators (community)

Pain point (Common stake)
Shared understanding of CPR
Low discount rate
Trust, reciprocity
Autonomy
Leadership, organizing skills

Pain points : The community understands that the sustained health of the CPR is vital to them, usually economic or material existence in the case of farmers. They have a vested stake in the outcomes of whether the CPR succeeds or fails
Shared understanding of the CPR : The community shares a common image of how the resource operates, how their actions affect 1) each other and 2) the health of the CPR
Low discount rate: The community values streams of extractable rents, benefits from the CPR far into the future
Trust, reciprocity : There are health working relationships within the community - they are able to communicate, they trusts one another to keep promises and relate to one another with reciprocity
Autonomy : The community has the autonomy to set their own rules for access rights, harvest and appropriate rents without prior approval or interference from an outside governing authority (either a parent company or the government)
Leadership, organizing skills : within the community are people who have the minimal skills of leadership and organizing either by prior experience or by observing, study other successful communities

A common denominator for Ostrom’s theoretical model for what separated successes from failures can be summarized in one word

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Collective action for CPR : Lessons learned

TRUST

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Collective action for CPR : Lessons learned

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Collective action for CPR : Lessons learned

8 Principles for successful CPR

Clearly defined boundaries
Congruence : Contextualized rules
Democratic decision making
Rules enforced by monitoring
Graduated sanctions
Conflict resolution
Endorsement of limited autonomy
(for collections of CPRs) nested, polycentric relationships

Clearly defined boundaries : Effective exclusion for members and non-members. In contrast a completely open access resources is sometimes referred to as a “public good”
Congruence : rational relationship between the appropriation rules and the specifics, dynamics of the common pool resource and the community
Democratic decision making : all members have ability to influence the appropriation rules (collective choice arrangements)
Rules enforced by monitoring : either by the appropriators or a delegate
Graduated sanctions : penalties for violation of rules begin for first time offenses with minor penalties (warnings) and gradually escalate with repeated offenses
Conflict resolution : mechanisms at low cost and easy access to the members
Endorsement of limited autonomy by higher authorities (usually a national government)
(for multi-scaled systems) Nested, polycentric relationships

The second contribution from Ostrom’s research was the methodological tool that she used in her field study analysis that she refers to as Institutional Analysis and Development Framework

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Institutional analysis and development (IAD) Framework

Image source : Anna Zachrisson, 2009 Commons Protected For or From the People Co-Management in the Swedish Mountain Region?

Constitution arena

Whole community members

Stakeholders

Operational team

Higher governing authorities

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Community organizing problem solving framework

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Case study : �Gal Oya Farmer Organization Program

Rice farmer Sri Lanka Photo credit : AFP

Summarize the story, once ready move to transition

The Gal Oya story illustrates that while there are some guidelines for success, there are also a number of risks and uncertainties (transition next slide)

Gal Oya Left Bank Rehabilitation Project, 1979�https://publications.iwmi.org/pdf/H001717.pdf

Excerpts from the report

Both the Government and USAlD agreed that to make maximum use of the rehabilitated irrigation system of the GOLB, it was necessary to develop better water management practices. To achieve this, it was imperative that the beneficiaries of the irrigation system, i.e., farmers, be drawn into look after, and manage at least those sections of the irrigation facilities that directly serve them. Otherwise it would not only be difficult to ensure the efficient use of the available water but also to prevent the gradual decay and ruin of the facilities themselves as happened during the pre-1979 era. Farmers’ involvement in such activities was to come through farmer organisations. The main objective of the Farmer Organisation Programme (FOP:, was to ��1) promote farmers' participation in water management and system maintenance at all stages from decision making�2) including the identification of needs

3) to implementation

4) to including the enjoyment of benefits

[.. ]

Institutional Organizers Recruitment Program

Several key criteria were emphasized in selecting IOs. The ARTI advertised calling applications from graduates (both male and female) who possessed at least two of the following qualifications: (1) knowledge of irrigated agriculture; (2) willingness to live in remote villages for extended periods of time; and (3) leadership skills and organisational experience’. More than 70% of the successful candidates were children of small farmers and this background helped them to win the confidence of farmers, to understand their problems quickly, and to live and work under hard living conditions, both physical and mental (Wijayaratne 1985)

The 10s were trained for 4-7 weeks before they were fielded in the GOLR. Their training consisted of lectures and discussions on the broad areas of agriculture, irrigation, local institutions, and communication. The nature and extent of the training varied from batch to batch. !iome hatches received more formal training and less field training, while others were exposed to more field training. The field training of the. later batches was facilitated by the presence of experienced IOs in the field. More emphasis was placed, during the field training 94 period, on a practical on-the-job training in thi: methodology of promoting people's participation by working in partnership with farmers. IOs learned how to enter into the rural community and establish rapport with the farmers. Further, they learned how to identify farmers' needs and problems and how to resolve their problems. The most important component of this training was to learn how to work with farmers and officers and how to promote healthy relationships between the two groups

A team approach was the basic strategy of deployment of IOs. Four to five IOs were assigned to an area, within which individual assignments were made, but not exclusively. The group would meet weekly to discuss their work and problems, seek solutions by consensus, and become acquainted with the area. The IOs in the field were supervised by Research and Training Officers of the ARTI. A Government Officer (District Land Officer) from the Ministry of Lands and Land Development was appointed on a part-time basis as the resident IO supervisor in the GOLB. He was in charge of administrative and logistics problems of the IOs.

The learning component of the FOP was initially done through a "process monitoring programme," using participant observation as its main tool. Process Documentators (PD) who were selected from the IOs, observed and reported the social dynamics generated as a result of the intervention of IOs in the community. Process documentation attempted a continuous assessment of the progress of farmer organisations, their defects, strengths, problems. and potential solutions. At the beginning, each PD discussed his report with the whole team during its weekly meetings. They identified problems, and collectively devised strategies to cope with them."Quite often problems were discussed and solutions were found in the field itself.

The most significant feature of the IO training was that each of them was expected to enter the community with a trained but an open mind; he did not take with him a model organisation. He did not have a ready-made organisational structure, complete with constitution, by-laws, qualifications for membership, objectives, functions, sanctions for transgressions. etc. His objective was to initiate a process, encompassing a range of options applicable to different locations and situations (Wijayaratne 1985).

The first step towards organizing farmers was the IOs' private meetings with farmers. This was done in farmers' paddy fields or at their homes. Through these informal meetings, the IOs and farmers (developed a sense of friendship and in this way the IO managed to explain the participatory and egalitarian objective of the farmer organisations to the latter."

After initial familiarization with the avea and farmers, the IO met with groups of farmers, who cultivated land using water from the same field channel, to discuss their problems and needs. The focus of such meetings was to formulate strategies for solving problems, first through their own group initiative, and thereafter seeking outside assistance.

The next step was to organize an ad hoc committee or to choose a spokesman to represent the group and to direct group activities such as desilting a field channel, repairing a broken channel gate, or planning a rotation of water so that the tail-enders would also receive their fair share of water. When farmers got used to working together and realized that such group activity was beneficial to them, the IOs encouraged farmers to form a more visible farmer organisation at the field channel level. These are not formal or legalistic organisations but informal groups (kandayam) and they functioned mostly through the offices of a representatives chosen by consensus. Thus one can see an evolution of commniunity activity starting from a collective action towards a farmer organisation.

[...]

The ARTI has continuously encountered numerous problems in carrying out the FOP as a action-research project. The IOs who were the catalysts of the FOP were employed on contract with no assured prospect of career. When the Ministry of Education began a large scale recruitment of graduate school teachers. many trained IOs left the Project to become teachers in the Government sector as it assured permanent employment. As a result, 41% of the IOs left the FOP within 6 months after their appointment. Thus, although six batches and a total of 169 IOs were recruited and trained between 1980-1985, the effective number of IOs in the field never exceeded 50 and averaged around 30 (Kasyanathan 1986). This has prevented the ARTI team from making an accurate assessment of the capacity of IOs to consolidate FCO activities in their respective areas. The ARTI planned to withdraw the IOs from the field at different times with a view to studying how FCOs react to this and how farmers organize and sustain their group activity by themselves without the IOs' support. For this purpose, the ARTI had a plan of action for fielding and withdrawing IOs.

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Risks, uncertainties

Trust (3 dimensions)

Access (Trust between organizers and community)
Cooperation (within the community)
Autonomy (Trust given to the community by govt)

Identify value opportunity, pain points (PP)
Compelling case for associating PP to CAP
Turnover, resources for the organizers

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Singapore’s carbon footprint

System wide changes for Singapore
Case study : South korea food waste
Behavior, change and institutions
Urban relationship with natural capital
Pain points and collective action problems
Examples of collective action problems

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System wide changes

Electricity : NG w/o CCS → low carbon alternatives
Industrial value chain model : Linear → Circular
Consumption : materials → services
Road vehicles : reduction and conversion → electric (EV)
Travel modality : (plane, car) → (walk, cycle, train)
Protein : animal → plant based

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Photo: Jung Yeon-Je/AFP/Getty Images

Urban case study : South Korea food waste

(tell the story, summarize, once ready move to transition)

The lessons from South Korea’s food waste problem raise a number of questions about ownership of the problem and catalysts, agents, theories of change (next slide)

South Korea once recycled 2% of it’s food waste, now it recycles 95%�https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2019/04/south-korea-recycling-food-waste/

Globally 1.3 bil tons food waste per year. Ranges vary by region between 300 and 800 g per capita per day, with a larger component from consumer (vs supply chain) losses in developed, urbanized regions. ��Initially there was a problem gov’t recognized that food waste was excessive compared to other developed countries - at the table losses up to 350 g / person / day which some attributed to the nature of the cuisine tradition banchan optional small side dishes served with the meal that often are not eaten at the end of the meal.

As far back as 2005, dumping food in landfill was banned, and in 2013 the government introduced compulsory food waste recycling using special biodegradable bags. An average four-person family pays $6 a month for the bags, a fee that helps encourage home composting.

The bag charges also meet 60% of the cost of running the scheme, which has increased the amount of food waste recycled from 2% in 1995 to 95% today. The government has approved the use of recycled food waste as fertilizer, although some becomes animal feed.

Technology has played a leading part in the success of the scheme. In the country’s capital, Seoul, 6,000 automated bins equipped with scales and Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) weigh food waste as it is deposited and charge residents using an ID card. The pay-as-you-recycle machines have reduced food waste in the city by 47,000 tonnes in six years, according to city officials.

Residents are urged to reduce the weight of the waste they deposit by removing moisture first. Not only does this cut the charges they pay - food waste is around 80% moisture - but it also saved the city $8.4 million in collection charges over the same period.

Waste collected using the biodegradable bag scheme is squeezed at the processing plant to remove moisture, which is used to create biogas and bio oil. Dry waste is turned into fertiliser that is, in turn, helping to drive the country’s burgeoning urban farm movement.

The number of urban farms or community gardens in Seoul has increased sixfold in the past seven years. They now total 170 hectares - roughly the size of 240 football fields. Most are sandwiched between apartment blocks or on top of schools and municipal buildings. One is even located in the basement of an apartment block. It is used to grow mushrooms.

The city government provides between 80% and 100% of the start-up costs. As well as providing food, proponents of the scheme say urban farms bring people together as a community in areas where residents are often isolated from one another. The city authorities are planning to install food waste composters to support urban farms.

Which brings us back to banchan. In the long term, some people argue South Koreans will need to change their eating habits if they are really going to make a dent in their food waste.

Kim Mi-hwa, chair of the Korea Zero Waste Movement Network, told Huffington Post: “There’s a limit to how much food waste fertilizer can actually be used. This means there has to be a change in our dining habits, such as shifting to a one-plate culinary culture like other countries, or at least reducing the amount of banchan that we lay out.”

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Barriers to change?

Who’s responsible? Where to start?

Individuals could switch solar provider voluntarily
→ but they haven’t so far
Corporations could pay higher costs to operate with a lower environmental footprint, carbon emissions
→ but so far they haven’t done enough

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Institutions guide behavior and decisions

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Urban relationship with natural capital

Common pool resource�Natural capital within boundaries of the community

Urban sustainability�Natural capital beyond borders of the community

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Community pain points and collective problem

Common pool resource�Intrinsic association of the collective action problem (CAP) as the pain point

Urban sustainability�Work of the community organizers is to make the association between CAP and pain point

(explain the first, then transition)

There may not be an easy answer for how to overcome this dilemma. One possible strategy could be to break the problem up into two steps (reveal and explain)

A third alternative is ‘intervention’ by introducing new incentives such as carbon credits that make an explicit link between climate change and economic interests, but these intervention measures may be outside the reach of the community organizers.

As a concerned observer, in the beginning you may not have the access to the community to be able to observe or have a shared awareness of what the community pain points are, but what you can do to get started is to identify the collective action problems related to those communities that are also related to the systemic shifts that need to occur. (transition next slide)

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Examples : collective action proposals�large network-effect, coordination required

Electricity source : solar panel coverage
EV charging point coverage
Circular : Subscription (vs ownership) of durable goods
Circular : South Korea food waste model
Road vehicles : Community car sharing service
Travel modality : Local tourism