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Welcome to the sLowveld Transition Town Movement. This is in its embryonic stage and any comments are welcome.

We've created this site to assist you in exploring the alternative possibility - the fact that the price of fossil fuels will and within your lifetime become so expensive that you will be compelled to change your daily habits. Of course it will never manifest itself as a shortage of petrol or diesel, whichever your car prefers but it will manifest itself in hyper inflation, stagnating salaries & wages and generally the sense that everything is no longer affordable. Some people have this sense already, especially after the last recession but many predict that this is just the beginning of tougher times ahead.

It is possible to actively oppose such changes but there is a growing number of people who feel that a simpler less encumbered lifestyle has its advantages and are excited by the possible changes that lie ahead. Many are have joined or formed a local transition town movement and are engaging with like-minded people on issues of common interest.

A small group of White River residents have done just this. We're not intending to change the town, but we are intent on changing ourselves. It's social, not taxing on your time and most likely very beneficial to all involved. If you're keen, contact us or join our Ning group at http://transitionza.ning.com/.

What is a Transition Town?

Here's how it all appears to be evolving...

It all starts off when a small collection of motivated individuals within a community come together with a shared concern: how can our community respond to the challenges, and opportunities, of Peak Oil and Climate Change?

They begin by forming an initiating group and then adopt the Transition Model with the intention of engaging a significant proportion of the people in their community to kick off a Transition Initiative.

A Transition Initiative is a communityworking together to look Peak Oil and Climate Change squarely in the eye and address this BIG question:

"for all those aspects of life that this community needs in order to sustain itself and thrive, how do we significantly increase resilience (to mitigate the effects of Peak Oil) and drastically reduce carbon emissions (to mitigate the effects of Climate Change)?"

After going through a comprehensive and creative process of:

awareness raising around peak oil, climate change and the need to undertake a community lead process to rebuild resilience and reduce carbon
connecting with existing groups in the community
building bridges to local government
connecting with other transition initiatives
forming groups to look at all the key areas of life (food, energy, transport, health, heart & soul, economics & livelihoods, etc)
kicking off projects aimed at building people's understanding of resilience and carbon issues and community engagement
eventually launching a community defined, community implemented "Energy Descent Action Plan" over a 15 to 20 year timescale

This results in a coordinated range of projects across all these areas of life that strives to rebuild the resilience we've lost as a result of cheap oil and reduce the community's carbon emissions drastically. The community also recognises two crucial points:

that we used immense amounts of creativity, ingenuity and adaptability on the way up the energy upslope, and that there's no reason for us not to do the same on the downslope
if we collectively plan and act early enough there's every likelihood that we can create a way of living that's significantly more connected, more vibrant and more in touch with our environment than the oil-addicted treadmill that we find ourselves on today.

Final point

Just to weave the climate change and peak oil situations together...

Climate change makes this carbon reduction transition essential
Peak oil makes it inevitable
Transition initiatives make it feasible, viable and attractive (as far we can tell so far...)