DEFRA Waste Behaviour ESRC Policy Fellowship
Lead Research Organisation:
University of Cambridge
Department Name: Engineering
Abstract
Each fellowship will last up to 18 months to cover a three-month inception phase for set up activity, followed by a 6-12-month placement with the host organisation, and concluding with an impact phase lasting up to three months.
Fellows will co-design projects and activities with their host and produce analysis to inform government decision-making across a range of policy priorities. Fellows will also engage across the host organisation, building effective working relationships and supporting wider knowledge exchange with researchers. This will be supported through their embedded role within the host organisation, including line management support.
Fellows will co-design projects and activities with their host and produce analysis to inform government decision-making across a range of policy priorities. Fellows will also engage across the host organisation, building effective working relationships and supporting wider knowledge exchange with researchers. This will be supported through their embedded role within the host organisation, including line management support.
People |
ORCID iD |
| Lili Jia (Principal Investigator / Fellow) | |
| Steve Evans (Researcher) |
| Description | The funded work has led to a discovery of how different behavioural incentives could be combined together to generate stronger incentives to motivate sustainable consumption. This resulted in a development of a systems learning framework to map out the transformation process of sustainable consumption. |
| Exploitation Route | The outcomes can be taken forward and put to use in three ways: First, the systems learning framework can be used for analysing policy hypotheses and identify policy priorities. Second, the systems learning framework can guide the collection of new data to test the hypotheses. Third, the systems learning framework can be used to development metrics for measuring progress of the transformation of sustainable consumption |
| Sectors | Agriculture, Food and Drink,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology |
| Description | My research findings have been used for improving the understanding of complex evidence in policy design and the important role of business incentive in motivating sustainable consumption. They expanded the strategies of waste policy design from two (mandatory regulation and financial incentives) to five (mandatory regulation, financial incentives, voluntary regulation, sustainable products and services, and sociopsychological incentives). The systems learning framework developed through this project paved a new research method for designing policy interventions with a holistic approach to trigger systemic sustainable consumption. |
| First Year Of Impact | 2022 |
| Sector | Agriculture, Food and Drink,Manufacturing, including Industrial Biotechology |
| Impact Types | Societal,Economic,Policy & public services |
| Description | Standardising environmental data schema for the food and drink sector going beyond legal compliance (SEEBEYOND 2) |
| Amount | £980,000 (GBP) |
| Funding ID | 1070150346 |
| Organisation | Environment Agency |
| Sector | Public |
| Country | United Kingdom |
| Start | 01/2023 |
| End | 03/2026 |
| Description | DEFRA Webinar delivered by Prof Steve Evans: What works when transitioning to a sustainable system? |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | About 60 policy makers at DEFRA attended for the webinar. The discussions focused on the current challenges of environmental policy and how to motivate industry to improve environmental performance. The webinar reported increased interest in the systems approach and exploring potentials to improve environmental performance of industries. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | DEFRA-EA webinar: Standardising environmental metrics for food businesses going beyond legal compliance |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Over 100 policy makers at the DEFRA and Environment Agency attended for the webinar. The webinar sparked questions and discussion over how to motivate companies to go beyond legal compliance. The webinar reported increased interest in motivating sustainable production. This result has received interest from the DEFRA's Food Data Transparency team and a collaboration was established. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Going beyond legal compliance |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | 40 policy makers from different government bodies attended the Behavioural Insights Community webinar. The presentation 'Going beyond legal compliance' sparked questions and discussions over the incentives and contexts that can motivate companies to go beyond legal compliance. The participants reported a changed view of using combined incentives rather than singular incentive. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2023 |
| Description | Invitation to Food Data Transparency Partnership |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A formal working group, expert panel or dialogue |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Two meeting were held to discuss how to join the effort on increasing environmental and food data transparency. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022,2023 |
| Description | Motivating sustainable production in food and drink sector: an incentive-based approach |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | A talk or presentation |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | Local |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | About 30 policymakers attended the talk which inspired broad discussions and interests to explore new regulatory approach. Two more meetings were scheduled for deeper discussions with the Regulation team. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |
| Description | Webinar: An incentive-based approach to environmental regulation |
| Form Of Engagement Activity | Participation in an activity, workshop or similar |
| Part Of Official Scheme? | No |
| Geographic Reach | National |
| Primary Audience | Policymakers/politicians |
| Results and Impact | Over 60 policy makers at DEFRA attended for the webinar. The incentive-based approach inspired questions and discussion over the government's role in motivating companies to go beyond compliance. The webinar reported increased interest in an incentive-based approach to environmental regulation and a follow-up with the DEFRA's Food Waste Reduction Policy team. |
| Year(s) Of Engagement Activity | 2022 |