My job is to ensure we deliver London 2012 in as sustainable a way as possible, and leave a positive legacy. It involves everything from logistics and transport to catering and waste management. It's a lot like a school day in that you have about six different subjects.
One day it might be looking at fine details, such
as which materials are best to use for carrier bags, and the next it could be large-scale procurements for temporary seating and bus fleets. It's important that we choose sustainable materials, and we must always know what will happen to items afterwards.
We took data from previous Games and other events to map out the projected carbon footprint of London 2012. This helped us identify areas with the biggest impacts, so we could prioritise our efforts. For example, rather than having things purpose built, 85 per cent of the 'overlay' commodities, such as tents, barriers and seating, will be hired, meaning they can be reused afterwards.
We have also set out benchmark standards for procuring food products, which all London 2012 caterers have to sign up to. Meat and dairy products will be at least Red Tractor Farm Assured, eggs
will be free range, fish will be Marine Stewardship Council certified, and coffee, tea, sugar, bananas and oranges will be Fairtrade certified — this applies across all 14 million meals we have to serve.
Winning the bid has been my favourite moment
so far. When you watch sport and you're cheering someone on and they get a world record, everyone gets excited and starts jumping up and down. When we won the bid it felt like we were the people making that happen. We'd worked on the bid for two years and to know all the work we had put into it could now become a reality was hugely exciting.
Visit london2012.com.
Interview: Ianthe Butt
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