The findings of the influential All Party Parliamentary Small Shops Group report, High Street Britain, released a week ago today on Wednesday 15 February, backed nef's call to halt clone town Britain. nef believes that the costs of choking off local diversity on our high streets are counted in economic losses, local identity crises under the pressure of cloning and the dissolving of the social glue that holds communities together. The Small Shops Group agreed with nef that this dynamic is neither necessary nor inevitable. "Their report demonstrates that the local economic diversity underpinning healthy communities is in peril.  The Small Shops Group has shown a way forward and we now wait for the Government's response", says nef policy director, Andrew Simms.

nef launches new resource: clone town britain: the fight back newsletter

On 15 March, a month from the publication of the Small Shops Group report, nef will launch a new resource -clone town britain: the fight back newsletter - documenting the techniques employed by local campaigns across the UK fighting to turn back the tide of the clones.  clone town britain: the fight back newsletter will also include regular policy updates, and a special section highlighting experience in the US, where the domination of clone stores is more advanced, but so too is the fight back. 

Subscribers to the nef e-letter will automatically receive the first edition of clone town britain: the fight back newsletter, and can then choose to subscribe to the free, quarterly bulletin.

nef reveals the truth behind the myth that global growth can solve poverty

New research from nef has revealed that the world's poorest have seen a 73 per cent drop in share of the benefits of growth in the last decadeThe research, released as the World Economic Forum gathered in the remote Swiss enclave of Davos, showed that globalisation is failing the world’s poorest as theirs share of the benefits of growth plummet, and accelerating climate change

Growing dissent: nef’s Andrew Simms and David Woodward writing for Guardian Unlimited

environmental damage puts BP £18 Billion in the red as nef reveals the true cost of big oil

new figures from nef released as BP unveiled the latest oil profit windfall of £11 billion, showed that, based on UK Treasury estimates, if BP paid for the environmental damage caused by its operations and products it would actually have announced a deficit in the region of £18 billion.

Carbon addicts and climate debt, nef policy director, Andrew Simms on BBC Online

Join us:  All of the work that nef does from tackling the forces that create clone town Britain, to combating climate change is dependent on the help of people like you. Help us by supporting nef’s vision of a new economy based on social justice, environmental sustainability and collective well-being.