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Alison Sweeting, Practice Manager, Milton Keynes

As a team we thought we were quite environmentally friendly, then I went on a CPD course run by the SPVS VMG. The event I attended also had a guest speaker, Ellie West from Davies Vet referral centre and a representative from the iiE (Investors in the Environment). There was lots of great advice on how to get green in practice and what were the most significant things that we should be looking to change and monitor.

On my return I talked to Kirsty and Becca who had both done a similar CPD course. Together we were impassioned and decided to set up our green group" Proactive Environmental Team". Huw our JVP was fully on board with us trying to reduce our carbon footprint. We felt that we needed a goal to help us remain focused. We looked at the iiE website and felt that the Bronze award was something we could achieve. We had been told to set ourselves realistic targets and felt this would be a great way to start.

The iiE supplied us with spreadsheets and tools to keep track of what we needed to do and they were on hand to help advise if we needed it. They are not a veterinary specific organisation and we felt that this was a good way to achieve a goal that was validated from outside of the Vets4Pets Group. We had already implemented some changes before joining the iiE, but it only took us about 7 months or so to achieve a Silver award, this is above the bronze award that we had aimed for so we were of course extremely proud of our achievement.

We were also able to display the award on our website and Facebook pages. Lots of clients now look for practices that have environmental ethics. We have just signed up for our second year with the iiE and hope to continue to reduce our carbon footprint further and to help the wider vet group to achieve these same goals.