This week marks a year of Final Third operating.
It's been a fantastic opening year of supporting the sports industry to progress on its sustainability journey, and this article recaps some of the work we've been involved in over the last 12 months....
TRAINING & WORKSHOPS
Our training and workshops offer has seen over 150 employees across more than 10 organisations undertake a variety of sustainability education workshops linked to sport. We have delivered these for organisations such as The EFL, Arsenal FC, West Bromwich Albion FC, Wolves Foundation, Watford FC Community Sport & Education Trust, Birmingham City FC Foundation, Northampton Town FC Community Trust, Sporting Group International, Sporting Jobs, Rapid Charge, SGI Sports Management and Living Sport.
Feedback from participants suggests that:
97.5% strongly agreed or agreed that they learned something new during workshops
96.8% strongly agreed or agreed that the delivery style of the workshop was engaging and interactive
91.1% strongly agreed or agreed that their confidence to talk about climate change had increased as a result of the workshop
86.5% strongly agreed or agreed that they enjoyed the workshop more than they expected to
CARBON LITERACY TRAINING
Our Carbon Literacy for Sport course delivery has reached learners in not only the UK, but in Spain, Italy and India too.
Results show that 93% of learners feel more knowledgeable about climate change and motivated to act, and 87% feel confident that their actions will reduce the impact of their personal carbon footprint and their impact at work.
CAMPAIGNS
Green Football Weekend -
Final Third led the nationwide club outreach working with professional clubs and their club community organisations for the Green Football Weekend 2024 campaign, seeing 115 football clubs engage. The Green Football Weekend impact report will be released soon and linked here, but the campaign engaged nearly 4,000 fans to take over 30,000 climate actions and pledges and had a reach through broadcast and media into the millions.
On top of the club and CCO outreach, Final Third designed and created the schools education toolkits distributed to thousands of schools nationwide to engage children in climate change education through the power of football.
Cobblers Tackle Food Waste -
Final Third led the application, conception, delivery and evaluation of the Cobblers Tackle Food Waste campaign on behalf of, and in partnership with Northampton Town Community Trust. The initiative was funded by 'Eat It Up' from Hubbub with support from the Starbucks 5p cup charge.
Cobblers Tackle Food Waste is currently the highest funding pot received to date by any EFL club for an environmental initiative.
It has already engaged over 1,200 households, 61 organisations and seen food waste reduced by 47% in one local primary school, by 33% in individual households and has seen an 11% increase in regional food waste tonnage from council food waste collections as a result of more residents separating their food waste and leaving it out for collection. The campaign still has 6 months to run!
Green Gooners Cup -
Final Third supported this excellent campaign driven by Arsenal and their partners Ball Corporation through a bespoke Planet League platform. Final Third delivered departmental staff education workshops for Arsenal FC employees to support their community and schools delivery.
This initiative saw thousands of Arsenal fans all around the globe compete to take climate action linked to recycling.
CONSULTANCY
Sporting Group International -
Final Third have worked with Sporting Group International (SGI) for 6 months on a consultancy basis to support their ongoing development and ambitions to become the leading global sponsorship agency in sustainability.
Since the partnership, SGI have:
relocated to a new global headquarters in a state-of-the-art city centre office space with excellent energy efficiency and public transport links. This will result in drastic CO2e savings from energy use, staff commutes and business travel.
undertaken staff education programmes through workshops and Carbon Literacy training.
implemented a sustainable travel and procurement policy for staff
calculated their estimated baseline emissions for the last 12 months, whilst working towards more robust measurement data and offset the entire group's carbon footprint through accredited carbon offsetting partners.
set out plans to reach net zero by 2030 and signed a regional net zero pledge initiative.
OTHER PROJECTS
Dan Freedman
Final Third have partnered with best-selling children's author Dan Freedman upon the release of his Carnegie medal nominated novel 'I Am Lenny Brown'. We created an educational resource for CCOs which supports their delivery of targeted reading interventions in schools to promote reading for pleasure and making impact related to empathy and anxiety. This initiative has already been bought into by 7 Club Community Organisations including Tottenham Hotspur Foundation and 2 other Premier League CCOs. More here.
Football For Forests
Final Third supported Football For Forests with the UK launch of their charity's new App which sees supporters of football clubs pledge a small amount of money toward reforestation every time their club score a goal.
Manchester United Foundation
Final Third supported the launch event of Manchester United's Eco Reds initiative. This support will soon continue with a staff education workshops and some guidance for their internal steering group.
Novo-K Procurement Solutions
Final Third were invited to speak at two sustainability-linked procurement conferences by the hosts Novo-K Procurement at Stamford Bridge and the Emirates Stadiums. These events were attended by representatives of elite sports clubs from across the country.
Living Sport
Final Third hosted a seminar and workshop for a group of international sports business students visiting the UK from the USA to talk about UK football culture and the importance of sustainability in sport.
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