About
The Planet Local Summit is a project of Local Futures, an international nonprofit and pioneer of the localisation movement. The Summit will shine light on localisation as a solution-multiplier and bring attention to the worldwide grassroots movement that is unfolding. Central to this movement is a focus on the local food economy, but it also embraces local business alliances, decentralised renewable energy systems, local finance and more.
Building on Local Futures' networking and movement-building endeavours over four decades, the Summit will bring people together face-to-face from every continent, with the aim of forging a broad, international and visionary agenda for change.
About Local Futures
Local Futures is dedicated to renewing ecological and social wellbeing by strengthening communities and local economies worldwide. Our films, books, toolkits, blog, podcast, webinars, workshops, conferences and campaigns are helping to map out a realistic path towards a more truly sustainable future.
Our latest film, Planet Local: A Quiet Revolution, gives voice to a growing number of people building a more beautiful world. Featuring grassroots activists from every continent alongside internationally known figures like Noam Chomsky, Vandana Shiva, Gabor Maté, Naomi Klein, Jane Goodall and others – all of them bringing inspiration and clarity to a world full of dark news.
Watch for free here or on YouTube.
Our award-winning film, The Economics of Happiness, has inspired people across the world to rethink the global economy and explore alternatives that nurture human and planetary wellbeing. The film gave rise to an International Economics of Happiness Conference Series, comprising twenty-five public events in North America, Europe, Asia and Australia over eight years. These conferences stimulated debate, spread awareness about economic decentralisation, and birthed the International Alliance for Localization.
With the Covid pandemic, the conference series morphed into World Localization Day – an annual online and in-person celebration of the worldwide localisation movement, with participation from people and groups on every continent. The month-long campaign, held around June 21 every year, celebrates the plethora of local initiatives already making change from the ground up, and strengthens their collective voice.
What is localisation?
Localisation is bringing the economy home – back to a human scale. It is the process of building economic structures that allow the goods and services a community needs to be produced locally and regionally whenever possible.
It is about shortening the distance between producers and consumers by encouraging diversified production for domestic needs, instead of specialised production for export.
Watch our animation Going Local: the solution-multiplier that provides an overview of localization in just 2.5 minutes. The animation is translated into 33 languages. Find your language here.
Localisation does not mean eliminating international trade, or reducing all economic activity to a village level. It’s about shifting power from transnational corporations to genuinely democratic institutions, while simultaneously building up regional self-reliance.