Using the archive in policy, programmes and research

The gap this fills

Global sustainability evidence is dominated by national statistics, large projects and peer-reviewed studies. The actions of households, farmers, fishers, waste pickers and community groups are mostly missing, or appear only as anecdotes. Solution databases tend to feature organisations and funded projects; award programmes celebrate individuals but rarely explain how to replicate their work, or what failed.

We Speak Sustainability brings these together in one open, sourced and structured archive. Each action is classified by problem, topic, SDG, scale and evidence level, and comes with a replication guide and documented setbacks.

How institutions can use it

• Case studies and country evidence: filter stories by country, problem or SDG for reports, voluntary national reviews and programme design.
• Locally led adaptation and community engagement: see how communities organise, what they need, and what has failed, in their own context.
• Open data: download the dataset under CC BY 4.0 and combine it with your own.
• Teaching and training: each story is a ready-made, cited case with a one-page printable brief.

How to contribute

• Refer stories: field staff and partners can submit community actions they know of. We verify and credit them.
• Share evidence: if you hold monitoring data or evaluations for an action in the archive, help us move it from Documented to Verified.
• Correct us: report errors; corrections are logged publicly.
• Invite us: to present findings, run a workshop or brief a delegation, get in touch.

Standards

Read our methodology, editorial and verification policy and anti-greenwashing rules. We publish no sponsored content.