Mohan Munasinghe was appointed as Director-General of the Sustainable Consumption Institute, based in Manchester. Born in Sri Lanka, Professor Munasinghe is an internationally-recognised expert on energy, sustainable development and climate change. As the Vice-Chairman of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), he was one of the recipients of the 2007 Nobel Peace Prize with former US Vice-President Al Gore.

Climate change and sustainable development are two of the biggest challenges our world has ever faced. Nevertheless, I am optimistic that we can find an integrated response that will solve both problems together. We know enough to begin immediately to break the current 'vicious cycle' of unsustainable consumption and production. I believe that working in partnership we can replace it with a 'virtuous cycle', where sustainable producers turn to sustainable products and processes, and in turn, sustainable consumers adopt more sustainable consumption patterns and lifestyles. The Sustainable Consumption Institute (SCI) can act as the catalyst, and accelerate this process in the UK and globally, by pioneering a research framework that will exploit positive synergies between sustainable consumption and production.

The Sustainable Consumption Institute at Manchester was set up in a partnership between Tesco and the University of Manchester to address major national and international issues associated with sustainability in the retail sector, and to encourage consumers to adopt more sustainable lifestyles. Predicated on the belief that the key to combating climate change will be a cooperative approach between government, business and the consumer, this leading research centre will help us to understand how to move towards a low carbon economy by consuming more efficiently and how to make our lifestyles more sustainable.