About CommunityCred

CommunityCred is helping to build a more sustainable, local way of doing business across Scotland. We support businesses, social enterprises, charities, and community groups to connect, share resources, and keep value in their communities.

Our platform maps local trading and reuse networks, making it easier to find partners, share resources, and strengthen supply chains. We're also exploring a mutual credit system to support cashless trade, reduce waste, and build economic resilience.

By sharing your organisation's data, you help reveal valuable local connections, shape better tools, and uncover new opportunities to work together. Every contribution brings us closer to a stronger, more collaborative future for our communities.

Why share your data with CommunityCred now?

Sharing information about your trading, resources, or partnerships helps us map how local organisations are already working together. This makes it easier to spot new opportunities for collaboration, resource sharing, and simpler supply chains.

By taking part early, you could discover new partners, uncover hidden local supply or demand, and help shape tools that reflect real community needs. Your data highlights connections that benefit not just your organisation, but your wider community too.

Every contribution helps build a clearer, more useful network—supporting more sustainable, resilient, and community-focused ways of working across Scotland.

Who is behind CommunityCred?

CommunityCred is a collaborative project between University of Edinburgh researchers, circular economy organisations Ostrero and Lower Impact Living (Lil), and software engineering company HappyPorch.

The CommunityCred team

Frequently Asked Questions

▶What is a mutual credit system?
A mutual credit system is a type of community-based financial network where members trade goods and services without using conventional money, instead earning and spending credits that are tracked within the system. It’s a closed loop – so wealth doesn’t leak out of the community.
▶What is a circular economy?
A circular economy is an economic system that aims to eliminate waste by keeping resources in use for as long as possible, recovering and regenerating products and materials at the end of their life cycle.

A mutual credit system would support a circular economy by encouraging local trade, which shortens supply chains. It would also help businesses find local partners to reuse their surplus materials and then recognise and reward the value of these circular exchanges.
▶What is community wealth building?
Community wealth building is an approach to economic development that focuses on creating local, inclusive economies by building community ownership, local procurement, and democratic control of capital.

A mutual credit system would help keep spending power within the region and prevent money from leaking out of the local economy to distant shareholders. For individual organisations, it would boost financial resilience by insulating them from cashflow problems and preserving £ cash reserves.
▶What are my Direct, 2nd, and 3rd degree connections?
Direct contacts are organisations you buy or sell goods or services with on a one-off or regular basis. A 2nd-degree connection is someone connected to your direct contacts. They are one step removed from you. A 3rd-degree connection is someone connected to your second-degree connections. They are two steps removed from you. Essentially, they represent different levels of closeness in your professional network. Understanding these degrees of connection is helpful for networking, as it allows you to strategically expand your professional reach and potentially connect with organisations you may not otherwise have access to. It can help you identify potential new local trading partners based on who your trusted partners in turn trade with.
▶How accurate are the figures?
All network data is provided by the organisations themselves and are estimates only. The figures will not (yet) represent every local business relationship. Additionally, £ values do not include charitable and pro bono, circular exchanges - which may have great value to the organisations involved.

Mary presenting the CommunityCred project

We also have a East Lothian B2B Resource Exchange Facebook Group! ♻️

We're excited to invite you to join the local business-to-business exchange group on Facebook - specifically for East Lothian businesses who want to reduce waste, share resources, and support each other through circular economy thinking.

Join the group on Facebook