The 2024 Climate Camp was held at Ardboe, Co Tyrone, on the shore of Ireland’s biggest lake, Loch nEachach (Lough Neagh) from August 7th to 11th August.
Why Lough Neagh?
The 2024 camp was co-organised with frontline community campaigns resisting the extractive industries that cause so much harm to the environment in Tyrone – the intensive animal agriculture running noxious effluent into Loch nEachach and also highly destructive gold mining proposed for the Sperrins Mountains.
The camp acted as a central meeting point of resistance-building on the island of Ireland – connecting communities north and south of the Border. We supported and worked closely with local campaigns, in particular Save Lough Neagh, a coalition of environmental activists fighting to defend the lough from pollution and extractive exploitation; and Save Our Sperrins, a community campaign defending the Sperrin mountains in Co. Tyrone from industrial mining.
Lough Neagh
The ecological disaster at Ireland’s biggest lake demonstrates what happens when the economic growth of agriculture is prioritised over environmental protection. Industrial animal agriculture is the main cause not only of the pollution of Loch nEachach, but also the number one cause of greenhouse gas emissions, water pollution and biodiversity collapse across Ireland. We need to support farmers while recognising we simply cannot continue with the extreme destruction of business as usual.
The ecological catastrophe at Loch nEachach, which provides more than 40% of the North’s drinking water, has been caused by a combination of intensive animal agriculture – driven by the Stormont government’s Going for Growth strategy – raw sewage, industrial sand dredging and climate change.
We have also been highlighting the bizarre colonial legacy whereby the bed and banks of the Loch are owned by the Earl of Shaftesbury, who earns royalties from the more than 1 million tonnes of sand extracted from the bed each year. Watch our webinar to learn more.
Sperrins Mountains
More than a quarter of all land on both sides of the Border is under prospective licences for extractive mining practices. We must resist the neocolonial governments, who maintain unsustainable economic growth, while poisoning the land and the life that depends on it.
A Canadian exploration company, Dalradian Gold, applied for planning permission for a goldmine and processing plant in the Sperrins Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. Dalradian Gold was granted prospecting licences across 300,000 acres in Counties Tyrone & Derry.
Having researched goldmining in many countries of the world and learned that it pollutes water, air, land and health, Save Our Sperrinscampaign group formed in June 2015 and is registered as an environmental charity with NI Charity Commission (NIC108907).