Five-day family-friendly ‘festival of resistance’ to be held on lake shore at Ard Bó from 7-11 August
Hundreds of climate activists, community campaigners and others from across Ireland will gather on the western shore of Loch nEachach (Lough Neagh) in Co Thír Eoghain (Tyrone) in early August for a five-day “festival of resistance” in support of local grassroots campaigns working to save the lake from ecological disaster.
Climate Camp Ireland, which this year takes place from 7th-11th August near the village of Ard Bó, Co Thír Eoghain, is a family-friendly, anti-capitalist gathering at which people come together to share skills and strategies for radical climate action, with workshops, debates, art, music, dancing, direct action and more.
“This year’s camp is co-organised with frontline community campaigns resisting the extractive industries that cause so much harm to the environment in this region – the intensive animal agriculture running noxious effluent into Loch nEachach and also highly destructive gold mining proposed for the Sperrins Mountains,” said Dr Laura Kehoe, an environmental scientist and a member of Slí Eile, the main organising group behind Climate Camp.
“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.”
Slí Eile member Séamus Diskin said:
“We welcome people from the local area and from across Ireland who want to celebrate and show solidarity with grassroots community campaigns. Throughout history, positive change has always come from people coming together who dream of a better world.
“As well as being a space for skill-sharing, network building and radical education, Climate Camp has a focus on direct action. The programme includes direct action training, and each year the Camp ends with a mass direct action targeting the powerful vested interests that are causing climate breakdown and the unraveling of the web of life.”
Áine Fahey, a visitor to last year’s Climate Camp in Leitrim, described it as “inspiring and heart-warming – the energy of the amazing activists from across Ireland and beyond, empowering each other to make change. The workshops, fireside chats, céilí and direct action – I was thrilled to be a part of it.”
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.
Campaign groups involved in this year’s Climate Camp have also been highlighting the bizarre colonial legacy whereby the bed and banks of the lake 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.
Local campaigners involved in Climate Camp penned an open letter that convinced a keynote speaker to walk out of a festival held on the grounds of the Earl’s stately home in Dorset last month. This resulted in the Earl, Nicholas Ashley-Cooper, announcing a U-turn, stating he “would like to transfer the ownership” of the lake “into a charity or community trust model, with rights of nature included”.
Save Lough Neagh spokesperson Pádraig Cairns said:
“We welcome the U-turn by the Earl of Shaftesbury on his ownership of Loch nEachach. As recently as last year, he was making statements referring to it as ‘a business like any other’. It is only through sustained pressure that the Earl has been forced to change his tune – now we must ensure that he follows through.
“We cannot allow Shaftesbury to dictate the terms of the transfer. He must relinquish ownership at the earliest opportunity, without conditions. It is for the people of Ireland to decide how the Lough is owned and governed – not an English aristocrat.”
At a Slí Eile webinar last week about the Climate Camp, Fidelma O’Kane of Save Our Sperrins described the nine-year campaign of community resistance to plans by Canadian firm Dalradian Gold, which has been granted prospecting licences across 300,000 acres in Co Thír Eoghain (Tyrone) and Co Doire (Derry). Almost 50,000 objections have been lodged against Dalradian’s planning application.
The programme for this year’s Climate Camp revolves around themes of “head, heart and hands” – highlights include a discussion hosted by Save Lough Neagh on how agricultural policy has led to the degradation of the lake, and a panel of small-scale farmers on food sovereignty and agroecology, with speakers from the Landworkers Alliance, Talamh Beo and Nature Friendly Farming.
Renowned storyteller and Traveller activist Oein DeBhairduin will mark Lúnasa with a workshop on Traveller traditions and connecting to the land through storytelling, song and poetry, while Cairde Palestine will host a drumming and chanting space. Other workshop topics range from data centres and fossil fuel expansion to local crafts such as eel-skin tanning and a counter-mapping session with the Save Our Sperrins anti-mining group.
This year’s event at Ardboe follows a successful Climate Camp in 2023 in north Leitrim, co-hosted by community campaigns resisting gold mining, industrial conifer plantations and who achieved a ban on fracking in the Republic, along with a world first ban on the importation of fracked gas. The 2022 Camp in north Kerry supported local campaigners who have, to date, successfully held off the proposed Shannon LNG gas import terminal.
NOTES
The Detail: Lough Neagh – Facts on sand dredging
https://www.thedetail.tv/
Belfast Telegraph: Speaker exits festival after environmental campaigners raise concerns over Earl’s Lough Neagh ownership
Press release: Lough Neagh campaigners accuse Earl of ‘brazen greenwashing’
https://climatecampireland.ie/
Nicholas Ashley-Cooper: Thoughts on Lough Neagh
https://nickashleycooper.
Belfast Telegraph: Inquiry into controversial Sperrins goldmine suspended after officials complain about not receiving ‘entirely accurate information’ from DAERA
Slí Eile webinar: Save our Sperrins and Save Lough Neagh
https://climatecampireland.ie/