Last autumn, as many of us were looking ahead to the UN climate talks, people across the UK took part in The Climate Coalition’s Great Big Green Week and held all sorts of events to get their local community engaged with climate change. I was delighted to speak at one such event organised by Tearfund activists Chris and Peter who run Fairer World Lindfield.
Here, they speak about the events they ran during that week, and share what inspired them to take action.
What is Fairer World Lindfield – and where did the name come from?
Fairer World Lindfield is a climate and ecological action group based in West Sussex. The initiative emerged in November 2019 from our work to get Lindfield accredited as a Fairtrade Village. Since then, we’ve built on this momentum to highlight the environmental and social impacts of climate change. The word ‘fairer’ reflects our support of Fairtrade as well as our pursuit of climate justice.
What events did you hold in the lead-up to COP26?
In September 2021 we took part in The Climate Coalition’s UK-wide Great Big Green Week. We organised eight events over five days with the aim of raising awareness and encouraging action on the climate and ecological crisis. We held six of the events on Zoom, covering a wide variety of topics, such as: a briefing on COP26, a vegan and vegetarian cooking demonstration, green energy in the home, a talk on climate justice by Tearfund, tips on living more sustainably, and a climate movie, The Race is On. The two live events were a guided nature walk around Lindfield and a visit to our local organic dairy farm.