Looking back: Great Big Green Week 2024

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the words Great Big Green Week over an image of a group of people and a Greener Henley flag

Looking back: Great Big Green Week 2024

By Julia Samyui-Adams

What a Great Big Green Week we had this year, kicking off with our Nature Discovery Day, which saw 9 local conservation groups and a host of nature experts join us down by the river, all coming together to foster local engagement with Nature. We even made it onto BBC South Today who came down to film us and find out more about the state of our river, giving us and Professor Richard Fortey, one of our nature experts, the opportunity to highlight how the water quality is detrimentally affecting the river as habitat

Richard Fortey talks to the BBC
Chris Merchant talking about Our Climate Future

All in all over 500 participants attended Greener Henley’s events during GBGW. We put on two fantastic talks on poignant topics – one on climate displacement and our social and moral responsibility around this issue, and one on the future of our climate, both with distinguished speakers and much conversation afterwards. If you missed University of Reading’s Professor Chris Merchant’s talk on our climate future and what we can do about it you can read all about it here. Prof. Merchant is a passionate supporter of Zero Hour’s campaign for the Climate and Nature Bill (CAN Bill) and asked everyone to do two things; to use their voice more widely to push for change at pace, and to reach out to discuss these vital issues within their own sphere of influence, by starting a conversation – be that socially, at work, or within an organisation or group they belong to. 

Our beef vs plant burger tasting event in collaboration with Pavilion Foods was very well received, with about 50 people participating. More than half (58%) preferred the plant-based burger.  ALL the participants – not just those who preferred the plant burger – thought that our local restaurants should offer more plant-based options, so come on Henley eateries – step up and give us some more plant-based choices! We can all help move this forward by talking to restaurant staff about this if we eat out in Henley.

On the subject of business, our Greening Your Business workshop saw lots of local businesses, big and small, come together to explore ideas around sustainability, looking at how to cut through concerns about costs and ‘greenwashing’, whilst meeting fellow business people and hearing inspirational stories. Our Window Walkabout this year saw eleven of our most sustainable shops participating, displaying wildflowers made by the incredible knitters at the Henley WI. Teamwork!

During the week we screened two inspirational films in partnership with Regal Picturehouse,  Wilding and Elephant Mother, both with conversation and Q&A afterwards. Interesting conversations and differences of opinion often come to the fore at the films we screen, and these are always valuable. For example, in relation to Wilding: what’s the difference between ‘wilding’ and ‘rewilding’, and should land be managed or left? We think of Oxfordshire as green & pleasant, but most of us have grown up surrounded by a farmed patchwork of fields, which is of course not the land’s natural state – so what would it actually look like if we were able to give more land back to Nature? The way we use our land is crucial now in so many ways – it holds the key to Nature recovery and carbon capture, and this is what the push for more uptake of plant based foods is about – using land in a more efficient way to feed ourselves AND provide space for Nature. It can be done! Check out the stats in our Land Use blog – you might be very surprised. We know that regenerative farming is better for Nature in many ways, but it isn’t possible to feed everyone regeneratively as it requires lots of land – so how should we be farming and eating? These are often thorny, difficult subjects but they are the important conversations we need to be having now as we move towards a more sustainable future.

During the week we screened two inspirational films in partnership with Regal Picturehouse,  Wilding and Elephant Mother, both with conversation and Q&A afterwards. Interesting conversations and differences of opinion often come to the fore at the films we screen, and these are always valuable. For example, in relation to Wilding: what’s the difference between ‘wilding’ and ‘rewilding’, and should land be managed or left? We think of Oxfordshire as green & pleasant, but most of us have grown up surrounded by a farmed patchwork of fields, which is of course not the land’s natural state – so what would it actually look like if we were able to give more land back to Nature? The way we use our land is crucial now in so many ways – it holds the key to Nature recovery and carbon capture, and this is what the push for more uptake of plant based foods is about – using land in a more efficient way to feed ourselves AND provide space for Nature. It can be done! Check out the stats in our Land Use blog – you might be very surprised. We know that regenerative farming is better for Nature in many ways, but it isn’t possible to feed everyone regeneratively as it requires lots of land – so how should we be farming and eating? These are often thorny, difficult subjects but they are the important conversations we need to be having now as we move towards a more sustainable future.

Launching ‘The Big Green Conversation’

Food, Nature, farming – these are just some of the topics we need to be talking about now but most of us don’t really feel comfortable raising at the dinner table. This is what our The Big Green Conversation campaign, launched during Great Big Green Week, is all about: encouraging conversation within everyone’s circles on climate and Nature. In conversation we come together, hearing what matters to our friends, neighbours, colleagues, finding out about people’s frustrations, thoughts, and differences of opinion. Ultimately this is how we explore ideas on solutions. If the dinner table is too daunting, could you have a coffee morning, discuss a Big Green Read with your book club or friends, or organise a meeting at work to open up a topic on climate and Nature?  Get a conversation going about the actions – big or small – that we can take now to move towards a better future. It could be simply starting a wildflower patch at work with free seeds from our Nature Squared campaign, or asking parents or your school to take part in School Streets to improve safety and air quality, or getting more plant based food provided at meetings or your work canteen. There are so many ways we can take action in our circles of influence and it all starts with conversations.

New partnerships

All in all we had a huge number of volunteers, organisations and businesses give time and support to Henley’s Great Big Green Week this year. Events such as this provide a great opportunity to come together with our local community and forge partnerships through common concerns. Whilst Great Big Green Week always fosters learning and raises awareness of climate and Nature issues, there was a BIG surge this year in collaborative involvement and partnerships we can move ahead with to help reach a wider audience and be more effective in the future.

We worked hard to raise awareness of the CAN Bill, and GBGW gave us some really good opportunities to do this. Individual sign-ups helped in the run up to the general election, showing the strength of local support for these issues, which in turn provided a mandate for our local parliamentary candidates to support the Bill before the election. We also saw a flurry of sign ups from organisations supporting the Bill during GBGW including: Phyllis Court Club, The Kenton Theatre, Regal Picturehouse, The Hart Surgery, Badgemore School and Pavilion Foods. You can find the full list here – see how many familiar names you can spot.

Our participation in the fabulous Beautiful Blue exhibition and all the activity around river pollution and flooding this year has also given us the chance to collaborate more closely with the River and Rowing Museum and we are grateful for their support as well as the action they have taken to raise awareness of these important issues. 

Why we do it

Organising GBGW is a gargantuan task but it is all worth it. We were able to engage with a good cross section of people on a variety of topics, got lots of thought-provoking conversations going, and had a big spike in newsletter sign-ups (during just one month we had an increase of 450%!!) And importantly we were able to progress our three calls to action: Nature SquaredThe Big Green Conversation, and raising awareness of the campaign for the CAN Bill.

We’ve had lots more sign ups to our Nature Squared campaign and currently have 132 m2   of wildflower seeds planted in Henley  – another big step towards our 500m2 total! If you have seeds you haven’t planted yet, fear not! September is the perfect time to do this. Don’t forget to add your m2 to our total via the form here.

We’d like to say a HUGE THANK YOU to everyone who helped make Henley’s Great Big Green Week 2024 happen – a multitude of volunteers, experts, businesses and organisations, many helping with time and skills, some providing financial support, prizes or catering for events. A special mention must go to Henley Town Council, without whose generous support we could not have done what we did. Thanks also to the River & Rowing Museum, Henley Library, Henley Distillery, KJ Smith Solicitors, Pavilion Foods, Southern Plant Hire and HoT WI.

Long-term Greener Henley member, Sue Turner, in partnership with Henley Library, organised the Tread Gently on the Earth poetry competition for GBGW again this year, which was a great success, bringing people of all ages together on a common theme: a love of nature and the importance of caring for our.planet. We’d like to leave you here with one of the winning poems. *

The Soil – winner of the David Grubb Memorial Prize

By Richard Fortey

We need it so we feed it
Then we bleed it
Dry. 

We plough it and we sour it
Then we let it 
Lie.

But still it lives and gives
– how long before it 
Dies?

We must find a kind way
– A less than blind way – to 
Care

To gently but intently bring
The precious soil to 
Where
Its health and wealth will prosper
And its beauty we all share.

Richard Fortey

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