Category: Human Rights (Page 1 of 2)

Nottingham Green Festival

Wed February 24, 2016 / pat / 0 Comments

We are delighted to announce that the Nottingham Green Festival will return on Sunday 11th September, following its hugely successful relaunch in 2015.

The event is organised by grass roots, community based volunteers, with no statutory funding, so your help would be most welcome. Whilst we are only a small part of the organising team, Veggies is pleased to provide support by facilitating planning meetings, hosting the NottmGreenFest.org.uk website and, of course, providing Food by Veggies on the day!

Due to the withdrawal of funding the event did not happen in 2014, but Veggies covered essential up-front expenses and the Nottingham community rose to the challenge of making it happen in 2015, regardless of the tight budget. However these funds will need to be recouped and recycled long before 11th September to fund this year’s event, so your support is invited:

Show support for the event by making a small donation. Click the button to donate with PayPal or credit/debit cards; send a cheque to “Nottingham Green Festival”, c/o Sumac Centre, 245 Gladstone Street, Nottingham NG7 6HX; or transfer directly to: Nottingham Green Festival, Unity Trust Bank, sort code 08-60-01, a/c no 53110426 …more…

Nottingham Green Festival Ethos

Inspired by the decision by Shambala Festival to be the first mid-scale commercial festival to declare a meat free policy – a position established by Nottingham Green Festival over 30 year ago – we welcome a debate about whether to stay ahead of the game by taking the next logical step, aiming for vegan catering, whilst sharing info inviting other stall holders to leave animal products at home on this occasion.

“Shambala HQ is a mixed bag, with vegans, veggies and meat eaters co-existing harmoniously together, but the whole team agrees that it is important to be bold with our environmental stance, and encourage this debate.”

“The research available clearly demonstrates that overall, a meat-free diet has about half the carbon impact of a meat diet, and a dairy-free vegan diet has a third of the impact.”

Please, see the full meat-and-fish-free-for-2016 discussion.

As Shambala say: “We’re certainly not trying to tell everyone they should become vegan overnight. We are simply not serving meat for [4 days at] the festival to reduce the festival’s impacts, to take a stance, and to encourage an important debate.”

Please let us know what you think: info@NottmGreenFest.org.uk

Veggies is also hosting a mailing list for announcements, news and information about Nottingham Green Festival. (Note: You may get a ‘security certificate‘ warning! Fear not; this is because the list is provided by The Riseup Collective, an activist internet group that doesn’t tick all the corporate boxes). You can safely click through. Honest. Please do subscribe.

Your support will make all the difference in ensuring the success of Nottingham’s own Green Festival, the place for the whole family to learn, explore and try the latest in everything environmentally friendly and ethical, whilst also having lots of fun in the beautiful setting of the Arboretum Park, Waverley Street / Addison Street, a couple of minutes from Nottingham’s Old Market Square.

With your help, the event will have over 100 product, information and food stalls, kids rides, workshops, natural therapies and sustainable technologies, performers and entertainment throughout the park and live music from the bandstand.

Visit the Nottingham Green Festival website for more event details.

Tweets by @NottmGreenFest

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Food for a Future

Tue May 26, 2015 / pat / 0 Comments

For over 20 years at Glastonbury Festival, Veggies has invited different groups to campaign alongside us, including Camp for Climate Action, Bicycology, Animal Aid, Indymedia, Calais Migrant Solidarity and many more.

This year we were going to invite ‘Food for a Future‘ to work with us, but their proposal was so amazing we think it would be lost in Veggies cafe space.

We suggested that they go it alone and pitch their ideas directly to the Green Fields team. They said “YES”, so we are excited to look forward to seeing a unique new campaign space at Glastonbury Green Futures, which we think would add something exciting and new to the great diversity of things that already take place at the event.

As well as running this space at Glastonbury Festival, we are keen to invite the Food for a Future team to work alongside us at our many other other green-orientated events on our tour, including the Green Gathering, the Northern Green Gathering and Nottingham Green Festival

They say:

“Essentially we would like to empower people to make green lifestyle choices through what they eat, something simple anyone can do at home that would have a positive impact on the environment. Current estimates for the global greenhouse gas emissions for animal agriculture are at least 20%, which is more than all the world’s transport combined.

Therefore a green cookery, talks and workshop space would be very appropriate for an ethically-minded event such as Nottingham Green Festival. We would like to show people in a creative and interactive way how ethical food choices can create a greener, more sustainable planet.

All workshops and resources will be available just by donation, with any proceeds likely going to Vegfam, a registered humanitarian charity that helps people overseas by providing funds for self-supporting, sustainable food projects which do not exploit animals or the environment.

“We have a large recycled canvas tent, which would be an ideal space for hosting talks, workshops and environmental documentaries. We would like to put together a programme of activities including ‘Ethical Eating Cookery Workshops’, which would teach people how to cook creatively with plant-based foods and reduce food wastage, raw food demos, and ‘Greener World Talks’, which would include talks by eminent nutritionists, green athletes and green campaigners about how a plant-based diet is the most healthy and sustainable for the planet and the issues surrounding this.

“The ultimate aim of our space is to give festival goers a fun, creative experience, combined with information and skills to lead a greener, healthier and more compassionate life. The leading of such a life will benefit the individual, the planet’s rainforests, oceans and air, and its animals.”

We look forward to hearing your feedback.

The ‘Food for a Futures’ campaign team.

Follow Foodforafuture on Twitter and on Facebook

Tweets by @FoodforaFuture

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Nottingham Green Festival

Fri February 20, 2015 / pat

Note: this article by Veggies refers to the 2015 Nottingham Green Festival..

The 2016 Green Festival will be at The Arboretum on Sunday 11th September 2016. Details at www.NottmGreenFest.org.uk

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Latest News Tweets

Sat January 3, 2015 / pat

Veggies Twitter Account includes news of Veggies Events and other activities, and substantial items from like-minded friends.

As we are busy people, and expect that you are too, we do not tweet too often. We do not intend to document the trivia of our daily lives! Likewise we tend not to follow others on twitter who tweet too often.

Follow our news at http://twitter.com/veggiesnottm or on Facebook.

Search Veggies Tweets:

Recent news tweets from http://twitter.com/veggiesnottm
Use scroll bar to read more

Tweets by @veggiesnottm

The Vegan Side of Twitter

Twitter co-founder, Biz Stone, went vegan in 2001 after visiting Farm Sanctuary.

Biz Stone is also lobbying for vegetarian meals in school lunches. He sent a letter to Rep. George Miller, chair of the House Education and Labor Committee, writing: “Hundreds of thousands of students across the country don’t eat meat, according to a recent Centers for Disease Control and Prevention study. However, these young vegetarians often can’t find healthy, meatless meals in the school cafeteria.”

Biz Stone obviously believes in the power of lunch, because Twitter’s San Francisco headquarters provides free vegan lunches to its employees.

…more…

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Veggies Summer Tour

Tue July 15, 2014 / pat

Between now and the end of August, Veggies has eight weekend camping events, as well as several single day events.

We recommend you to check out all these events with view to attending / supporting them.

Even better, if you are attending any of these events you might like to help with Veggies Campaign Catering.

Please contact us if you might help in any way.

Warmest wishes and motivational ‘Go Team Veggies!’

Friday 18th to Sunday 20th July
Peace in the Park – Oxfordshire

A Buddhist event at the Global Retreat Centre with a mix of music, talks and meditation pavilions. Events and activities will include ‘Mindset Talks’, new ‘One Question’ events, woodland activities for children and adults, story-telling from ancient lands, an open air chill-out meditation lounge, sacred music in the grounds, and the hugely popular ‘Meditation & Music for the World’ event.

See: http://peaceinthepark.globalretreatcentre.org/

Friday 18th to Sunday 20th July
and Friday 25th to Sunday 27th July
Goddess Camp – Bestwood Park, Nottm

Women, men and children are welcome for a weekend of celebration, ritual and workshops at the Goddess Camp at Bestwood Country Park.

See: http://peakspirit.wix.com/goddesscamp

Thursday 24th to Sunday 27th July
Northern Green Gathering
Derbyshire Dales, Nr Ashbourne, Derbyshire

A small volunteer-run environmental/educational gathering, a 4 day event on a beautiful new site, focussed around sustainable living and green campaigns. There will be environmental workshops & campaigns, permaculture, organic veggie cafes, stalls, healers & alternative therapies, kids space, theatre & circus workshops, and a showcase of environment living in action, including solar power and wind power.

See: http://www.nggonline.org.uk/

Thursday 31st July to Sunday 3rd August
Green Gathering – Chepstow, Wales

At the Green Gathering you can rediscover ancient skills and explore
pathways to future sustainability; talk with key speakers from the Green movement and engage in lively debate at the Green Forum venue and inform yourselves about current issues and causes with groups in the Campaigns area, which will include a Co-ops Camp, co-ordinated by Radical Routes.

See: http://www.greengathering.org.uk/

Thursday 31st July to Monday 4th August
Peace News Summer Camp 2014 – E.Suffolk

Event to help build a radical movement for the future by building a living community today, with local activists – top trainers – revolution – non-violence – learning from other movements – community – glorious countryside.

See: http://peacenewscamp.info/

Thursday 7th to Monday 11th August
Animal Rights Gathering – Notts/Derbys

The Animal Rights Summer Gathering exists to promote cooperation and to spread information between the various groups and individuals working throughout the UK to stop animal abuse.

See: http://www.argathering.org.uk/

Thursday 14th to Wednesday 20th August
Reclaim The Power – location TBA

August will see thousands ‘Reclaim the Power’ and stand in solidarity with communities opposing fracking. Camp will be a hub for skillshares, workshops, entertainment and direct action. There will be a probable Veggies Cafe space & action catering.

See: http://www.nodashforgas.org.uk/

Thursday 28th to Monday 1st September
Earth First Summer Gathering

The Earth First! Summer Gathering is the place where people involved in radical ecological direct action – or those who want to be involved – get together for five days of time and space to talk, walk, share skills, learn, play, rant, find out what’s going on, find out what’s next, live outside, strategise, hang out, incite, laugh and conspire. The workshops, networking and planning of actions at this low impact eco-living camp is organised non-hierarchically.

See: http://efgathering.weebly.com/

During this period we also have these one day events:

Community Circle

Tuesday 22nd July &
Tuesday 19th August
Details from http://www.veggies.org.uk/event.php?ref=555

Veggies vs the Arms Trade

Tue September 17, 2013 / pat

Published: September 17, 2013 21:54 at Nottingham Indymedia by Tally

Last week saw peaceful days of action co-ordinated by the ‘Stop the Arms Fair Coalition’ in response to the bi-annual arms fair DSEi (Defence & Security Equipment International) at the London ExCel Centre. DSEi is the world’s largest arms fair and it exists so that arms buyers and sellers can come together, network and make deals.

From ‘Campaign Against the Arms Trade’ (CAAT): ‘DSEi 2013 featured 1,500 exhibitors from around the world displaying arms ranging from rifles to tanks to fighter jets to battleships. They were joined by “trade visitors” and military delegations, including countries involved in conflict and from human rights abusing regimes, as well as those with desperately underfunded development needs.’

On the Sunday 8th September the week of action was kicked off with a demo organised by Occupy London: Occupy vs the Arms Trade. Volunteers from Nottingham-based Veggies, the vegan catering campaign, went down to London on this Sunday to provide food by donation for the peaceful protesters. Veggies has been supporting campaigns for humans, other animals and the environment since 1984.

On Sunday 8th September, Veggies of Nottingham packed up their vegan cakes and samosas and headed down to London to give their support to the hundreds of peaceful protesters campaigning against the immoral and unethical DSEi arms fair.

At least two Nottingham companies had stalls at DSEi. Heckler & Koch and Ergo Computing exhibited their wares to military delegations from around the world. H&K, which is based in the Lenton Lane industrial estate, sells assault rifles and submachine guns to repressive regimes such as those in Bahrain and Egypt.

Campaigners were very happy to see the Veggies team (and their delicious vegan food!) along on the day. The team provided a boost of morale to those that had been out protesting since the early hours of the day and hadn’t had anything to eat. In fact people were so happy to see Veggies that the stall was swamped with those eager to get hold of food by donation and all boxes of food and trays of cake quickly sold out.

People were also very interested in the campaign literature the team had brought along, as human rights and animals rights campaigning is all part of the same struggle against needless suffering and injustice. Animal Aid’s purple poppies, sold to commemorate the many animal victims of war, were available on the day and people donated generously for these.

If you would like to join the friendly Veggies team to campaign against social injustice, animal abuse and enviromental destruction then you can contact them at: info@veggies.org.uk

Information on the website: www.veggies.org.uk

More details about the Arms Trade and what happened during the week of action can be found on the following websites:

www.stopthearmsfair.org.uk

www.caat.org.uk/issues/arms-fairs/dsei/

Animal Aid’s purple poppy appeal:
http://www.animalaid.org.uk/h/n/CAMPAIGNS/living//2256//

Email Contact email: info@veggies.org.uk

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Sumac Centre – a future vision

Tue December 4, 2012 / pat

In 1985 Veggies helped establish Nottingham’s Rainbow Centre, later taking on the co-ordination of the running of the space. In 2001 the support generated over the previous decades enabled the purchase of the Sumac Centre, a collectively owned space supporting a wide range of interconnected initiatives, including being the home of Veggies Catering Campaign.

Sumac Image On Satuday 8th December 2012 there is to be a discussion on the future of the Sumac Centre noting, amongst other things, its role as “a meeting place for politically motivated activists, a resource centre and library. Meeting place for vegans and animal rights activists/campaigners and a tool for their propaganda.”

This role hasn’t just happened in isolation.
It is due to Veggies and others being centrally involved in the running of Sumac from 15 years before it even existed. We may feel this role to be carved in stone, and this may well be the case.

However Sumac is simply the sum of its parts so we, as ‘vegans and animal rights activists/campaigners’ must continue to play our part.

If you are free on Saturday 8/12/12 (11am-6pm) please consider supporting the vegan status of the Sumac Centre and its role as a national resource for the animal rights movement.

This Saturday is a Sumac visioning day, a chance for all of you who come to the Sumac Center to bring your excitement, enthusiasm and inspiration in order to help shape the future of the Sumac Centre.

1) Intro

2) Use

– How is the Sumac used?

Meeting place, tat storage, music venue, peoples kitchen, food bank, a base for lots of varied campaigns/alternative cultures, bike project, fundraiser events, information and awareness raising events, film screenings, autonomous DIY infrastructure, ABC letter writing, gardening club.

– Is this the kind of useage we want to continue?

3) Purpose

– What is the current purpose of the Sumac?

A meeting place for politically motivated activists, a resource centre and library. Meeting place for vegans and animal rights activists/campaigners and a tool for their propaganda.

This will include a conversation about whether the sumac is there to engage with the local geographical community or the activist community. It’s a stable part of infrastructure for ‘our movement’.

– Is this the purpose we want to go forward with?

There will be lunch in the middle and we’ll all have a big ole delicous peoples kitchen at the end.

Hope to see you all there.

Sumac Visioning Poster
The Sumac Centre
http://www.sumac.org.uk
0845 458 9595
245 Gladstone Street, Forest Fields, Nottingham, NG7 6HX

The Sumac Centre is an independent community and activist resource centre. It is made up of a community cafe, social club, library, exhibition space, veggie catering campaign, filmnights, talks, meeting spaces and the residents. The centre is used by various campaign groups and collectives working towards social change and justice for all. Come and visit us!

_________________________________________________________________

Full details of Sumac Events (and more from like-minded groups):
http://www.sumac.org.uk/diary.htm

Veggies News: http://twitter.com/veggiesnottm

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Gatherings for Social Change

Wed June 27, 2012 / pat

Three gatherings . One Location . Three successive weekends

Come for one or come for all

Peace News Summer Camp

Thursday 26th to Monday 30th July

Local activists – top trainers – revolution – non-violence – learning from other movements – community – glorious countryside.

Join us in 2012 for more discussions, training and debates on nonviolence, education and the anti-war movement, fuelled by “wonderful (vegan) food from Veggies of Nottingham”

More PN Camp Details…

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Earth First! Summer Gathering

Wednesday 1st to Monday 6th August
Ecological Direct Action without Compromise

Workshops, skill sharing and planning action, plus low-impact living without leaders. Meet people, learn skills, take action.

The 2012 Earth First Summer Gathering will be held on the first weekend of August.

As ever Veggies will be co-ordinating the d-i-y cafe space and holding cake baking workshops.

More EF Gathering Details…

+ + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + + +

Animal Rights Summer Gathering

Friday 10th to Sunday 12th August

The UK Animal Rights Gathering is to a great weekend not to be missed, with talks, discussions and workshops on a wide range of issues and activities related to animal rights campaigning, as well as a chance to relax with like-minded people and socialise and network with other campaigners from all over the UK.

The 2012 Animal Rights Summer Gathering on the second weekend of August.

As ever Veggies will be co-ordinating the catering, running a cafe space and holding vegan cookery workshops.
More AR Gathering Details…

_____________________________________________________________________

These three key Gatherings, inspiring and networking for action for humans, animals and the environment, are all to be hosted by hosted by Crabapple Housing Co-op near Shrewsbury.

Details from each respective group or at Veggies Website

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Time to Make History

Fri May 11, 2012 / pat

Watch the video, then Sign the Pledge

Or retweet this to your followers:

Do you want to #makehistory? See new 90second video @TheVeganSociety to inspire positive new views of #vegan living: vimeo.com/40717873

— Veggies Catering (@veggiesnottm) May 11, 2012

Also to watch:

Forks Over Knives

Trailer

Food That Kills

Full Documentary

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Zapatista & Freedom for Political Prisoner Calendars

Thu January 19, 2012 / pat

Zapatista Calendar 2012

The Zapatista Calendar 2012 is published jointly by the Edinburgh Chiapas Solidarity Group and Kiptik. All proceeds go to health and drinking water projects in Zapatista communites.

These were going for £7+p&p, but are now available for £5 inc delivery.

Buy Now …

If you live in Nottingham you can buy calendars from Veggies at the Sumac Centre.

CALENDAR COVER

zapatista calendar

CALENDAR PICTURES

calendar pictures

Freedom for Political Prisoner Calendars

Certain Days Calendar

The proceeds from the Freedom for Political Prisoner Calendar will be divided among the groups shown on the Certain Days website.

These were for £7+p&p, but are now available for £5 inc delivery.

Buy Now …

If you live in Nottingham you can buy calendars from Veggies at the Sumac Centre.

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Category: Human Rights (Page 1 of 2)

Nottingham Green Festival

Food for a Future

Nottingham Green Festival

Latest News Tweets

Veggies Summer Tour

Friday 18th to Sunday 20th July
Peace in the Park – Oxfordshire

Friday 18th to Sunday 20th July
and Friday 25th to Sunday 27th July
Goddess Camp – Bestwood Park, Nottm

Thursday 24th to Sunday 27th July
Northern Green Gathering
Derbyshire Dales, Nr Ashbourne, Derbyshire

Thursday 31st July to Sunday 3rd August
Green Gathering – Chepstow, Wales

Thursday 31st July to Monday 4th August
Peace News Summer Camp 2014 – E.Suffolk

Thursday 7th to Monday 11th August
Animal Rights Gathering – Notts/Derbys

Thursday 14th to Wednesday 20th August
Reclaim The Power – location TBA