GRO-FUN has undergone an exciting evolution over the winter months and enters 2010 refreshed & renewed. To celebrate we want to welcome you to a free evening at the Pierian Centre on March 2nd, 7.30-9pm. Come and hear what about the changes we have made and learn of our plans for next year. Help influence the direction of our community lead organisation-we welcome your input.

The evening will kick off at 7.30pm with something to drink, and be all ‘done and dusted’ by 9pm. Please arrive promptly.

If you happen to have any vegetable seeds going spare, we’ll facilitate a small Seed-Swap as well.

Book your place asap by contacting nadia@grofun.org.uk or tel 07973847894

Help us to help you to grow your own food

The Pierian Centre, 27 Portland Square, St Pauls, Bristol BS2 8SA. 2nd March, 7.30-9pm.

Here is the programme for the March April Freeskilling evenings, which take place every Tuesday evening @ 7pm in the Better Food Co. Cafe, Sevier St, St Werburghs, Bristol. As always, they are FREE for EVERYONE –

How to make great Compost!
Tues 9th March, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Join Nick Ward for an evening of tips and advice on how to make fantastic compost.

How to make Cushions and Pillows
Tues 16th March, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Learn how to make pillow cases and cushion covers with Abi Hirschmann.

Origami!
Tues 23th March, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Lucy Mitchell and her crew of origami folders will show you how to turn paper into animals!

Natural Birth and Breastfeeding
Tues 30th March, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Roma Norriss advices on how to achieve a natural birth and bond deeply with your baby.

Raw Chocolate Making
Tues 6th April, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Learn how to easily make chocolate that is both delicious and nutritious! With Fiona Smith.

Conscious Communication
Tues 13th April, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Join Laurel Pyne for another session Conscious Communication, otherwise known as Non-violent Communication (NVC).

Funding for Community and Voluntary Groups
Tues 20th April, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Learn how to succeed in funding applications for your local community and voluntary groups. With Becca Lamont.

Tuning In
Tues 27th April, The Better Food Company, Sevier St, St Werburghs @ 7pm
Jo Hanstead will teach you how to use your hands, intention and presence to ‘tune-in’ and help your family and friends.

Mark Boyle
the freeconomy community
www.justfortheloveofit.org

Date: 10 March 2010
Time: 9am to 2pm
Place: Conference Hall, Council House, Bristol

This important event will discuss how to ensure a sustainable and healthy food supply for Bristol. The Conference will focus on food security, the impact of Peak Oil, local sourcing, access to local food and how to involve local communities in growing food.  It will also consider the role of procurement and how to influence the purchasing decisions of food suppliers and providers.

Keynote Speakers include:

• Professor Kevin Morgan of Cardiff University, a leading authority in food policy and procurement
• Joy Carey, independent food consultant currently producing a report on food security issues for Bristol

Marketplace style sessions exploring local innovative practice and local implication of national initiatives include:                                                              

• Sidharth Sharma of the One Stop Thali Cafés in Bristol,  Winner for “Best Takeaway” in the BBC Food and Farming Awards 2010
• Somerset Foods in Bristol – Somerset Local Food Direct
• Local Implications of Food 2030, Government Office of the South West
• The Soil Association’s Food for Life programme in early years catering and hospital meals in Bristol
• Change4Life: building initiatives at community level
• and much more

This event is open to Bristol Partnership member organisations and those with influence over food purchasing and supply.  Lunch and opportunities for networking will be available.

For more information or to book a place, telephone 0117 922 4789 or email health@bristol.gov.uk 

Organised by Bristol City Council on behalf of Bristol Partnership    

Read more about the background to the Conference on the Bristol City Council website here.

Easton Energy Group (EEG) is a new community group which aims to help individuals reduce energy use in the home. They offer free advice on energy saving in the home and help with energy saving grants and funding.

The group was set up to help households save money, reduce carbon emissions and take community action against climate change.

There are several free grants available to all Bristol residents, to install insulation in your home and help keep you warm.

EEG is involving the local community as this initiative needs to be as participative as possible. We are offering the opportunity for people to train as Energy Advisers for their street.

Please come along and talk to us, and find out how you can get involved. The next two meetings are planned for:

Wednesday 27th January @ 7:30pm, Easton community Centre
Thursday 11th March @ 7:30 pm, Easton Community Centre

For further information, or if you would like free advice on improving energy efficiency, applying for grants and reducing your fuel bills, contact:

easton.energy.group@gmail.com

From Julian Jones of Bristol Friends of the Earth:

A ‘Climate Change and Energy Security Framework’ including 40 strategic and detailed actions was approved at Bristol City Council Cabinet on 25th Feb. Also a budget including £500k ‘new money’ for 2010/11 was approved to support these actions at the last full council meeting.

This Thursday 11 March, we are privileged to have Neil Harrison, lead councillor for sustainability, clarify these actions, and tell us what he can about their relative cost and impact, and who will do what and when. The planning process is ongoing but it will be useful to get early indications before the elections.

Then we can ask our prospective councillors to support these things in the run up to local council elections on May 6th, and work out how else we can support them with the public, press etc.

Finally there’s a great opportunity for FoE to help shape a new Eco Show in Millennium Square (Harbourside, City Centre) 29-30 May, a new part of Bristol’s successful Eco-Veggie Fair this year (formerly the Vegan Fair). This part of the show will have its own small stage, talks area, tents including Green Home Zone (sponsored by The Spark), food and other stalls. Please come and see how you can help get the best talks, exhibits, artists etc to get this new part of the show off to a flying start. But time is short to get things into the publicity, deadlines to follow.

Draft agenda:

7:15 – gather for tea/coffee
7:30 – any small items, and Eco Fair update
7:40 – Neil Harrison on BCC Actions plus questions
8:40 – possible discussion groups on Get Serious, Eco Show, Elections, Local Food Website depending attendance, followed by a drink, probably Old Naval Volunteer opposite (back bar)

If 40 actions were covered equally that would only be 1.5 minutes per action including questions!, so please have a read of the framework linked below in advance (especially Appendix 2) and a think about what looks most important, to come prepared with questions. Of course they will not have equal impact, importance or budget.

http://www.bristol.gov.uk/committee/2010/ua/ua000/0225_8.pdf

venue: 35 King Street, Bristol BS1 4DZ (near Old Vic)

Best Regards, Julian (07809 122474)

Grand Clear out – All items free!

Yummy cakes and fair trade hot drinks for sale.

Bring your unwanted gifts and items and take what you want.

Please bring only items in good working order and condition.

Large items: Please bring a photo NOT the actual item!

Date: Sat 13 March, 10 am to 2 pm

Venue: St. Aldhelm’s Church, Corrner of Chessel ST. and Ashfield Rd., Bedminster, BS3 3TT

for more information: 07740 342420

Suggested donation of £1 on the door.

A presentation and discussion organised by Transition Bathford with the Centre for Sustainable Energy and in partnership with Bathford Enterprise For All (BEFA) Plus group

What can we do to reduce our dependency on carbon fuels?

How can we harness our local natural resources to combat the increasing likelihood of climate change and scarcity of fuels?

Are there local solutions for each of us and our community?

These and other questions and issues will be discussed at this public meeting for local and surrounding area residents.

Recently the government has introduced new ways for individuals and communities to earn money from renewable energy. There are projects across the country bringing benefits like community funds which are being used to create better green spaces and support community groups.
The evening will provide the opportunity to hear about these and how individuals and as a community we could access them.

PlanLoCal is a new national initiative which aims to help a range of organisations and communities become directly involved in the planning of their area’s sustainable development with a particular focus on low energy use. Rachel Coxcoon, Senior Project Manager from the Bristol based Centre for Sustainable Energy, will give a presentation on the scheme to support low carbon living. She will describe how local communities can develop the new technologies and own renewable energy schemes. Rachel will bring a scale model which has been used by Bath and North East Somerset to demonstrate how a community might look with these different technologies in the landscape. .

To round up the evening, Transition Bathford will then host an open discussion on what can be done next to support local residents move to low carbon living. This will include energy monitoring and energy audits in the home, as well as looking at larger community owned renewable energy schemes.

Please join us if this is something you are interested in.
Thanks

Jamie

Global oil production could peak and then decline within the next few years, posing serious challenges to transport, agriculture and the economy.

And there are no easy fixes.

And then there’s global warming…

How will farming cope?

Watch Farm for the Future and discuss the issues

Film & Q&A with expert panel
Falfield Village Hall
Thurs 18th Mar
7.30pm

Free event

Refreshments available.

For more information Tel 01454415345

A weekend of Training for Transition Tales aimed at educators of all description; in fact anyone wanting to work with school and/or community groups of all ages to engage them in the process of visioning and develop Transition Tales in their area.

Transition Tales are visions of a positive future. They help us to collectively envision a world in which we are meeting present day challenges, they can entice us to take the next step and affirm that, however small that step might feel, it’s part of the interweaving of a larger whole. They are also an especially effective way of engaging the creativity and imagination of young people.

Background

It all started in 2006 when Rob Hopkins (Transition Town Totnes (TTT), & co founder of the Transition Network) and other TTT-ers saw the need to involve young people in the process of visioning the future we would all like to see. Since then Transition Tales has been working in 4 local schools, and has presented at 3 South West conferences aimed at school children and educators, several Transition events in Totnes and London, a Summer Family Camp, as well as at the National Transition Conference in Battersea in May 2009, and the National Transition Scotland Gathering in December 2009.

The Course

The weekend will be facilitated by Steph Bradley and Inez Aponte, two experienced trainers whose approach is fun, inspiring and inclusive. We will take the story within each of us as a starting point to envision and create the possible collective stories of a positive future. We will also be sharing one of the key tools so far developed by the group – an interactive community game called “The Quest” – as well as a host of other innovative techniques for unleashing the storyteller in all of us.

Who is it for?

The course is aimed at educators of all description; in fact anyone wanting to work with school and/or community groups of all ages to engage them in the process of visioning and develop Transition Tales in their area.

Details

19-21st March 2010
Bowden House, Totnes, Devon, TQ9 7PW

Cost: £105

Further news:

Shortly after the course, Transition Tales will be doing a community walk around Britain with the intention of co-creating and collecting the stories of our island to be compiled into a Transition Tales publication in 2011.

If you would like to enrol on the course, get involved with the walk or are interested in the work of Transition Tales in Totnes in 2010 please contact:

Steph at transitiontales@google.mail.com

Or leave a message on 01803 849094

“It takes a thousand voices to tell a single story.”
Native American proverb

The Bristol Seed Swap announces its programme lineup for the day:

• Seeds from the Heritage Seed Library
• Andy Hamilton from self sufficientish will be leading two wild food walks
• A selection of seeds for free and for sale from Beans and Herbs
• Community gardens plant stalls from Eastside Roots and Windmill Hill City Farm Garden Team
• Local gardening groups and Transition BS3, Gardenshare Bristol, film showings, seed saving workshops, tea and cake and more to come.

If you have spare seeds that you saved from last year, flowers and vegetables it is a brilliant chance to swap your surplus. If you did not manage to save any last year it’s a chance to get a few packs of seeds to save this year. There will be a stall with Seed Saving info so you can find out how to save seeds this year. The day is a brilliant chance for new growers to pick up a few packets of free seeds and some growing tips. Entry is by donation. Hope to see you there!

For more information, contact
bristolseedswap@yahoo.co.uk
www.myspace.com/bristolseedswap