th February 2010

 Dear members and friends of CANWin

 Can you help us push the SUSTAINABILITY barrow for 2010?

 We are inviting you, our members and friends, to help us make a bright spectacle at the Australia Day Parade in Berrima on Tuesday 26 January 2010 at 12pm as part of CANWin’s “Wheelbarrow Flotilla.”

 Marching behind the rainbow CANWin banner, we have a vision of a gentle citizenry of CANWinners and friends pushing barrows full of all the good things each of us does in our community.  Can you imagine what a positive statement that will make?  Our entry in the 2009 Tulip Time Parade made a wonderful gentle and effective statement and to top it off won the prize for best float!

 All you need is your wheelbarrow, decorated with whatever you feel is an appropriate way to show your passion.  As a starting point some suggested decorations/themes are biodiversity, transition, food gardens, grow and eat local, renewable energy, water saving, mulch, re-use/re-cycle, compost, bush tucker, slow food, preserves, seed saving, permaculture, transport, water tanks, solar cells.

 To help organise, we need RSVPs as soon as possible so we can plan the event.  Be creative and think of others who would like to join in.   Forward this invitation to a few friends with a personal message AND we can swell our numbers.

 Twenty wheelbarrows would be great, fifty would make an unforgettable impact! 

 If you can come please send an email to secretary@canwin.org.au.  We are not sure of the exact marshalling point but we meet at 11am in Berrima.  Don’t forget include your name, contact number and email address.

 We think CANWin can make this Australia Day Parade the best one ever and really hope you are equally inspired and can join us there.

On Thursday evening Thursday 5th November at 6.30pm members of the steering committee of the Australian Water Network (AWN) will screen the award winning documentary FLOW (For Love of Water). The evening will be an informative fundraising to assist with the incorporation of the AWN and to build a website to provide a platform for over thirty water campaign groups and individuals around Australia.

Friday 18 September 2009 7:30pm
Wingecarribee Shire Council Civic Centre Theatrette, Elizabeth St, Moss Vale

Dear members and friends of CANWin

Can you help us push the climate change barrow at the 2009 Tulip Time Street Parade on Saturday 26 September?

We are depending on you, our members and friends, to make a bright spectacle at the Parade with CANWin’s “Wheelbarrow Flotilla.”

Marching behind the rainbow CANWin banner, we have a vision of an gentle citizenry of CANWinners and friends pushing barrows full of all the good things each of us does in our community. Can you imagine what a positive statement that will make?

All you need is your wheelbarrow, decorated with whatever you feel is an appropriate way to show your passion. Some suggested decorations/themes are biodiversity, transition, climate change, food gardens, grow and eat local, renewable energy, water saving, mulch, compost, bush tucker, slow food, preserves, seed saving, permaculture, transport, water tanks, solar cells. Use this as starting point.

To help organise, we need RSVPs as soon as possible so we can plan the event. We meet at Banyette Street at 1pm and the March goes from 2pm to 3pm. Children are most welcome. Be creative and think of others who would like to join in. If you forward this invitation to a few friends with a personal message, I’m we can swell our numbers.

Twenty wheelbarrows would be great, fifty would make an unforgettable impact!

If you can come can you please reply to secretary@canwin.org.au Can you include your name, a contact number and an email address.

We think CANWin can make this Tulip Time Parade the best one ever and really hope you are equally inspired and can join us there.

Sincerely

Maree Byrne
For the Management Committee
CANWin
Climate Action Now! Wingecarribee

SIGN ON FOR AUGUST!

TRAINING FOR TRANSITION workshop Bowral 8th & 9th August
“to inspire, encourage, & inform”  people in the Transition process.

The Transition Town movement offers an opportunity to create a future that is abundant, sustainable and resilient as we stand at this critical time. Our response to the global challenges of climate change and peak oil will shape the lives of generations to come.

Transition Shire Wingecarribee recently hosted the national Transition Training workshops given by the UK trainers who have prepared local groups to deliver this exciting program which offers an inspiring vision and action plan for the transition to a low-carbon future in socially connected, resilient communities.

What you can expect at the Transition Training Workshop:

• an in-depth experiential introduction to Transition

• an inspirational/energetic boost that will empower and propel you as a powerful Transition catalyst in your community

• connection with others who are responding to the call for Transition

This 2-day fundamentals course is designed for people thinking of creating a Transition Town group or those  already in a group working towards becoming a Transition Town,  It is for those wishing to know how to set up, run, and maintain a successful transition initiative in their locality. The course is packed with imaginative and inspiring ways to delve into both the theory and practice of Transition.

For more information see Transition page on CANWin website

Register (by 22nd July) – please contact: Sandra at menteith@bigpond.net.au or phone 0403 790 777.

Click here to read the February issue of Transition Shire News

Click here to read the November issue of Transition Shire News

PATHS FORWARD

If you missed the Revisioning Workshop you missed some stimulating discussion about CANWin’s objectives for 2008. Included for discussion were papers by two of our members. These can be downloaded by clicking on their title below.

Strategy Motion

Where to from Here

Consider the budget figures. For every dollar for research into renewables, two dollars will be spent on the corporate ‘clean coal’ farce. For every dollar spent on tackling climate change, $28 will be spent on fossil fuel subsidies and $44 on military spending. Funding of the Department of the Environment has been cut by $50 million. Road transport and coal export infrastructure has been again favoured over rail and non-road transport. (Source: Jill Redwood, Potoroo Review, Winter 2008, p. 14).

In their more adult moments, most people probably intuit that Government is the handmaiden of Big Business. Our taxes are being used to fund coal expansion and thus our own destruction. Renowned US climate scientist James Hanson has proposed putting the CEOs of the big oil companies on trial for crimes against humanity, given their years of denial and successful outright sabotage of any tackling of climate change. Perhaps a good case could also be made for their political representatives in government to join them there? A million dead Iraqi men, women and children for imperial oil region control (and the right to continue increasing global warming) is surely another crime against humanity. Unfortunately however, such a court does not (yet) exist.

 

For your enjoyment is a short video made from the inspiring 2007 Walk Against Warming.

Below are two sites that have successfully created a wide appeal and are suitable for general consumption.

http://manpollo.org/ – a site that aggregates (or “mashes up” to use the correct term) a series of youtube videos using a risk management matrix for climate change. Created by a (science?) teacher using rational argument. Strong and simple, states that doing nothing to address climate change is unacceptable using the RM matrix. The creator has used Youtube to request “peer review” to validate assumptions and refine argument. There are seven hours (!) of video and they are chunked up nicely. I have watched the first nine minutes. The first video is well worth watching for opening the discussion about climate change action vs inaction. Aimed at inquiring minds (secondary students and up).

http://storyofstuff.com/ – clever animation showing the hidden cost of “stuff”. The cost to the environment and the third world. Very well packaged, weakness for analytical minds is that many “facts” are thrown to support the argument and they are not well cited. One “fact” is that computer manufacturers make a new chip every year that requires the entire computer to be thrown out rather than replaced. Having worked in ICT for 20 years I haven’t seen that chip! It is perhaps a comment on the rapid evolution of the tool rather than some planned obsolescence conspiracy on the part of the ICT PC manfacturers. Errors like this will diminish the value of the video, although the intent and thrust of the video is sincere. Aimed at impressionable rather than inquiring minds.

Are there more – have you seen short, sharp, punchy, succinct presentations? The internet is a great vehicle for moving information/knowledge/wisdom rapidly to a wide audience. These “useful” items are still small boats in a sea of self-indulgence and triviality, but they are there.

Andy