But it’s not all bad news. Festivals have changed a lot. Eco Warriorz have had a huge impact, and we’re definitely leaving the fields better than we found them.
Our spiritual home, Boomtown really has been the best example of that, and kudos to them and their sustainability team for taking the problem of campsite trash seriously, and stepping up their sustainability. We also saw huge improvements at Shambala, Latitude, Isle of Wight and Lost Village to name a few.
Although Eco Warriorz were invited back to Boomtown for 2025, it was with a smaller crew, and it has become clear it is not workable for us, so instead it’s time to hand over the eco-baton to the sustainability of the Changemakers (aka Green Guardians) at Boomtown. If you’re looking to keep up the mission of making clean campsites the new normal – their application form is here.
A HUGE gratitude goes to all of the past volunteers in their crazy green outfits, out in the fields in all weathers to be eco-conscious party-goers, and an especially massive thanks to the organisers and team leaders, especially to Ian and Liv, core organisers and also Carly, Chris, Rory and Richard –organisers through the years – and to the original Eco Rangers, Jo and Chris for all of your incredible eco efforts over the years – and a heartfelt and sincere apology for having to bring things to an end, but it feels like the right thing to do.
If you’re feeling sad – please remember that every single one of the countless interactions you had in the fields, every one of the tens of thousands of medals handed out not only helped show that clean campsites were possible – but will also have had immeasurable lasting impacts in the wider world, and will never be forgotten.
This is really difficult, Eco Warriorz has been an incredible success, and has been an amazing honour to help steer., and it’s hard to say goodbye, but it is time. Outside of Eco Warriorz, I’ve also been a coordinator with Extinction Rebellion (XR), bringing together marches of 100,000s people for climate and nature….and now I find myself co-founding a new campaign called Media Revolution which seeks to target media inaction and deliberate failure on climate and social justice. It’s looking to be quite big, which is really exciting.
But sadly this does mean there’s just not enough time for me to give Eco Warriorz the attention it deserves, and there just isn’t a team to take it forward.
I know this will be disappointing to many of you, and I just hope you can tap into some happy Eco Warriorz memoriez to help keep you smiling.
Huge love to each and every awesome green one of you. It’s been an epic eco journey.
All that is left to say, for one last time…. WHEN I SAY “DROP BASS”….. YOU SAY “NOT WASTE”…. “DROP BASS!!!……..”
xxx
Liz 💚. Eco Warriorz Lead Organizerz
P.S – I’ll be writing up some learnings from our time in the fields to share with festivals who want to improve their campsite carnage. If you’re interested, please get in touch. We want the knowledge we learned over the years to be freely available to anyone.
The first thing that needs doing is to implement a tent-check in and check out system to stop the problem of tent abandonment.
Festivals say it’s not possible – but in times of Covid, we all had to stick things up our nose and provide a photo of a test to prove we were allowed in a field. Proving that campers take the same tent home with them that they arrive with could be easy – and it NEEDS TO BE DONE.
P.P.S – If anyone wants several suitcases full of green fancy dress, do let me know?! 😉 email@ecowarriorz.org