St Paul's Carnival has said they would like to be the UK's first green Caribbean Carnival and will be holding a conference to announce their major plans to make carnival a more sustainable art form.
These plans include potentially cutting down on the use of plastic and using sustainable materials for costume making. They aim to reduce the dependency on plastic foam and increase the use of willow, a more sustainable material. As well as introducing the usage of biodegradable glitter.
The New Carnival Network (TNCN), organisers behind the conference, support carnivals which take place in the south, including St Paul's Carnival and will be making sustainability recommendations throughout the conference. This includes encouraging the use of vendors who only use biodegradable cups across all the carnivals they manage in the south.
Chris Flann, 61, Executive Director of TNCN feels as though it’s crucial for plans to begin this year. He said: “There's no point in setting goals if you don't monitor the progress being made.”
The two-day conference will be taking place at the Malcolm X Centre from March 13, with speakers from Arts Council England and Shambala Festival who has reduced the carbon footprint of their festival by over 80 per cent, achieved 100 per cent renewable power, become meat and fish free and eradicated disposable plastics.
The New Carnival Network aims to encourage the St Paul's Carnival team to reduce the amount of plastic usage and want them to “commit to certain actions to make carnival more sustainable.”
Chris hopes that these plans will began to happen this year.
He said: “Many of the carnivals and festivals across the UK will be coming together as we decided that carnival had to be more sustainable as its quite a wasteful art form.
“Some of the materials we use such as glitter is so damaging for the environment. We need to start thinking consciously about how to make carnival a sustainable art.”
TNCN recently received £15,000 of funding from Arts Council England and they will be putting it towards running the conference, which cost £17,000.
You can see the full conference programme here.
