The Disappear Here Film Club, in partnership with The Henry Girls, is hosting a screening of “Freedom to Run” on April 5, 2024, at the Colgan Hall in Carndonagh from 7.30 PM to 9:30 PM.

Pre-book now to reserve your €5 ticket.

The film highlights the restrictions on freedom of movement in the West Bank.

After the screening, there will be a post-show discussion, Fairtrade tea, and coffee. Everyone is welcome to join the Henry Girls at McClure’s Bar for music.

The post-show discussion will be chaired by Michael McLaughlin, producer of the Disappear Here Film Festival, and will feature Majida Al Askari, Palestinian activist, artist and member of the Inishowen Palestine Solidarity Group, and Miriam Killeney of the Inishowen Palestine Solidarity Group.

The Disappear Here Film Club is raising funds for Medical Aid for Palestine at this event. Tickets cost €5 (which you are asked to pay in cash at the door on the night) and additional donations will be welcome on the night too.

Booking here now will pre-book your seat and add your name to the attendance list. We ask that you email changemakers@inishowen.ie with Cancellation in the subject line if you wish to cancel your ticket.  

*** Please note that there has been a venue change from Wesley Hall to the Colgan Hall due to demand**

DONEGAL shop and café owners are being encouraged to stock more Fairtrade products after the impact it has on rural farming communities was highlighted reality of modern-day slavery and child labour was highlighted during Fairtrade Fortnight.

Throughout the last two weeks, ChangeMakers Donegal has embarked on a campaign throughout Inishowen to raise awareness about Fairtrade and how farmers and workers around the world are often exposed to hazardous working conditions.

Brazilian Fairtrade ambassador Rafael Fonseca travelled to Inishowen along with Fairtrade Ireland representatives where they embarked on an awareness-raising campaign in Buncrana Clonmany and Moville along with the Changemakers team.

To support Fairtrade at a local level, take these three steps:

Step 1: Ask your local shop to stock Tony Chocolonely.

Step 2: Ask your local centre, group or employer to buy Fairtrade Tea and Coffee from local supermarkets for the communal areas.

Step 3: Ask your local hotel to offer Fairtrade Tea and Coffee and to put the Fairtrade logo on the menu.

 When you buy products with any of the FAIRTRADE Marks, you support farmers and workers as they improve their lives and their communities. Fairtrade Fortnight will be celebrated around Ireland from 4 – 17 March. ChangeMakers Donegal is working with committee members across the County to line up a programme of informative events to celebrate existing Fairtrade towns and help places applying for Fairtrade Town status to increase the number of products available for purchase as that’s an important element of the campaign.

Inishowen Development Partnership will host a guest from the Coffee coop COOMAP in Brazil, Rafael Fonseca, visiting Ireland during Fairtrade Fortnight 2024. He will travel to Inishowen to meet community members in Moville, Buncrana and Clonmany to share the news

Events

You are more than welcome to attend these events:

Wednesday 6 March 2024 at Colgan Hall, at the invitation of our wonderful Inishowen Development Partnership colleagues, we will present a Fairtrade stall alongside Mary Kay from Derry who we have invited to present a stall of Palestinian Fairtrade goods from the Zaytoun website. Another small way to show solidarity in the face the atrocious genocide taking place in the world today?

Thursday 7 March 2024 at 11am: Fairtrade Coffee Morning at St Eugene’s Hall, Moville at the Moville Cafe Hub.

Thursday 7 March 2024 at 1pm: Fairtrade Ireland Ambassador from COOMAP in Brazil, Rafael Fonseca,  will meet with local students from Crana College, Buncrana who will be surveying local shoppers on the day. 

Thursday 7 March 2024 at 3pm: Join Patsy Toland of ChangeMakers Donegal & Rafael Fonseca for a community conversation about fair trade to support Clonmany/Ballyliffin’s bid to become recognised as a Fairtrade zone.

Thursday 14 March 2024 at 11am: Join the Intercultural Cafe at the Exchange Inishowen for a relaxed morning of chats and Fairtrade goodies sponsored by SuperValu Buncrana. Find out how you can help our bid to become a Fairtrade town in Buncrana.

Did you know? More than 37,000 products Fairtrade products were sold in 143 different countries available to shoppers worldwide. Let’s see what other products we can ask local supermarkets, shops and cafes to stock in Donegal.

Purchasing FAIRTRADE COFFEE is a tangible way to support the campaign as we  need to support the coffee farmers and the coffee companies buying on Fairtrade terms.

As well as the well-known Fairtrade products such as tea, coffee, bananas, we are encouraging local people to buy:

FAIRTRADE ROSES Fairtrade roses from Kenya have a smaller environmental footprint when compared to roses produced in Holland, even when factoring in transport to Europe, according to a recently released report.

With the release of the movie Wonka just behind us, we are also supporting inspirational Irish Fairtrade businesses such as  Exploding Tree Chocolate and the fabulous Tony Chocolonely CHOCOLATE company.

Mother’s Day is coming up on Sunday 10 March 2024; how about some Fairtrade Mother’s Day gifts from your local Aldi, Lidl or SuperValu. Food for thought!

Now in its third year, the Bookless Bookclub sees us create a safe online space for like-minded people to talk about local and global issues. This year’s topic is Hate, Hope and Stepping Up (for change), places are limited, email changemakers@inishowen.ie to book a space.

Have yourself a sustainable little Christmas in Donegal by following the guidance in our Sustainability Passport. We know people get overwhelmed by sustainability sometimes so we did the research for you and created five simple guides ranging in theme from Water & Energy to Responsible Consumption. Find out more here.

As we approach the season of over-consumption, did you know?

• Fast Fashion results in the creation of large amounts of clothing-related waste each year. Workers in factories, particularly
  women and children, producing garments for some high street labels face appalling work and
  pay conditions and health and safety harms (UN Alliance for Sustainable Fashion).
• Ireland produces the highest volume of plastic waste per person in the EU, while having the fourth worst recycling rate
  for the material (Eurostat).
• It takes up to 500 years for plastic to decompose (Statista).
• Almost 70% of plastic in Ireland is burned instead of recycled (EPA).
• 91% of Ireland’s ‘internationally important’ habitats (bogs, grasslands) have ‘bad’ or ‘inadequate’ status. Failure to protect our most endangered natural habitats and species will result in substantial EU fines for Ireland (Biodiversity Impact Plan).

Speaking of that feeling of powerlessness and the ethics of supporting some brand over others, local Palestinian Solidarity campaign groups in Donegal and Derry are advocating for the BDS movement and you can learn more about that here. The Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions (BDS) movement works to end international support for Israel’s oppression of Palestinians and pressure Israel to comply with international law. Household brands such as Puma, Mc Donald’s and HP are named in the campaign.

Ends 

In December, ChangeMakers Donegal invited Arran Murphy, Programme Manager with Rediscover Fashion, at the Rediscovery Centre to present two community get togethers called Green your Wardrobe. The first event took place in Letterkenny in partnership with Letterkenny Tidy Towns at the Regional Cultural Centre and the second event took place at Spraoi agus Sport in Carndonagh, affording us the opportunity to visit the impressive Siorai Home and Accessories after the event.

Arran brought along bags of inspirational upcycled items and a Pop Up Swap Rail and over the course of the two days we saw almost 60 people learn more about the problem with fast fashion and reflect on how they could change their ways especially at Christmas time.

“Change needs to happen at every level, it’s not just up to the individual to change,” Arran Murphy, Rediscovery Centre, speaking in Donegal. 

PRE-LOVED CHRISTMAS, ANYONE?

Here are Arran’s top tips on how to be a more conscious consumer this Christmas.

• Buy less – reduce what we have
• Buy locally to lessen carbon footprint
• Buy natural fibres avoiding micro-plastics
• Buy second hand
• Take part in alternative ownership models
• like Rent the Runway
• Read your care labels to take care of your clothes properly
• Wash your clothes less
• Use your own clothes more – shop your wardrobe
• Repair – a stitch in time saves nine
• Sell/Swap/Donate
• Learn more about our collaborators at the Rediscovery Centre

WHAT DO LOCAL PEOPLE THINK?

“Shopping in a charity shop, you can actually get really lovely stuff” Listen back to Ours to Protect on Highland Radio to hear what local Donegal people taught about both buying second hand and receiving second-hand goods. Donna Marie Doherty of Highland Radio leaves us with a tip to waste out for food waste and consider the local charity shop for Christmas cards.

WHAT’S NEXT?

We are all about providing education to spark change and we’d love to see more sustainability in action with local people reducing their fashion consumption for the good of the planet. Afterall, we have enough clothes on the earth now for six generations, do we really need more? Through our Seeds of Change programme, we are funding and mentoring a number of groups to carry out upcycling projects to plug the gap locally when it comes to skills development. If you would like us to connect you to Letterkenny Tidy Towns, Spraoi agus Sport, Pobail le Cheile or Rathmullan Tidy Towns, get in touch at changemakers@inishowen.ie.

Inspired to take action this Christmas? Visit our Responsible Consumption Sustainability Passport here and take three steps to be more sustainable.

THANK YOUS

So many people collaborated with us to make these two events happen. Firstly, thanks to Arran Murphy, Programme Manager, Rediscover Fashion and Claire Downey, Research and Policy Director at the Rediscovery Centre. Thank you to Fiona O’Reilly of On The Dot Design and Letterkenny Tidy Towns, Eilish Kennedy of ATU Fashion and Letterkenny Tidy Towns, Ann-Louise Mc Clintock of Letterkenny Chamber and Letterkenny Tidy Towns. Jeremy Howard, Director of the beautiful Regional Cultural Centre. At Carndonagh, thank you to Helen Nolan, Mary Mc Weeney, Kathleen Mc Daid at Spraoi agus Spórt and Spraoi Circular Economy Hub Lead, Lorraine Carey at Síoraí Sustainable Home Store. Thanks also to our colleagues at Inishowen Development Partnership who worked behind the scenes to organise and promote our events. Finally, thank you to everyone who came to take part. Happy Christmas.

The Fashion Industry is having an increasingly negative impact environmentally, socially and economically. It is contributing hugely to global greenhouse emissions as well as polluting waterways and destroying biodiversity.

These two fun and informative community workshops with The Rediscovery Centre (Dublin) are open to everyone in Inishowen and will look at the actions we can take individually and as a community to change our relationship with the clothes we buy, the clothes we own and the clothes we no longer want.

From repairs and upcycling projects to hosting swap shop events, this workshop will inspire you to make small changes that can have lasting impacts for you, your community and our planet and help create a more sustainable fashion industry.

Letterkenny

As a follow up to our successful Sustainable Communities LK event, join us and our community partners, Letterkenny Tidy Towns, at the Regional Cultural Centre on Thursday 7 December 2023 at 7pm – 8:30pm. Inspiration guaranteed and a cup of tea promised!

Book tickets for the Letterkenny workshop at this link.

Carndonagh 

To celebrate the recent opening of Síoraí Clothing & Accessories (fashion) & Síoraí Home at Spraoi agus Spórt, the Carndonagh-based social enterprise, let’s gather all upcycling enthusiasts in Inishowen, to talk together about what’s possible in our area. Friday 8 December 2023 at 12 noon to 1:30pm, refreshments provided.

Booking link for Carndonagh event at this link.

Visit this video to get a feeling for what the event will be like. This video was recorded by Poca Productions for ChangeMakers Donegal and the Letterkenny Tidy Towns Committee earlier this year.

What can we do?

With so many groups getting together to sew, what else can be done in Donegal? Come see what’s possible in your own community with the support of the ChangeMakers Donegal Sustainability programme called the Sustainability Passport which is open to everyone interested in being more sustainable.

That’s why we have invited The Rediscovery Centre to Donegal. Arran Murphy Programme Manager of Rediscover Fashion Rediscovery Centre is the National Centre for the Circular Economy in Ireland facilitating a wide range of sewing, design, repair and upcycling workshops for the general public, universities, secondary schools, community groups, and corporate organisations. She is also the head judge of the Relove Fashion Competition Arran has extensive industry experience as a Designer, Maker, and Educator working in Sustainable Fashion, Costume, Community Arts, and Community Education.

Join us for some inspiration and creativity pre-Christmas.

This Christmas, forget ‘jingle all the way’….think ‘justice all the way’!

Across the world people are being pushed further into poverty due to the climate crisis. But we’ve a chance to change that. If we act by joining our project partner’s Trócaire Climate Justice campaign.

Disappear Here Film Club, which takes place monthly in Clonmany, Co. Donegal, is pleased to announce the lineup for its November Film Club on Saturday 25 November.

The Film Club is funded by Concern Worldwide in partnership with ChangeMakers Donegal at Inishowen Development Partnership and Disappear Here Film Festival to encourage local people to think globally inspired by documentary and feature films.

After the success of a community event earlier this month – where the Film Club hosted the Irish Film Institute to showcase archival footage of Donegal and local people saw themselves on screen – the Film Club is continuing with a similar approach this November. The Disappear Here Film Club will present six short documentary films made by non-professional filmmakers from Donegal, Derry, and North Africa. These films last under one hour in total and will be followed by a short panel discussion.

The films include:

• Derry, the Oak Grove by Molly Phillips and Tom Hannigan; a lyrical essay film about Derry featuring current and archival footage.
• Triang Times by Emer O’Shea, Manus Brennan, and Michael Mc Monagle focuses on the lives of two people; a Unionist and one Nationalist, who have spent a lifetime stepping outside their cultural boundaries to make Pettigo a better place to live.
• Connecting Borders, directed by Derry-born, Gemma Gfeller, features interviews with people from different backgrounds, cultures, and religions, from Ireland, Palestine, Colombia, the United States, and Turkey, and examines what it means to live in a bordered world.
• Crossing Lines, directed by Margaret Gordon, is about a group of young women who formed a football team in 1979. The team was both cross-border and cross-religion. Margaret is involved in Finn Harps Football Club today.

The films were made during a filmmaking programme facilitated in The Nerve Centre, Derry, in collaboration with The Reel Borders Project based in Vrije Universiteit Brussels.

Universality of Border Life

Alongside the Donegal/Derry-based films, we will also show two films from North Africa to highlight the universality of border life and the connection between the local and the global dimension, in keeping with the work of ChangeMakers Donegal and the Film Club funder, Concern Worldwide.

• Frontera (Borderland) (7 minutes) is a short film narrated by Lakbira Ijamai. It tells the story of cross-border workers and what they will do when the border between Spain and Morocco is closed due to COVID-19.
• Quiero/I Want (2.5 minutes) features a voiceover from an undocumented migrant worker in Ceuta, on the border with Morocco. It explores the young mother’s dream for the future.

These short films are the result of a three-month participatory filmmaking workshop by Reel Borders with Moroccan cross-border women who are living and working irregularly in Ceuta, a Spanish enclave bordering Morocco. The workshop was hosted by the local NGO Digmun, the Association for the Dignity of Women and Children of Ceuta, which offers language literacy and legal support.

Event details

REEL BORDERS SHORTS – Short Films from Ireland and North Africa

• Saturday 25 November 2023 at 2 pm – 3:30 pm at Market House Clonmany above the Market House Café run by Clonmany Community Centre
• The six short films will be followed by a brief post-show panel discussion featuring some of the filmmakers and producer, Diana Cheung
• The event is free thanks to the REEL BORDERS Project

To be added to our Film Club mailing list, email changemakers@inishowen.ie with Film Club Mailing List in the Subject.