By Freya Aitchison
More than 60 eco champions converged on Lochgilphead Joint Campus on Sunday to talk about sustainable land and sea management.
A host of stalls were run by sustainability groups such as ACT Now, Heart of Argyll, Argyll Coast and Islands Hope Spot, the GRAB Trust, Cardross Climate Action Network, and Plastic Free Helensburgh.
Attendees had the chance to look around the stalls and chat to the members of the groups while enjoying tea and cake, before hearing from five key speakers.
Roger Dixon-Spain, a regenerative farmer from Lismore, talked about the importance of soil biology for farming and carbon sequestration, and how this realisation completely changed the way he had been farming all his life.
Elspeth MacDonald, who runs a community croft near Benderloch, talked about her work in bringing under-served communities in to work on her croft, where they gain an appreciation for where everything comes from and nothing is wasted.
Then, Adam MacLean from Helensburgh talked about the sustainability standards of commercial forestry and how this is changing to preserve more biodiversity and lock in more carbon.
Later on, Dr Anuschka Miller, from the Scottish Association of Marine Science near Oban, talked about the challenges faced when setting up Marine Protected Areas locally, including a lack of research about the ocean and the importance of including communities and stakeholders in the process.
Finally, Hannah Clinch talked about the Dunoon Beach Hut project which aims to build a community beach hut, highlighting both local heritage and biodiversity.
Two of MSPs attended the event as well as some of Argyll and Bute councillors.
Jenni Minto MSP and Ariane Burgess MSP both gave comments at the end of the event and said that they would use what they had learned from the speakers and stallholders in their work on the Rural Affairs, Islands and Natural Environment Committee in the Scottish Parliament.
The speeches were recorded and will be available to watch on the Time for Change Argyll and Bute website.
Freya Aitchison, of Time for Change, said: ‘We were really pleased with how the event went and that so many people came out to discuss these important issues.
‘We’re really lucky in Argyll to have such beautiful landscapes and coastlines, and we would all like them to still be there for generations to come; however, they are currently threatened by the impacts of climate change.
‘The speakers at the event showed that there are many ways to make a living from the land and sea while also allowing biodiversity and nature to thrive, and that the people who rely on the land and sea for a living are vitally important to these conversations.’
