cultivate.ie

Green Jobs | Resilient Communities | Well-being | Sustainability | #converge12

Kilkenny | Dublin | Belfast | Sligo | Cloughjordan
And in communities across the island of Ireland

Coinciding with Rio+20 Earth Summit

The UN Conference celebrating the 20th Anniversary of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro

Convergence 2012

Convergence 2012 will shine a spotlight on some of the best ideas out there and ignite a national conversation on how we can most effectively work together to create a brighter and more sustainable future for Ireland.

Using an interactive, positive and engaging format Convergence will bring people together from government, local authorities, business, civil society, NGOs and communities to advance the national agenda on sustainability and help chart a path to Ireland’s recovery.

President Michael D. Higgins, who attended the original Earth Summit in Rio, will open Convergence 2012 in Cloughjordan on June 6th. 

Convergence 2012 will include:

• Breakthrough Ideas for the Future We Want - a gallery collecting and showcasing exciting initiatives already in existence from different sectors across Ireland and Northern Ireland. An online form will be used to collect ideas and social media will be utilised to rate them.
• Conversations for the Future We Want - a facilitated forum bringing a diverse group of stakeholders together to explore how we can work across specialised sectors to position Ireland on the international stage as a leader in the green economy, community resilience, wellbeing and sustainability.
• The Green Business Incubator - an innovative process providing support for aspiring entrepreneurs and new businesses while generating rapid peer-to-peer input to help take breakthrough ideas to the next level. 
• Host Your Own - a facilitation guide allowing local groups to host their own ‘Convergence’ and feed into the national harvest and findings.
• The ‘Ideas for the Future We Want’ Exhibit - The second phase of this project is to develop an exhibit that will showcase the best of the ideas collected through the road show and disseminate the findings of the forums. This will be launched in September at the Electric Picnic, Ireland’s leading cultural festival and then hosted along with an incubation event in venues around the country.

Have we done anything like this before?

Cultivate Living and Learning has hosted Convergence sixteen times since the year 2000. Cultivate is one of the foremost Civil Society Organisations in Ireland providing access to the knowledge and tools to cultivate sustainable lifestyles and resilient communities. Convergence, Ireland’s longest running sustainable living festival, has brought together a wide variety of stakeholders from across Ireland and from abroad. This annual event highlights community resilience and green jobs while championing the changes needed to create a sustainable economy, society and environment.

Convergence Road Show Impacts

• Providing a creative platform for connecting, transforming and changing mindsets
• Bringing together a wide variety of stakeholders from different sectors to engage in debate and take a role in finding lasting answers to the challenges we face 
• Illuminating good ideas and showcasing breakthrough initiatives already underway that are helping to transform the island of Ireland
• Engaging 1500 stakeholders directly through the fora and local events 
• Reaching approximately 50,000 people when the exhibit tours libraries and public spaces from September to December  2012
• Disseminating the ideas and sustainable pathways showcased to a national audience through media partners 
• Supporting Ireland’s contribution to the Rio+20 Global Summit
• Providing a vehicle to communicate key ideas and initiatives from Government, business and civil society that could transform Ireland
• Advancing the national agenda on sustainable development and helping to chart a path to Ireland’s recovery

A Call to Collaborate

Cultivate would like to invite stakeholders and partners to get involved in different ways.  We are specifically looking for:

• Endorsement
• Help in identifying other stakeholders
• Assistance in selecting breakthrough ideas in the general area of sustainability 
• Help to identify participants to ensure a diverse representation at each forum
• Local support teams to help with facilitation, venue set up and identifying local ideas and participants
• Local groups that would organise a ‘Host It Yourself’ forum in their own community

Crowdsourced

In line with the theme of ‘collaboration’ this Convergence is being crowdsourced with the initial idea and production being co-developed by a growing network of collaborators. Crowdsourcing is a distributed problem-solving process that involves a network of people, also known as the crowd.

Crowdfunded

This event is dependent on raising a certain amount of funding which has traditionally come from a small number of agencies and businesses. Our objective is to raise the financial support needed to deliver Convergence through targeting a much wider pool of funders. If you can support or help us identify sources of funding please let us know.

Utilising Social Networks

We will leverage social media to collect and illuminate the breakthrough ideas, build momentum and participation in this Convergence and help harvest the findings from the forums.  We are tweeting with #converge2012

Contact

If you would like more information or details on how to get involved contact Davie Philip at 0505 56061 | 087 6340697 | email contact form