THIS YEAR THE ISLE OF WIGHT FESTIVAL HAS EXCLUSIVELY JOINED FORCES WITH ED MILIBAND AND THE DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY AND CLIMATE CHANGE TO ENCOURAGE THEIR AUDIENCE TO SIGN UP TO THE CAMPAIGN TO REACH A GLOBAL DEAL ON GREENHOUSE GAS EMISSIONS. THEY WILL BE THE ONLY MUSIC FESTIVAL TO PROMOTE THE GOVERNMENT’S ACT ON CLIMATE CHANGE MESSAGE AHEAD OF THE NEXT ROUND OF KYOTO TALKS IN COPENHAGEN IN DECEMBER.

The Isle of Wight Festival was an ideal choice for the DECC because of the success they’ve had over the last two years in making the festival a more sustainable event with their intelligent programme of Eco Actions. These include the use of more renewable energy; promoting responsible travel; as well as launching a headline environmental campaign Give Bees a Chance.
 
The festival also offers a diverse audience profile owing to the eclectic mix of bands they attract each year and with this year’s headliners The Prodigy, Razorlight and Neil Young, the audience will again be a mix of young and old giving DECC a unique chance to promote the launch of the new Copenhagen website while the festival itself showcases what they as a business are doing locally to reduce their emissions.

Ed Miliband, Secretary of State for the Department of Energy and Climate Change comments: "Congratulations to the Isle of Wight Festival for going green and helping to spread the message on cutting carbon. The UK Government is working hard to reduce the country’s greenhouse gas emissions, and we’ll be heading to Copenhagen in December determined to achieve an historic international deal to tackle climate change"

He continues "But we all need to play a part in helping to combat global warming. Through the partnership between DECC and the Isle of Wight Festival’s environmental consultants Eco Action Partnership, we’ll be able to spread the message about the importance of individual actions, while urging people to sign up to a pledge calling on all Governments to reach an agreement on global action."

The collaboration sees a video message from Ed Miliband broadcast to festival-goers on the main stage, throughout the three day event, encouraging people to visit the new website and sign up to the campaign; and as a way of saying thank-you to the festival for helping to spread the word the DECC have donated solar panels to power some of the backstage area and have provided the local Scouts and Guides, who will be on site collecting money for the Give Bees a Chance campaign, with specially designed T-Shirts.

John Giddings, Isle of Wight Festival Promoter comments: "Last year we employed Eco Action Partnership to implement a five year plan to make the festival more sustainable and together we are now in the second year of what is already a well received programme of Eco Actions, tackling our main negative impacts which are Waste, Travel and Energy. The collaboration with the Department of Energy and Climate Change allows us to promote the importance of reducing emissions on a much bigger scale which will hopefully send a strong message to other businesses and individuals that by working together towards a common goal we can make a huge difference to the future of our planet."

Click Here for Our Full Programme of Eco Actions at this year's Festival.