The government in Norway is debating about oil drilling in Lofoten, Vesterålen and Senja (LoVeSe), an an area of beautiful nature in the north of Norway. If oil drilling goes ahead here, it will have a drastic influence on the whole ecosystem in the Norwegian Sea.
This coming Sunday 8th September there will be national elections in Norway and most of the main political parties are in favour of oil drilling in Lofoten. For the new government of Norway, oil drilling in LoVeSe will be a major topic, and civil society is working together to put pressure on the politicians and major political parties and show them that there is broad opposition from the people against oil drilling in Lofoten, Vesterålen and Senja.
In support of Young Friends of the Earth Norway’s campaign, we are asking all of you to join them in a day of European-wide solidarity actions against oil drilling on 7th September.
What can you do?
To put pressure on the Norwegian Government we want as many Young FoE groups and inidividuals to take action and send photos and messages in support of YFoE Norway this Saturday before the elections, to add pressure to the politicians and political parties of Norway. We are thinking of small-scale actions all over Europe to make all the Young FoE groups show their support to say “No to drilling!”. You will find posters and a template press release which we encourage you to also use in your actions.
If you can support this action call out, we’ll be collecting photos from your action and publish these. So make sure as soon as you’ve done your solidarity action to send your photo and a message to Juli, so that we can put this online and send to YFoE Norway.
Ideas for actions
Why not:
- Have a small information stand with some flyers and posters
- Perform a little street theatre on a much-frequented square
- Make flash mob
- Make an expressive picture of your group
- To get some interesting photos from your actions, it could be a good idea to somehow play around with something that looks similar to fossil oil (black paint, chocolate sauce, etc) and fish of any kind. It is very important to have pictures form all the actions to send them to norway.
- Send out a press release to your local and national media. A press release template, which you can access here.
When you’ve done your action, make sure to send a photo and message to Juli on Saturday 7th September.
For more information, please contact Halvard from Young Friends of the Earth Norway.