Live Music Fighting Climate Change
Almost every industry on the planet is contributing to the climate crisis and live music is no exception. It's an obligation of everyone involved in this sector, including governments and regulators, to make every effort to significantly reduce carbon emissions of live touring, in order to meet the Paris Agreement goals.
Following Massive Attacks' release of "a roadmap for the UK live music sector to play its part in tackling the climate crisis" , commissioned to the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research , a group of European promoters and venues have decided to join efforts to expand this initiative to all European Union and neighbouring countries. The mission of this platform is to advocate for the implementation of measures, in all stages of a concert lifecycle, to reduce the impact of live touring on the planet.
This urgent shift in the way live music operates is only possible if artists, venues, promoters, booking agents, other live music professionals, governments and regulators cooperate with each other. Live Change aims to bring all these stakeholders together, making it easier to research, design, promote and implement these measures. Simultaneously, a unified voice makes it easier to negotiate with regional, national and European bodies the creation of support programs and policies necessary to execute this plan. Some of these measures require a significant investment by the different stakeholders - for example, venues might have to acquire new equipment to allow bands to travel with less weight -, we believe that governments should create funding programs to support smaller companies and individuals, specially being one of the sectors most affected by the Covid-19 pandemic and Brexit.
These are some of the actions undertaken by this group:
- Alert the sector and governments for the urgency of this matter;
- Promote the implementation of these measures across all European Union countries;
- Cooperate with international markets, like the UK and US, to ensure consistency, making it easier to prepare the routing of international tours;
- Support researchers in the creation of new studies;
- Facilitate the implementation of pilots to evaluate the effectiveness of these measures;
- Work with regulators on new policies, making sure that each new policy does not represent a financial problem to smaller businesses and is accompanied with a financial support package;
- Help regional and national governments to design (new or adapt old) funding programs;
- Help the European Commission to design (new or adapt old) funding programs;
- Monitor the impact of these changes on carbon emissions and publish regular public reports.
Climate crisis is everyone's problem. We all must play our part. Join us and help spread the word. Live must act to stop climate Change.