“With the festival team, we became aware that an event like Arte flamenco has an impact on the environment. Whether in terms of stage equipment, waste management, mobility, etc. »
“With the festival team, we became aware that an event like Arte flamenco has an impact on the environment. Whether in terms of stage equipment, waste management, mobility, etc. »
Tuesday May 7, 2024, Lionel Niedzwiecki, director of the festival, outlined the environmental ambitions of Arte flamenco. And this year, he wants to focus on the mobility of the public and its teams.
In this sense, Arte flamenco is part of Festivals in motionthree-year national project which aims to reduce the environmental footprint of the mobility of audiences and teams. Around fifty French festivals are involved.
Experienced carpooling
According to a study carried out in 2022 on travel within the framework of Arte flamenco, 56% of festival-goers come from Landes, 8% from Lot-et-Garonne and 5% from Gironde. Three quarters are therefore from the region. The majority of them – retirees – go to Mont-de-Marsan by car, Landes being a rural department poorly served by public transport.
“An event like Arte flamenco has an impact on the environment”
Starting this year, a first experiment will be carried out and will take effect until 2026. A partnership with Tribulive, carpooling and mobility information service for festivalswill be implemented this summer.
Each person can suggest a trip on the site, with access to the platform coupled with ticketing. This experiment will give rise to a practical sheet with the results for other festivals.
This 35e edition of Arte flamenco will be the first to see part of its programming at the Cultural Center, in Saint-Pierre-du-Mont. “We proposed a partnership with Transdev – a transport group, Editor’s note – so that the public could go to Saint-Pierre-du-Mont in free shuttles,” specifies the festival director. They will be available from Tuesday to Friday and will leave at 6 p.m. from the Midou stop, Allée Raymond-Farbos in Mont-de-Marsan. The return to the city center will be fifteen minutes after the end of the show from the Pole, with festival-goers dropping off near City Hall.
Six axes identified
Arriving in the organization of the festival in 2021, Claire Lacomme notes certain problems. “It was a Covid year, with a reduced format and only outdoors. I observed that it was not very brilliant in ecological terms, there was a lot of waste, food waste. »
Faced with this observation, she takes stock and thinks about solutions. And shares his work and his thoughts with Lionel Niedzwiecki, who is very receptive. It becomes a reference for sustainable development in 2022.
Started that same year, the partnership with the Landes eco-citizen house (MEC) made it possible to amplify this ecological transition of the festival. “We worked on six areas: reinventing mobility, local food, waste treatment, energy consumption and resource management, social and solidarity action and raising awareness of sustainable development,” explains Emmanuelle Pedezert, director. of the MEC.
Decisions are made, measures put in place. “We have reduced the purchase of plastic water bottles, we have halved the printing of programs and posters. In terms of drinks, we source locally, we work with a caterer who uses dishes that we clean, etc. », explains Claire Lacomme.
In addition to this, actions are undertaken with the MEC during the festival. “We do workshops with the children. We start from waste to make objects linked to the festival. The children come with their ideas and put them into practice,” explains Emmanuelle Pedezert. The MEC also has an information stand at the heart of the festival so that people can find out about and become aware of the environmental cause.
In 2023, the festival decides to apply to obtain the Reeve label, a network of eco-responsible eventsso that all this work and these projects are recognized. To obtain level 1, Arte flamenco commits to 33 points: encouraging carpooling, informing the public about access to cycle paths, no chemical toilets, appointing and training an accessibility representative, etc. It works: the festival gets the eco-committed event label.
This distinction concretizes the work of the festival team and the 33 commitments made for 2023. They will be continued in the years to come.