LÁMH DHEARG GAC are to participate in the pilot roll-out of the GAA’s Green Clubs Programme which will see the club champion biodiversity and promote a greener way of living to their members.
Explaining the programme, the club’s Margaret Murray said the programme is about promoting sustainable development, waste management and green transport to the club’s members.
“The programme involves 45 clubs across the whole island and Lámh Dhearg are the only club in Belfast participating in the pilot,” said Margaret.
“Through this programme we will be working with NI Water, the RSBP, Action Renewables and the Belfast Hills Partnership to strengthen the health and wellbeing not only of our members but also our neighbours and the wider Hannahstown community.
“The green action awareness will aid the health and wellbeing projects that the club are involved in through our Highway to Health and other campaigns.”
Discussing the development of the programme, Margaret said: “The first stage involved establishing Lámh Dhearg as a green team, we have completed an audit to establish where we are in terms of meeting the programme milestones and the next stage will involve hosting a community consultation so that we can establish how the wider community hope to benefit from the programme.
“We will also be drawing up a green club charter for Lámh Dhearg and the theme that we are working around is ‘neighbours in nature – making the most of what is around us’. The first part of that is educating our members about the environment around the club such as the plants and species that are native to the area.
“We are working with the Belfast Hills Partnership to develop a video on how to make the most of the woodland surrounding our ground and are looking at the possibility of developing a Fairy Trail on site.”
Margaret said in relation to communication, the forward-thinking club are hoping to install new signs to encourage those making use of their grounds to take their waste home.
“In addition to this we are encouraging other clubs to join us in banning single use plastics from our grounds and encouraging the use of reusable water bottles. We are also hoping to have another water fountain installed on site to encourage the use of reusables.
“Our third theme is ‘action to protect’ and involves getting the community involved in promoting an initiative involved in adopting a spot in the club grounds which they will clean up, green up and spruce up. We are also looking at installing some more seating areas in the ground so that our older visitors have somewhere to rest.
“Our final theme is ‘action to encourage’ and we have already started to install some bird boxes to encourage nature into the ground. We are hoping to promote the area behind our 3G pitches as a wildflower area and we are also looking at the creation of an outdoor hub such as a Men’s Shed where we can hold events such as coffee mornings to encourage the wider community to make use of our facilities.”
