The Brome County Agricultural Society (BCAS) is expanding its eco-responsible approach for the 2023 edition of Brome Fair to reduce the amount of waste that is produced and sent to the regional landfill.
The expansion of BCAS’s is a part of a longer-term vision to assess its carbon footprint and to come up with a plan to “mitigate that footprint over time,” according to Peter McAuslan, chairperson of the BCAS’s Suitability Committee ("Green Team").
“Agriculture lives with a healthy environment. So it seems logical that when you have an agricultural event, such as the fair, that we should try to be as green as we possibly can. It seems consistent with the mission of the agricultural community, that’s the basis of it,” explained McAuslan. “Of course, we also see what’s going on around us. The circumstances we are beginning to see daily that affect people around the world and our own community."
In partnership with Festivals et Événements Verts de l’Estrie, which has provided guidance and support to the BCAS in developing a more environmentally-friendly approach over the last couple of years, the BCAS is stepping up its commitment to the environment by introducing a number of new green initiatives at this year’s Brome Fair.
These initiatives include having water stations available on site to encourage people to bring their water bottles rather than buying plastics and promoting carpooling by no longer including parking for any of the admission tickets. Instead, parking will be available at a rate of $10 per day per vehicle.
“The actual suppliers on site, the restaurants and so on, have also been obligated this year to buy compostable, recyclable, materials. So everything in the restaurant and so on can go into composting. There are no plastics at all that are allowed to be used by people offering those services. It’s a multiple sort of plan,” added McAuslan.
To ensure that these initiatives are successful, the BCAS has beefed up its waste management system.
“There is a gang of people (the Green Team) off in the back of the site and they actually sort things. We sort things into recyclable materials, organics that can go into composting programs, and things like bottles., etc,.That’s been going on and we are beefing that up, we are using some volunteers,” mentioned McAuslan. (…) “We’ve now increased the number of triple bins on the site to 60. There’s multiple places for people to properly place the materials that they generate.”
For all of the agricultural plastics, they will be collected and recovered through the Agri-Récup program.
“There is program set in place in the municipal regional area to reutilize plastics. We have all see the humungous marshmallow like bales here and there along farms during haying season, that is the material that is being collected and re-used,” McAuslan said. “(…) The idea is to work with them and to give that program a little bit of recognition within the farming community.”
Marking some of the first major steps in reducing its carbon footprint, McAuslan emphasized that the BCAS is “determined” to play its part in helping the environment.
“We really would like, in-so-far as possible, be carbon neutral. That’s a challenge for an organization such as ours, but that’s the attitude of the leadership of the board is to take us in that direction,” he noted.
The BCAS’s Sustainability Committee is still looking for volunteers. If you are interested in becoming a volunteer, call 450-242-3976. Brome Fair runs from Sept. 1-4.
Listen to the full interview below: