Environmental as anything

Davie Philip lives according to his principles – he wears hemp clothes, shares a communal house and works with a co-op. Softly spoken with a mellowed Scottish accent, he is passionate about his latest project, the Convergence Festival, which has just ended in Dublin’s Project Theatre. Its title, ‘Exploring Culture For A Better World’, reflects his inherent optimism.

The annual festival brings together a diverse and eclectic bunch of people including activists, actors and academics to discuss topics such as green architecture, fair trade and ecology. In essence, it’s about opposing corporate power and campaigning for global justice.

But Davie hasn’t always had a problem with multi-national corporations. When he left school in the early ’80s BP sponsored his four-year welding apprenticeship in his hometown of Grangemouth. His dad, who had been a painter decorator before taking a job with the oil company, thought “that if you had an apprenticeship in BP that was you safe for life sort of thing”. Davie, however, was neither interested in welding nor a safe life. He wanted to dye his mohawk red and sing with his punk band. But most of all he wanted to skate.

From the time he got his first skateboard at the age of 11, he was passionate about skating. Magnus Woolfe Murray, nicknamed Moona, was also obsessed with skateboarding and knew Davie well. “He was the best in Scotland and Britain at the time. He was leader of the pack sort of thing, but very modest and mellow with it. We’d look up to him and say, ‘Waah, I’ve got to learn from him’. He was our god.”

The day after Davie ended his welding apprenticeship he and the skateboarding “brotherhood” went to the USA where they bought a van and spent five months travelling around the west coast. For four years Davie skated professionally (sponsored by Converse Shoes and Nike), and internationally from Turkey to Brazil. “He was respected all over the world for what he did on a skateboard,” according to Moona.

Back in Scotland Davie’s entrepreneurial skills came to the fore when he set up business selling surf equipment and skateboards. He soon got into designing skateboarding clothing made from natural, hardwearing material. The first designs were based on the pattern of his dad’s pyjamas. From these humble beginnings grew Poizone, a clothing company jointly established by Davie and business partner Jamie Blair. In 1989 they won the Prince of Wales and Reader’s Digest UK Young Entrepreneur of the Year award.

In spite of their success “business for the sake of buying and selling stuff” was not for Davie so he sold his share in the company. It’s a move he doesn’t regret. “Everything is now made in sweatshops in Indonesia, not by local suppliers in Scotland like it was when first established,” he says. “After selling the business I wandered around south-east Asia for a year and a half where I got into meditation and yoga and books. Then I came to Ireland following my girlfriend of the time. I spent six months surfing in Donegal and then I went to Galway to do my Leaving Certificate in 1995. Afterwards I started studying Anthropology and Philosophy at NUI, Maynooth.”

It was there that Davie started getting into environmental issues. Micheal Murray remembers setting up the student society, Low Impact, and launching the first Earth Fair with him: “Originally when we conceived of the idea of Low Impact and having these conferences it was about opening up this term environmentalism, particularly to working class groups, trade unions, the whole rainbow coalition thing”.

In Davie’s final year at NUI Low Impact brought Indian physicist and philosopher Vandana Shiva to Ireland as the keynote speaker for that year’s Earth Fair. One of the world’s most outspoken critics of genetic engineering and bio-patenting, her presence inspired many of her Irish audience, including Davie, into activism. The anti-GM food campaign in Ireland blossomed and in 1998 Davie was one of those arrested and charged with destroying Monsanto’s genetically engineered sugar beet in county Wexford. Everyone charged was acquitted.

Davie’s excitement at the success of the Earth Fair in 1998 was, his Dad reckons, the reason he decided not to sit his final exams. So, after three years at NUI, he left without a degree but with a new passion – the promotion of ecological sustainability, which he set about with tenacity.

Micheal Murray remembers Davie as very

single-minded, very focussed and an absolute brilliant man for thinking on his feet: “To be

honest I think innovation is his greatest strength.” He took the original idea of Low Impact’s student Earth Fair and from it created the Convergence festival, now in its third year and sponsored by the Department of the Environment, Temple Bar, Nude and Dublin City Council.

Davie is convinced of the importance of sustainability and events such as this year’s Convergence Festival. “It always amazed me when I met people in Britain from the DIY culture who were doing exactly the same events. It was like, wow, we are connected to something that is much bigger than just us. It’s progressive, it’s new and together it could make a difference”.

The festival, now organised by Sustainable Ireland co-operative, is not the only eco-project Davie is involved in. He also works part time for Feasta, the Foundation for Sustainable Economics and is a member of Ireland’s only eco-village, The Village. And although he is a key player in the anti-globalisation movement in Ireland he’s adamant he’s not fighting anything.

“I’m just doing what I do. I want to have a livelihood that gives me satisfaction and I feel is doing something for the good. I won’t work for anyone again. It’s been 20 years since I worked for BP and I don’t want to do that again. I want to work with likeminded people; people who are in control of our livelihood and have the potential to make a difference in our own life and in other people’s lives.”

One thing is clear, whether the campaign for ecological sustainability succeeds or not, Davie is giving it his all. As one old friend from Scotland said, when Davie gets into something “he does nay do it; he loves it”.