What is Bioregional Weaving Lab?

BWL SE (South East) Ireland consists of the Irish stakeholders and partners we engage with and the nature in the land and sea we are held by.  We are everyone and everything choosing to work collectively for a better future, be they within or outside of the South East Irish bioregion.

BWL SE Ireland is a non-profit organization, in operation since 2022 and formally constituted in 2024 (see BWAI below). We are currently funded by international grants and diverse Irish project-based funding. The small core team operates through an office at Dunhill EcoPark in County Waterford. It is connected to a wider network of more loosely related colleagues across Europe who work in sister Bioregional Weaving Labs, collectively coordinated by the global NGOs Commonland and Ashoka.

Our mission is to work in a variety of ways to generate environmental, social, financial, and inspirational value in a geographical area that we call the SE Ireland bioregion. The bioregion, or landscape, is defined by both nature and culture, does not follow traditional county and regional borders.

Our principles include being place-based, community-led, regenerative, systemic, holistic and guided by the common good. We focus on long-term change at a bioregional scale, focusing on relational connections to build the futures we aspire to.

We aim to support local changemakers and connect their ideas and innovations based on personal lived experiences and insights to make greater collective impact for a better future for ecosystems and communities. Knowledge-exchange with other European BWLs may lead to replication of ideas and systems approaches from one country to another.

BWL SE Ireland sees itself as a transition hub, or a bioregional learning centre, or a living lab, or a safe space of belonging – deeply embedded in our local context and ready to work with similar sister organisations around Ireland and beyond.

BWL SE Ireland is guided by a manifesto we co-wrote with local stakeholders in 2022 – the Waterford Bioregion Food Manifesto. This is also aligned with the mission of the BWL European Collective of ‘Restoring, Regenerating or protecting 1 million Hectares of Land, mobilizing 1 million changemakers and delivering value through 4 Returns (social, environmental, financial and inspiration).

The Bioregional Food Manifesto, written by 40 farmers, teachers, growers, decision makers and engaged citizens is a powerful and emotional statement of the future we aspire to.

The manifesto is best read out loud or listened to when you have a few minutes to dedicate to it – you can do that here: The Waterford Bioregion Food Manifesto.

Read more about how the manifesto was written in this report and others from autumn 2022 downloadable from our Resources Page.

The manifesto is ambitious. We want to deliver on each and every line of it. Join us.

The BWAI is the name of the legal entity established in 2024 as a non-profit Company Limited by Guarantee (CLG) – (register number 762472). There is a board of four people. BWAI was established in a form suitable for support other organizations across Ireland that might want to work in similar ways in Ireland under a common umbrella organization.  Bioregional Weaving Lab SE Ireland is the current operating identity of the Bioregional Weaving Alliance Ireland CLG.

The objects for which BWAI is established are as follows:

1. To support initiatives and actions that lead to the holistic protection, restoration and regeneration or land and waters, working at a bioregional scale and contributing to thriving ecosystems and communities, and for the common good.
2. To consider the SE Bioregion as an area of prioritized focus (defined by natural and cultural factors, including all of County Waterford and some of the neighbouring counties and marine area), including its connection to the Bioregional Weaving Lab Collective in Europe

The BWAI constitution states that the organisation will: ‘Strive to work through participatory, democratic, solidarity and equitable mechanisms for the mobilization of changemakers and sustainable systems change’.

BWL SE Ireland is one of eight BWLs around Europe coordinated by two main backbone organisations, both global pioneering NGOs: Commonland and Ashoka.

BWL Collective consists of BWLs located in Spain, Romania, France, The Netherlands, Greece and Poland.

Commonland works for holistic landscape restoration from Australia to India and developed the 4 Returns and 3 Zone frameworks.

Ashoka is a network of 4000 world-leading social innovators and has an ambition that everyone can be a changemaker.