BT 2009 – Feel the Heat!
From July 2009 we cycled from Macedonia to Croatia, crossing Albania, Montenegro and Bosnia and Herzegovina. We start our tour on the Belgrade-Skopje train, and reached the MuM festival in Croatia on the 28th of August
To get an impression of our huge trip, you can watch pictures in the gallery on our site or at the (picture) blogs of several Biketour participants.
This year, the biketour chose the theme of climate change and energy. In November, the biggest climate summit ever will be held in Copenhagen. The EU is negotiating its energy and climate package for this summit, which still will be far from sufficient to solve the climate crisis. Only, climate and energy policy in the Balkans is even worse! So now the risk is huge that non-EU South Eastern Europe will end up as the sink-hole for dirty energy production of the EU – with all their oil pipelines, nuclear- and coal-fired power, etc.
In the Balkans, national climate energy strategies are underdeveloped and still created in in-transparent ways. There’s low public awareness on environmental issues, generally weak civil society and many corrupt governments. The region urgently needs attention from all people who know about the issues of environment, especially climate change and energy, to raise awareness amongst the public and to governments.
The biketour visits interesting places on its way: alternative, environmental, artistic projects and communities, nature monuments and people who preserve them or resist environmental destruction. During the planning of our route, we will make links with local environmental activists, and see how they are fighting climate change, and to learn what’s going on with regional energy politics. Together, we hope to organise workshops on our way, help out environmentalists from the region by participating in their campaigns, prepare actions with local people, and make the 19th biketour a great ride!!
