1st International Vegan Festival 1981 - Denmark

from The Vegan (Vegan Society UK):

INTERNATIONAL VEGAN FESTIVAL DENMARK JULY 1981

During the busy week at the Festival for Mind, Body & Spirit at Olympia. I was privileged to receive an invitation to take the Vegan Society film "A Better Future For All Life", to show at an International Vegan Festival in Denmark - only a fortnight away. The event was being organised by our Danish member Kirsten Jungsberg and about 50 people were expected. How could I refuse?

Margaret Ploger, originally from Germany, and two members from Bath travelled from England and it was a great joy for us to meet the hospitable Danes, a lady from Finland, and Dee North and her party from Sweden. (The Swedish Vegan Society, founded by Dee in 1976, now has 673 members.) I think our greatest surprise and delight was when a French party of 14 arrived. They were from a 100-strong vegan co-op movement that runs a shop in Paris. They have two plots of land in the country outside, aim at being self-supportive and avoid orthodox medicine. They had been going for five years and seemed as surprised to hear of us as we we were to hear of them.

I was able to give a talk on the growth of the Vegan Society and many questions were forthcoming after the showing of the Society's film.

Our thanks go to Kirsten and her Danish friends for their initiative and hard work. I feel that we shall be hearing much more about vegans overseas and, who knows, we may have a Vegan World Conference in the not too distant future!

Serena Coles


Compiled by John Davis