On 6 October 2013, a few days after the IPCC presented the first part of its fifth report, the first People of Alternatives, Bizi, was held in Baiona! organised by the Association. The participation was 12,000 people and was the starting point for more than a hundred initiatives that subsequently emerged under the same name. In addition to the Basque Country, there have also been alternatives throughout the French State and in other European countries.

The goal of Bizi! It's to stress that climate change is a matter of gravity and, in general, of the alternatives that are made here and there. However, rather than talking about the problem, they want to talk about solutions. In short, a People of Alternatives is a fair, a showcase of the activities that can be carried out to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. The alternatives are in eleven areas: agriculture, construction, energy, recycling...

According to Bizi!, over 400,000 people have already participated in the events that have taken place under the brand Alternatiba. This huge figure is largely explained by the success of the Vuelta Alternatiba between June and September. The participants climbed the bicycle, in most cases to the tarpaulins of more than one person, and traveled 5,000 kilometres between Baiona and Paris to ask for real solutions to be accepted at the COP21 climate summit in the French capital in December.

24 October, in Bilbao

On 10 and 11 October, the fourth edition of Euskal Herriko Alternatiben Herria was held, with the participation of 3,500 people in Donibane Garazi, before and after Baiona, in Ziburu and Donostia. Bilbao will host on 24 October the International Day against Climate Change, organized by the Social Charter of the Rights of the Basque Country and under the motto Sovereign Life with full rights.

While taking advantage of the wave of the previous Alternatives and using the same name, in Bilbao climate change will not be the only main axis. “We want to assert the need to transform society,” said Liz Quintana, one of the spokesmen for the initiative, “replacing patches with radical solutions, not only in the field of climate”.

The People of Alternatives of Bilbao will have five neighborhoods, all located in the Casco Viejo or its surroundings, dedicated each to an area: nature, social and transformative economy, democracy and sovereignty, education and culture, and a dignified and plural life.

The Charter of Social Rights seeks to assert a social model that puts people’s needs at the centre. In Quintana’s words, “we will have to learn to live with less because we will have no other solution, but the question is to live better with less, because this consumption based model does not make us happier”.