- 5 mins read time
- Published: 13th March 2026
Local meets global: Oxfam Ireland launches the Global Education Movement in Northern Ireland
Hosted at the Holywood Golf Club in Co Down, the night’s speakers emphasised how community solidarity has the power to reach the masses.
Holywood Golf Club became a hub of powerful local-meets-global connection and conversation recently, as Oxfam Ireland officially launched the Global Education Movement (GEM) in Northern Ireland on 25 February.
Supported by Irish Aid, GEM is a new initiative designed to empower communities to link the challenges they face locally to the realities experienced by people worldwide.
Hosted by Jim Clarken, CEO of Oxfam Ireland, the event marked the first rollout of GEM in Northern Ireland - building on January’s successful launch in Wexford. It also signalled Oxfam Ireland’s growing commitment to make global justice education more accessible for everyone by curating workshops that are rooted in everyday life. Northern Ireland’s own history of resilience, conflict transformation and community leadership offers a powerful backdrop for this vital work to take shape.
Connecting Northern Ireland to the wider world
At a time when climate breakdown and conflicts that disproportionately affect regular citizens are becoming an increasingly visible part of daily life, GEM aims to create open-hearted spaces for volunteers, students and community groups. It’s all about exploring how inequality operates globally and also close to home, with the two intrinsically linked.
The evening’s keynote address was delivered by Laurence Simms, Joint Secretary of the Irish British Intergovernmental Secretariat. He reflected on his mother’s time working in the Oxfam Ireland store in Rathmines, and his own memories of volunteering in the same shop. “I was wearing second-hand fashion before it was cool,” he said.
Cross-border partnership and dialogue, both of which were central pillars of the peace process in Northern Ireland, remain vital tools for understanding and responding to global challenges today.
Attendees also heard from two leading voices in humanitarian policy and justice:
- Bushra Khalidi: Policy Lead for Oxfam in the Occupied Palestinian Territories provided a sobering update remotely on the escalating humanitarian crisis in Gaza and the disturbing expansion of illegal settlements in the West Bank. Palestinians do not want to be a statistic or a headline, but simply human beings living freely with the same rights as everyone else is entitled to under international law. Bushra has worked for years to fight for the future of Palestine.
- Dr Brendan Browne: Award winning academic and Associate Professor of Conflict Resolution at Trinity College Dublin spoke about how the people of Palestine educated him in the realities of oppression, apartheid, illegal occupation and conflict, when he was working as an educator in the region. Seeing the waves of support for the Palestinian struggle blossom over the past two years has given him hope that the world is finally waking up to the injustice.
Together, the speakers highlighted the interconnectedness of local experience and global struggle - highlighting exactly what GEM is designed to bring to life.
Audiences on the night also heard from Holywood’s own constituency MLA, Andrew Muir of the Alliance Party, who spoke passionately about the Northern Ireland’s desire for better climate action from Government. Oxfam Ireland’s work goes hand-in-hand with this desire for change, targeting textile pollution and the circular economy with our stores.
Director of Public Affairs at Oxfam Ireland, Bríd McGrath, outlined how global citizenship education was a matter of justice not of charity. Using graphs, McGrath showed how economic inequality, gender inequality, the effects of climate breakdown and the decline of freedoms was more predominantly felt in the Global South. This was not an accident due to deliberate policy by countries of the Global North.
We need to understand how we are both the cause and the beneficiary of this global inequality,” Bríd McGrath noted, emphasising how true global citizens must be active. Oxfam Ireland's GEM programme will not only seek to raise awareness and understanding of the world as it is today but would help participants to “scaffold action in their local communities— Bríd McGrath, Director of Public Affairs at Oxfam Ireland
You'll find communities themselves often know the answers but need some help in terms of structure and collective action. GEM aims to be truly transformative at a local level in order to create the change we want to see globally. Together, we are more powerful than we know.— Bríd McGrath, Director of Public Affairs at Oxfam Ireland
In his opening remarks, Oxfam Ireland CEO, Jim Clarken, emphasised Northern Ireland’s long tradition of civic action and grassroots leadership. The deep gratitude for our local volunteers and employees at the Oxfam Holywood Superstore was also a core part of the event. Since its grand opening in April 2024, the Superstore has created a tight-knit bond with the vibrant local town and its residents. We were thrilled to return to Holywood for the GEM launch.
Real change begins in our back garden
Over the next two years, GEM will be rolled out across 24 locations, supported by Oxfam’s network of 45 shops and more than 600 volunteers. Each chosen spot will act as a hub for workshops, conversations and activities that link local stories and concerns to global issues such as climate responsibility, gender justice, forced displacement and conflict. Up next on our GEM map of Ireland is the Ormeau Road store in Belfast.
Communities across Northern Ireland have demonstrated, time and again, that local leadership can transform society. When local experience meets global awareness, unbreakable movements can grow. GEM is here to help make that happen: one community and volunteer at a time.
