Nimbin is a village in the Northern Rivers area of the Australian state of New South Wales, approximately 30 km (19 mi) north of Lismore, 33 km (21 mi) southeast of Kyogle, and 70 km (43 mi) west of Byron Bay.
Nimbin is notable for the prominence of its environmental initiatives such as permaculture, sustainability and self-sufficiency as well as the cannabis counterculture. Writer Austin Pick described his initial impressions of the village this way: "It is as if a smoky avenue of Amsterdam has been placed in the middle of the mountains behind frontier-style building facades. ... Nimbin is a strange place indeed."
Nimbin has been described in literature and mainstream media as 'the drug capital of Australia', 'a social experiment' and 'an escapist sub-culture'. Nimbin has become an icon in Australian cultural history with many of the values first introduced there by the counterculture becoming part of modern Australian culture.
History
Nimbin and surrounding areas are part of what is known as the "Rainbow Region", which is of cultural importance to the Indigenous Bundjalung people. The name Nimbin comes from the local Whiyabul (Widgibal) clan whose Dreamtime speaks of the Nimbinjee spirit people protecting the area. In recent decades, since 1973, the area has become a haven for Australia's counterculture.
Forests of Red Cedar first attracted loggers to the area in the 1840s, but by the end of the century most of the land had been cleared. With the Cedar forests gone, Nimbin was subdivided in 1903 with the land turned over to dairy farming and growing bananas. In the 1960s, the local dairy industry collapsed due to recession and Nimbin went into serious economic decline until 1973, when the Aquarius Festival, a large gathering of university students, practitioners of alternative lifestyles, 'hippies' and party people, was held in the village. The Festival was the first event in Australia that sought permission for the use of land from the Traditional Owners and a significant attempt at reconciliation. After the festival hundreds of participants and festival goers remained in Nimbin to form communes and other multiple occupancy communities, in search of an "alternative lifestyle". Nimbin in fact made legal history for the first ever application of group title ownership of land in Australia. Since the Aquarius Festival, the region has attracted thousands of writers, artists, musicians, actors, environmentalists and permaculture enthusiasts, as well as tourists and young families escaping city life.
Lee Hartney from The Smith Street Band was born in Nimbin in a barn.
In 1979, the Nimbin community staged the "Battle for Terania Creek" to protect the remaining local rainforest. As a result, the New South Wales government imposed a "no rainforest logging" policy covering the entire state, the world’s first government legislation to protect rainforest.
The population of Nimbin before the failure of the dairy industry in 1961 was 6,020. At the 2006 census Nimbin had a population of 352, compared to 321 at the 2001 census. The region's high rural population . Nimbin had the highest unemployment rate in the Lismore Local Government Area in 2006, 18.1 percent. Nimbin's population at the 2011 census was 468.
Cannabis culture and MardiGrass
In New South Wales the cultivation, possession or sale of cannabis is punishable by law. In Nimbin, cannabis is openly bought, sold and consumed.
The prevalence of a drug culture in Nimbin since 1973 has been accompanied by a prevalence of collective and public creativity: colourful and spiritually motivated art (including large paintings above the shop awnings), music, poetry, craft and fashion can all be seen on the main street. The town is known as a hotspot for alternative social activities, grassroots political discourse, and the espousal of naturalist, humanist, anarchist, feminist, libertarian, permissive, new-age, mystical and radical social philosophies (which can all be seen as collective creative endeavours).
To rally for an end to the prohibition of cannabis in Australia, Nimbin has held an annual MardiGrass festival since 1993. On the first weekend with any part of it in May, thousands descend on Nimbin for cannabis oriented fun and frivolity. Activities include: a Prohibition Protest Rally and Parade with the Ganja Faeries, the Nimbin Cannabis Cup, the Hemp Olympix, which includes the Bong "Throw'n'Yell", Joint Rolling, and the Grower's Iron Person event, where runners must first carry a 20 kg (44 lb) sack of fertiliser, then a bucket of water, and finally "the crop", as a tribute to the difficulties faced by growers in the hills, and to show that cannabis users can be fit and healthy. At night, entertainment ranges from the Harvest Ball and Picker's Ball, rave doof parties, to poetry and jazz in local cafes.
There are a number of shops in Nimbin geared to the cannabis culture.
Police intervention
The level of police intervention against drug trafficking has fluctuated over the years, however the State and Federal Police have never been able to stop or even significantly reduce the prevalence of cannabis use in the village. In April 2008, a squad of 110 officers, six horses and police dogs conducted searches in a police operation. Several buildings were searched including the Hemp Embassy. Eight people were arrested, 72 people were issued cannabis cautions and police seized 4 kilograms (9 lb) of cannabis and cannabis ‘cookies’. Police sent letters to the Nimbin Museum and the Hemp Bar leaseholders indicating an intention to seek closure orders under the Restricted Premises Act of 1943 for the MardiGrass weekend. The Restricted Premises Act allows for the closure of premises for three days and orders may be obtained weekly. The Museum reopened with a new leaseholder while the Hemp Bar remained closed for eight months and reopened in January 2009.
CCTV cameras in the main street of Nimbin had pushed dealing off the streets and into the museum and the Hemp Embassy had been requesting that police deal with the problem. Following the raids, Hemp Embassy volunteer Andrew Kavasilas commented: "This is a real slap in the face for people who would like to see other resources in town. We have been inviting the police to come down and sort out the dealing in the museum for years and this is their response. They could work with the community, but they're not interested." Many locals voiced their opposition to the Police operation. Following the operation, Richmond Police local area commander Superintendent Bruce Lyons vowed to "shut down the drug trade."
Nimbin's local economy
A wide variety of accommodation is available for visitors, from camping grounds and backpacker hostels, to bush cabins and hotels.
Nimbin has a police station, hospital and medical centre, lawyers, real estate agency, service station with NRMA accreditation, restaurants, cafes and pub. The pub has an in-house restaurant. There are a number of sporting clubs and the Bowling Club maintains licensed premises. The Nimbin Neighbourhood and Information Centre (NNIC) run by local volunteer residents offers visitors guides, computers for Internet use, a small Centrelink office, legal advice, nurse practitioner, welfare worker, weekly soup kitchen in the adjacent park, and publishing service for the local newspaper. Local entertainments include the town hall, once a year Madigrass, markets, bands, walks to the mountains, and day-to-day activities from buskers to street stalls.
Other nearby attractions:
Media
The Nimbin Good Times is a free monthly community newspaper, also distributed in Lismore, Byron Bay, and some suburbs of Brisbane and Sydney. The community radio station is 2NIMFM which offers an independent alternative media voice playing a diverse range of music and programming in Japanese, German, and Bundjalung language.