With only six weeks left before the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change — thankfully known as COP21 for short — it’s time to get serious about what message needs to be sent to the world’s leaders regarding the climate crisis.
Plenty of promises regarding the fight against climate change have been made at past COP meetings, but the environment has little to show for them as past promises have mostly failed to become real world actions. So how do we avoid this same outcome in Paris?
There are a couple of organizations that think they’ve come up with at least one good idea. Boulder-based Global Greengrants Fund and 350.org think COP21 should be about the world’s youth, because it is the young who are inheriting the mess we’ve made and who will have to figure out how to reverse, or at least survive, the ever-worsening climate crisis.
“The climate crisis affects everyone, but it will affect today’s youth and future generations most of all as the impacts worsen in the years to come,” says Micah Parkin, executive director of 350 Colorado. “Fortunately, most young people today know what’s at stake and are stepping up in powerful ways to change the current paradigm — from fossil fuel divestment campaigns on campuses to local community campaigns to protect themselves against polluters and promote the transition to a clean energy future. Youth are leading the way.”
The two organizations are working to send a delegation of young environmental activists to COP21 as part of a program they’re calling #YouthOnClimate Road to Paris.
When asked why it’s so important to get young people to COP21, Katy Neusteter, Global Greengrants senior communications manager, says, “Because they’re the future leaders. They’re inheriting this planet that’s warming and they have the energy and ideas we need to pull us through this crisis.”
In recent months, Global Greengrants Fund and 350.org have been working together to deliver grants to young environmental activists in Africa, Asia, the Middle East, Latin America and elsewhere to document and address the impacts of climate change in their communities. Why these locations? Neusteter says, “We believe that the people on the front lines are best equipped to handle the challenges in their environment that are effecting their lives everyday.”
The #YouthOnClimate Road to Paris program will help bring these young leaders from across the globe to the world stage in Paris, where it will be nearly impossible to ignore their demand for “real action now.”
Fortunately, for those of us who live in Boulder County, the Road to Paris starts right here on Thursday, Oct. 15, when Global Greengrants Fund and 350.org will host “Climate Change and Youth Voices” at the Boulder Public Library. The event will include the following speakers:
Nnimmo Bassey — award-winning environmental activist from Nigeria and Global Greengrants board chair
Nurul MohdReza — CU-Boulder student and energy pioneer
Liz Gangware — CU-Boulder student and member of Fossil Free CU
In addition, the event will feature screenings of a series of videos from Ecuador, Kenya and the Philippines in the Library’s Canyon Theater. The videos will tell the powerful stories of youth activists like 21-year-old Ekai Nabenyo, whose small village of Lorengelup in Northern Kenya is struggling as a result of climate change and energy extraction. Nabenyo shares how the lake that provides both food and water for his community is drying up even as the oil companies take an everincreasing share of the region’s limited water resources.
The world’s leaders need to know that the people who will still be around decades from now are watching, and this time it’s going to take more than empty promises to keep them pacified.
ON THE BILL: Climate Change and Youth Voices. 5-6 p.m. Thursday, Oct. 15, Boulder Public Library, 1001 Arapahoe Ave. Library Garden – refreshments. 6-7 p.m. Canyon Theater screenings. Q&A to follow screening. Free, but please RSVP at www. greengrants.org.
