It’s t-minus three days to go, and I’m running around like crazy trying to get all the last-minute stuff in place. In a few days I’m off, and there’s still so much to do!
Along with over 160 young people from around the world, including 24 other Canadians, I’ll be descending on the UN Climate Change Conference in Bali from December 3 - 14. Our purpose? To keep our leaders accountable, stir things up and suggest constructive ways forward. Oh yeah, and to keep building a global youth climate movement.
But where did this movement come from, anyway?
As young people, we’re the ones who will have to deal with the biggest impacts of climate change. Our parents won’t have to clean up this mess - we will. So why don’t we have a place at the climate talks table? It seems only right that the people most affected by climate change should get a say in how an international climate agreement is shaped.
Not being the type to sit quietly on the side, hundreds of us converged in Montreal in 2005, when the Climate Change negotiations were held in Canada. We brought our energy, creativity and willingness to stir things up without worrying too much about the consequences. This conference was actually when Its Getting Hot In Here was first founded (trivia fact!).
Last year in Nairobi, youth delegates went again to the negotiations and blew everyone away by lobbying leaders, staging creative actions, and building bridges with others who are fighting for strong climate action.
This year in Bali, the stakes are even higher. This is the year when we MUST develop a post-2012 plan and starting working toward it. We can’t afford to stall any longer if we want to avoid dangerous climate change, as the just-released 4th IPCC Assessment Report makes crystal clear.
And the role of youth is becoming more prominent. Even UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon acknowledges that we’re the most important stakeholders here. I have a feeling that this is our year. We’re going to build this global movement into a global roar, so that politicians around the world can’t ignore us any longer.
Our words are varied but our message is the same: we want a safe and just climate future, and we want it now.
Keep your eyes peeled here over the next few weeks as we report back from the front lines of the international climate talks, sharing what’s happening, what it all means and how it impact us. We promise to write here, and write often. And if you’re not going to Bali (or even if you are), please stand in solidarity with us and send a message to your leader urging climate action!
Check out frequent dispatches from the youth delegation to the Bali International Climate Negotiations here at It’s Getting Hot In Here and at Bali Buzz (where you’ll also find news updates and releases from major news outlets on the Bali Negotiations).
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you go, Liz. I really appreciated the ease and comfortable way you handled yourself on CBC Newsworld midafternoon on the 26 (at least that when I saw you on, don’t know if that live).
i, for one, am completely behind you. your statement “we want a safe and just climate future, and we want it now” is such a compact, concise statement. and one not too much to ask for.
thank you sharing, and good luck. I hope we can learn from the perspectives of other youth at the conference, not just youth from Canada, the US, and Europe.
We will be making a big effort to get other delegations blogging from Bali. Unfortunately, the high cost of traveling to Bali has prevented a number of youth organizations from the developing world from participating. Hopefully, we will get some bloggers from Indonesia though!
iNTERESTED IN THE BAIL CONFERENCE. hOW CAN i GO??