In the lead-up to the Copenhagen conference on climate change (COP15) scheduled to take place this December in only a matter of days, the environment is on everybody’s minds.
It has wealthy nations heading back to the drawing boards of environmental policy; it has emerging-market economies striving to make their climate change agendas well known; it has developing nations making their voices heard in order to declare the need for poverty-conscious environmental programs (and for environment-conscious poverty-reduction programs); and, it has United Nations officials highlighting the importance of women’s rights and family planning to mitigating the effects of environmental degradation.
But, where are the voices of the world’s children? Climate change is unquestionably an issue that is of the utmost significance to young people, as it is they who will inherit a planet under stress.
In a groundbreaking decision in 1983, the World Commission on the Environment and Development was formed by the United Nations to investigate the consequences of environmental degradation. Four years later, the Commission’s findings—commonly known as the “Brundtland Report,” named after the Commission’s chair, Dr. Gro Harlem Brundtland—developed a definition for sustainable development.
Sustainable development, a way for poor nations to responsibly lift themselves out of poverty and a way for richer nations to live responsibly, is defined as: “development that meets the needs of the present without compromising the ability of future generations to meet their own needs.”
In recognition of the environment’s centrality to human life, children in Canada and in developing countries around the world, spoke out actively in support of Copenhagen and for the future of the Earth. At the start of the month, before the Canadian government announced today its decision to fund $10 million for programs that fight climate change in poor nations, hundreds of Canadian children wrote to Prime Minister Stephen Harper, requesting him to make new inroads in the fight against global warming.
On a world scale, the Children's Climate Forum, sponsored and organized by UNICEF, kicked off today in Copenhagen. The 160 children from more than 40 countries that are delegates at this conference have begun discussions that will culminate with the creation of their own declaration to be read at the official UN conference on December 7-18. Some youth delegates will engage in a dialogue with world leaders and UN special envoys for the environment during the first days of COP15.
It is important that children are recognized as stakeholders in global issues, and that their input is sought and considered seriously.
Already, millions of people face difficulty finding any water (let alone, clean water) as well as arable land on which to grow food. It is estimated that in the near future, the number of climate change related deaths among children will increase to about 160 000 per year in Africa and Asia alone. That’s 160 000 futures snatched away, irretrievably.
The Copenhagen conference and the Children's Climate Forum are two substantial opportunities to set the stage for positive change and establish life-saving policy decisions. They are opportunities with which to give the Earth—and its human inhabitants: men, women, and children; wealthy and poor— a new lease on life.