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View all search resultsAvoiding our ghastly future – the power of collective action
Indonesia provides examples of sustainable interventions that have reduced deforestation, much of it through collaborative efforts and collective actions.
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I
n an unusually blunt assessment, a group of scientists early this year warned of the catastrophic consequences of climate change. Their paper, “Underestimating the Challenge of Avoiding a Ghastly Future”, published last month, presented ample evidence that our environmental conditions are much more dangerous than commonly believed.
Almost as dangerous is the chronic underestimating of the perils of climate change by leaders and governments, leading to the failures to achieve the already established sustainable development goals.
The Paris Agreement adopted at the Paris climate conference (COP21) in December 2015 set the 1.5–2 degrees Celsius target to avoid dangerous climate change. However, without huge additional commitments, global warming is expected to reach 2.6–3.1 degrees by 2100, even if present commitments are achieved – an impending catastrophe for biodiversity and humanity.
In another assessment, the 2020 United Nations’ Global Biodiversity Outlook reported that none of the ambitious goals of the Aichi Biodiversity Targets were reached. The targets were set in 2010 by 196 countries in Japan, aimed at conserving the world’s biodiversity. The aim of the 2020 Outlook is to reset the 10-year plan so that the 2050 Vision for Biodiversity could be achieved, a task that would require a global collective effort.
How likely is that to happen? Skepticism abounds but if we treat the current response (however imperfect) to the global suffering and disruptions caused by the pandemic as a dress rehearsal to confront the dangers ahead, society may respond in the same way for the climate change crisis.
As the UN Secretary-General António Guterres stated in the report: “the response of governments and people around the world [to the pandemic] has demonstrated society’s capacity to take previously unimaginable steps, involving huge transformations, solidarity and multilateral effort in the face of an urgent common threat.”
Indeed, contrary to what many governments and leaders believe, there is strong evidence of widespread support for urgent climate change action. In the largest survey of public opinion on climate change ever conducted, for example, 64 percent of the 1.2 million people polled in late 2020 by the UN Development Program believed climate change was a "global emergency".
