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At the Youth4Climate: Driving Ambition summit in Milan, hundreds of young delegates from all over the world worked together to draft a seminal

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Youth Driving Ambition

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On the central theme of Youth Driving Ambition, the writers of the Youth4Climate Manifesto called on policymakers to open new avenues to young people and empower them to participate in the process of developing and implementing climate action. In response, the <a href="https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/resource/cma2021_L16_adv.pdf" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Glasgow Climate Pact</a> included a call “to ensure meaningful youth participation and representation in multilateral, national and local decision-making processes.” Additionally, Italian Minister for Ecological Transition Roberto Cingolani announced at the COP that the Youth4Climate summit will henceforth be an annual event, giving young people a direct pipeline to the latest climate negotiations.

In particular, the Manifesto called for renewed commitment to elevating, respecting and acting on the voices of indigenous people, women, and the most vulnerable. At COP26, the <a href="https://unfccc.int/sites/default/files/resource/Improved%20Marrakech%20…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">Improved Marrakech Partnership for Enhancing Ambition</a> incorporated this message into its charter along with a five-year plan emphasizing accountability to stakeholders. A number of countries, including Bolivia, Canada, Ecuador, the US, and the UK, made fresh commitments to Gender Action, investing in women’s leadership and initiating a policy of conducting gender breakdowns in all statistical climate analyses moving forward.

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Sustainable Recovery

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Within the Sustainable Recovery theme, the Youth4Climate Manifesto urged all countries to rapidly transition towards renewable energy to reach net zero emissions by 2030. The percentage of the world covered by net zero targets now stands at 90%, up from 30% two years ago, but most of these plans do not meet the ambitious timeline called for in the Manifesto. To help push for increased ambition, The Glasgow Climate Pact sped up the timeline for countries to submit stronger Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), requesting that world leaders “revisit and strengthen” their 2030 targets by COP27 next year.

The Manifesto stressed the role of innovation and technological development in driving the needed changes, a message which 35 world leaders at COP26 took to heart in their accession to the new <a href="https://ukcop26.org/breakthrough-agenda-launching-an-annual-global-chec…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">Glasgow Breakthrough Agenda</a>, which aims to accelerate the development and deployment of clean technologies around the world this decade—all while driving down costs. The Breakthrough Agenda’s primary objectives are making renewable energy structures attractive alternatives in the most population-heavy regions of the world by 2030 and empowering developing countries to take advantage of clean energy.

In line with the Manifesto’s call for collaboration with the private sector on green energy, the Glasgow Financial Alliance has committed over $130 trillion (USD) in private capital to reshaping the global economy. Spanning 45 countries, these commitments will go a long way toward making net zero a reality.

One point youth leaders were very clear on in their text is the need to abandon entirely the exploration and extraction of fossil fuels. Although COP26 did not deliver the ambition asked for by young people on this front, their calls for action did spur some progress in Glasgow. Denmark and Costa Rica launched the <a href="https://beyondoilandgasalliance.com/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">Beyond Oil & Gas Alliance</a> with countries such as France, Sweden, and Ireland, who all committed to a managed phase-out of oil and gas production within their borders. The UK assembled a coalition of 190 countries committed to the rapid upscaling of green power and the <a href="https://unfccc.int/news/end-of-coal-in-sight-at-cop26" style="text-decoration-line: none;">abolishment of coal</a> by the 2030s for major economies and the 2040s for the rest of the world. The Glasgow Climate Pact also marked the first time that a COP decision text has directly referenced the need to move away from coal reliance and fossil fuel subsidies.

In the push toward a sustainable future, the Manifesto was resolute that developed nations must assist developing nations in their implementation of the energy transition. On this front, COP26 saw some big announcements, including the launch of a World Bank trust fund that will mobilize $200 million over the next decade to support the decarbonization of road transport in emerging and developing economies. The UK government’s <a href="https://www.gov.uk/government/news/uk-funding-to-support-developing-cit…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">Urban Climate Action program (UCAP)</a> was also a standout, pledging $27.5 million in funding to support cities across Africa, Asia and Latin America as they pursue net zero.

Accounting for “loss and damage” was key to the youth leaders’ conception of Sustainable Recovery, and COP took some needed steps in this regard. Section VI of the Glasgow Climate Pact empowered the Santiago Network to ramp up its ongoing efforts to address loss and damage worldwide while bolstering resilience to future climate impacts. While COP26 may not have delivered the level of progress hoped for by Youth4Climate delegates, loss and damage became a central topic in the negotiations. In the Pact, countries agreed to start a dialogue in anticipation of COP27, which was viewed by the Alliance of Small Island States as “a key step towards the creation of a loss and damage finance facility.”

The cultivation of nature-based farming practices and climate-smart agriculture is a major priority of the Youth4Climate Manifesto—no surprise, given the extent and impact of our food systems. Responding to this call to action, 45 nations and 95 high-profile companies at COP26 pledged to redouble action and investment toward <a href="https://unfccc.int/news/nations-and-businesses-commit-to-create-sustain…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">safeguarding nature and transitioning agriculture</a> to a sustainable model in the years to come. Further, more than 100 countries pledged to <a href="https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-11-01/100-nations-pledge-t…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">halt and reverse deforestation and land degradation</a> by 2030 with the help of $19 billion in allocated public and private funds.

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Non-State Actors’ Engagement

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The vision articulated in the Youth4Climate Manifesto extended beyond governments, stressing the need to engage non-state actors in the building of a green future as well. One key means of facilitating this sort of engagement, wrote the youth delegates, is “promoting and simplifying the processes for equitable global technology transfer,” both among research institutions and between those institutions and private industry. At COP26, the UK-led <a href="https://ukcop26.org/breakthrough-agenda-launching-an-annual-global-chec…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">Breakthrough Agenda</a>, which enlisted 42 nations, aligned itself with this aim, pledging to ramp up the development and rollout of innovative green tech worldwide. And in a dedicated “clean technology development drive,” 35 world leaders committed to increasing their countries’ ambition on both producing green tech and making it more affordable for the average consumer this decade.

It’s no secret that the wasteful “fast fashion” industry is long overdue for a pivot to sustainable practices, and the drafters of the Manifesto demanded the fleshing-out of “guidelines to elaborate … ethical, sustainable, and climate-friendly” approaches to clothing production. Rolled out at COP26, the updated <a href="https://unfccc.int/news/fashion-industry-steps-up-climate-ambition-with…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">UNFCCC Fashion Industry Charter for Climate Action</a>, to which 130 companies and 41 supporting organizations are signatories, lays out a plan to source all of the industry’s electricity sustainably by 2030, abandoning coal power for good. It also offers guidelines on the responsible sourcing of raw materials.

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Climate-Conscious Society

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A vital and overarching goal of the Manifesto was the cultivation of a climate-conscious society worldwide. Recognizing the deepening impacts of the climate crisis, the document called for the proliferation of knowledge of “the interconnected implications for the environment and nature as a whole,” with special emphasis on addressing biodiversity and embracing nature-based solutions. At COP26, 95 leading UK companies, including Burberry and ITV, committed to a <a href="https://spnews.com/british-businesses-pledge-naturepositive/" style="text-decoration-line: none;">“Nature Positive” approach</a> moving forward, pledging to make sustainability an integral part of their brand identity.

A key component of the push toward broader climate-consciousness outlined in the Manifesto was the empowerment of underrepresented people everywhere to safely share their lived experiences of the climate crisis. To encourage diversity within party delegations, the COP26 Presidency funded the attendance of six female negotiators from underdeveloped countries, and the “Advancing Gender Equality in Climate Action” event on <a href="https://unfccc.int/topics/gender/events-meetings/gender-day-other-event…; style="text-decoration-line: none;">Gender Day at the COP</a> saw numerous countries come forward with fresh pledges to support women and girls in sharing their climate stories. Bolivia, for instance, issued a commitment focused on getting indigenous and Afro-Bolivian women into climate leadership positions, while Belgium committed $58 million to a 5-year Sahel Climate Program focused on the needs of women and girls. Norway also laid out a new initiative to raise the impact of women and girls at both the national and international levels of climate policymaking.

A Note From the Author: My work as a fashion designer brought me to Tiruppur on several occasions in 2005, during which time I learned firsthand about the situation I paint with this article—one that shamefully persists to this day. The specific people described are fictitious, but their stories are very real, based on direct accounts from residents of the town's outskirts.

Rani wakes at 5:00 AM on the dot and drowsily tiptoes over the other members of her family, taking pains not to touch them with her feet—a mark of disrespect in India. She can’t help but graze the children, apologizing under her breath.

The shanty she shares with her parents, grandparents and four siblings has just one wicker cot, occupied by her grandfather: the head of the household. She and the rest make do with the baked floor, upon which a few sheets are strewn.

Carefully undoing the latch of the iron door, which creaks and groans with rust, thirteen-year-old Rani stealthily makes her way to the empty cow shed, grabs a small pail of water she set there the previous night, and washes her face.

Photo by Runa Ray.

Rani hurriedly brushes her teeth with some powder, slips on her sandals, grabs two five-gallon buckets, and steels herself for the journey ahead. She will walk six miles, past Black lake and over the rubble of an aborted construction project to the fresh water pump in the neighboring village. Drinking water is only available for a few hours each morning; if she arrives late, she will return home empty-handed.

Rani secretly wishes the Black Lake would give her fresh water. it would save her the arduous journey and the long wait every morning. But she has known the lake since her birth... and it has always been black.

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Rani’s family is one of many whose lifestyles have been upturned by industrialization. They belong to a marginalized community on the outskirts of Tiruppur that does not have the socioeconomic and political means to oppose large corporations, making them easy targets of discriminatory environmental policies and leaving them vulnerable to the associated health impacts.

Formerly a low-profile agricultural town, Tiruppur is now the knitwear capital of India, accounting for 90% of the country’s cotton knitwear exports. One of many fashion production hubs in South India, it is the livelihood of thousands of workers and over the past three decades has contributed massively to the Indian economy.

The everyday citizens of Tiruppur—residents of the hinterlands in particular—have long been victims of the factories’ indiscriminate discharge of industrial effluents into local bodies of water. These effluents contain chemicals and dyes in large concentrations and come with all manner of negative health effects. Local companies release the waste clandestinely through storm drains, masking their activities with the cover of night or heavy rainfall.

Photo by Denniz Futalan (Pexels).

I’ve gotten to visit this famed city on several occasions in my career, and the hardworking people there never fail to impress me. But their livelihoods come at a tremendous cost.

I vividly remember walking through the markets on Sundays and taking in the heaps of big-brand goods deemed unfit for export. Clothes you would pay top dollar for overseas were piled high in small shops in the labyrinth of roads and sold on the basis of weight rather than by the piece.

Scores of provocative pieces meant for Western buyers—spaghetti-strap dresses, lingerie—would accumulate on shelves, gathering dust in a town of modest working-class people. Across South India and beyond, the story is the same: second-hand retailers buy garment factory rejects in bulk, then struggle to offload the impractical clothes designed for Western consumers.

Predictably, almost all of these garments end up in landfills.

The operations of fashion companies in towns like Tiruppur thus create an intersection of social and environmental concerns: workers are paid low wages, unused garments pour into landfills, and lakes and rivers grow thick with toxic waste products.

Photo by Denniz Futalan (Pexels).

The members of these communities generally do not have the political capital to resist corporate incursions into their land, nor the socioeconomic status to flee when their situations sour. Meanwhile, those in wealthier regions can divert waste and impure drinking water into communities like Tiruppur with impunity, exacerbating miscarriages, birth defects and disease as the years wear on.

This sort of socioeconomic discrimination—which often correlates with racial discrimination—can be found even at the highest levels of policymaking, where government officials view cheap tracts of land with low populations as prime locations for polluting factories.

How can the fashion industry work to prevent these catastrophic effects and atone for the damage it has already done?

For one, these brands need to commit to communities, not just exploit the land and leave. It is common for companies to swoop into a factory for a single season of production, then abandon it when they find better deals elsewhere. This needs to end. Brands should respect the communities where they produce, investing not just in bare-minimum factory compliance but also in wastewater treatment, emissions reductions, and circular production to avoid wasting clothes.

Photo by Tom Fisk (Pexels).

Such measures would go a long way toward preventing large-scale damage to communities and their environments.

Paying workers good wages instead of the lowest rates possible is another vital step. This would enable cities like Tiruppur to expand and develop rather than stagnate, and would give their people the political capital needed to stand up for themselves and make reasonable demands of their government. It’s only fair that the workers who form the backbone of a three-trillion-dollar industry have a real voice in their nation’s policymaking.

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It was Rani’s grandmother who spoke of a village so pristine that you could see with perfect clarity white herons diving into the lake to snare writhing silver fish, kingfishers darting to and fro in the bubbly spring.

She recalled how Grandfather would take out his little raft, cast his line, and come home with the coveted ‘meen’ fish, which the family would fashion into a spicy curry to be eaten with rice and crisps.

And how before those grey cement garment factories arrived, the entire landscape was dotted with trees.

These wonderful stories of days long past were best listened to in the evenings by the dim light of a lamp, illustrated with the play of shadowy hands on the walls of the hut.

But the children knew the truth: the lake was always black, and fish was only found at the market.

Banner and thumbnail images by, respectively, Tom Fisk and Denniz Futalan (Pexels).