Some 65 young people from Gilgit Baltistan participated in an interactive workshop on climate change organized by United Nations Information Center (UNIC) in collaboration with Australian Aid, Connect4Climate and the Aga Khan Foundation.

[video: https://vimeo.com/185184528]

The primary purpose of the workshop was to raise awareness about climate change among the youth of Gilgit Baltistan, a region heavily affected by periodic floods, one of the effects of climate change.

This workshop was part of the Pakistani Youth for Climate Change initiative, a multidisciplinary project aimed at involving Pakistani young people in the global conversation on climate change

Several young people took the floor to share their own experiences and suggestiond for tackling the effects of climate change.

[video: https://vimeo.com/186238729]

Anusha, a 9th grade student from Sher Qilla, warned the audience about the devastating effects of climate change. She narrated how the climate has visibly changed since the time of her grandmother’s youth.

Saira Zahid from Skardu urged the participants to start acting to stop global warming and talked about glacier grafting, a local practice in Gilgit Baltistan consisting in building small glaciers as a mean to combat climate change. Mariya Akbar, from Gilgit Baltistan shared her personal experience with extreme weather conditions in Gilgit Baltistan to highlight the effects of climate change on life and livelihood. Nazish Amir from GIlgit focused on the manmade actions contributing to climate change and said: “We shouldn’t wait for miracles to happen. Why don’t we go out and plant more trees?”

Lastly, Jibran, a 9th grade student from Gilgit, explained his vision of a climate smart Gilgit Baltistan and proposed practical and easy solutions, like effective waste management.

All the participants received useful information on climate change together with sustainable and environmentally friendly bags to be used as an alternative to plastic bags.

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Communicating about a phenomenon like climate change, which by nature is complex, in plain language is a process fraught with several challenges.  

The most important aspects of climate change issues, ideas, and policy measures are lost in the rumpus created by the confusion resulting from the lack of proper understanding of what climate change is really about.  

While the basics of climate change is well known, that the world is warming due to increased levels of greenhouse gases emitted by humans, the real phenomenon is often reduced to an abstract theory. The evidence clearly points to a warming world, with record temperatures recorded every year, and still some argue that Earth is cooling. Some even argue that global warming is a scam, though overwhelmingly the Scientific community has shown that climate change due to a warming world is a reality. The difference in opinion is so much that there is very little room for rational argument.

The opinion on climate change is divided not because of the unavailability of proper information, but mostly because of the way the available information is falsely analyzed and mis-presented to the public. Communication with the vast majority of people who range from being dismissive to indifferent or undecided about an issue like climate change sure isn’t a cakewalk.

Creating an efficient communication strategy that brings about real change in people’s perception requires understanding the target audience’s psychology.

Photo credits: Feel green. Think green, Kristina Bychkova, Carpi, IT , Voices4Climate competition

While evidence-based science is something climate change specialists are comfortable with, common people are far removed from the harsh realities of climate change and the scientific data and concepts surrounding climate change. Also, since essays, research findings, and scientific data can be full of jargon, simplifying such information and presenting it in a well-articulated manner can be the first step towards getting and retaining the audience’s attention.

To overcome challenges and effectively communicate the causes and effects of climate change to a widespread audience, it is necessary to:

1. Craft messages that offer immediate benefits. Since climate change is not something that would top everyone’s priority list, it is important to create and deliver messages that would make them want to give a serious thought to climate change implications.

Instead of saying: Weatherization is essential to battle the consequences of climate change.

It’s better to say: Give your family a better and safer environment by protecting your home and taking action against climate change.

2. Let go of jargon. The language used for the purpose of communicating climate change is full of jargon, which at times can be intimidating. To make sure that more people pay attention to the issues at hand and understand the proper context of communication, it is imperative to simplify the language.

Instead of saying: Research bears testimony to the fact that the recent climate change is anthropogenic.

It’s better to say: Research supports the fact that the recent climate change has been brought about by human activity.

People should be made aware of the availability of  jargon busters and acronym finders.

3. Tell a story. The focus should be on the audience rather than the argument. Putting out numbers, graphs, percentages, and other statistical information will not help drive the point home. It’s important to use a narrative that appeals to the emotions of people. To bring about a behavioral change, it’s important to understand what really appeals to the people. Using an emotional appeal which is also logically sound can help make the language more persuasive.

4. Make the messages relatable and credible. People respond better to someone they can relate to. People tend to react with skepticism towards things they can’t completely grasp. Therefore, it’s important to deliver messages that people can relate to, which in turn can have a lasting impact, when compared to climate change messages put out by Government and other institutions of authority.

5. Harness the power of social and visual media. Social media has tremendous reach and can be utilized to deliver messages to the masses. From graphs to charts to infographics, one can use different types of visual messages that summarize the cause and consequences of and solutions to climate change. Creating other impactful visual media such as videos and images can help garner much attention since they elevate the experience of the viewers.

Photo credits: Tomasz Wawer

Although the basic idea of communication is to help people know about something, it’s also important to focus on what they would do with the information they’ve access to. A message without any call to action hardly brings about any change. A change in behavior can be brought about by changing people’s mindset, which is why it’s important to deliver messages that can strike a chord with people and influence long term behavior.

It’s crucial to implement effective communication strategy sooner than later because we are at a juncture where creating awareness is more necessary than ever before.

Banner photo credits: Stefano Cefalo Geronimo, UK, Voices4Climate competition

The closer you get to diplomacy the more you realize it is not that sexy. No offense to all my pals at United Nations and the yearly COP meetings, each of you are incredibly sexy in you own special ways, but then it comes to the process of getting the international community to agree on something let alone on begin acting on it, well the process can be quite drawn out, but it certainly isn’t a tease.

When the world’s countries agreed to the Paris Climate Agreement last December, it sparked what many thought would be a very lengthy process of each and every nation ratifying the agreement in their own special way. I remember someone telling me at a meeting shortly after Paris that it could take years, depending on the domestic politics in each nation, to get everyone onside. Hearing this, my optimism surrounding what was achieved in 2015 shifted to concerns that we wouldn’t deliver the dish we all ordered in before the end of 2016. Now, three quarters into 2016, I am back to feeling confident and for good reason.

All eyes were on the French capital last year during the United Nations Conference on Climate Change (COP21). Photo Credit: Max Thabiso Edkins

Before I explain why I am confident that the Paris Agreement will ratified before year’s end, let’s do a quick refresher. In December of 2015 representatives from 195 nations negotiated and agreed to the Paris Climate Agreement, which among other things was the first globally comprehensive climate agreement, it bound nations to contain warming to 1.5 degrees, and made financial flows consistent with a pathway towards lowering greenhouse gas emissions and climate-resilient development. Pretty cool right? Still, the agreement that started in Paris didn’t end there. In the months after Paris, 191 nations have “signed” the agreement, which is a largely ceremonial distinction with most nations “signing” during a high profile event on Earth Day. Still, signing doesn’t equal ratification. Ratification only happens when the government’s of each country undertakes their own unique process back home to making the deal official. Ratification, in all it’s forms, has been taking place throughout the year, but not every country that has signed has ratified at that point, it’s an ongoing process that begs the question, “Do we need to wait for all 195 to do this and if not when does this happen?”

Well our friends at the United Nations had an answer for that question and, like all things United Nations, it’s a bit more complicated than it probably should be. For the Paris Agreement to go into effect, or into “force” as they say in UNland, two things need to happen. First, at least 55 countries have to ratify the deal and second, countries representing at least 55 percent of the world’s emissions have to ratify the deal. I’ll let you do the venn diagram in your head for that one, but after you draw the two circles you will get it and be sure to note that the overlap in the middle is fairly irrelevant.  

As of the time I write the comma at the end of this introductory clause, 61 nations have ratified the Paris Agreement. So the first threshold has been met, however, the second one remains just out of reach, as those 61 nations fall just short of reaching the 55% threshold. Still, the world is very close to hitting the second mark, and there's reason to be confident it is about to be met.  And it’s only October. For an unsexy process, this is actually pretty steamy.

The Headquarters of the United Nations in New York City, United States. Photo Credit: Daniel Pinto Lopes

Now to the confidence, which stems from two big develops since the UN General Assembly meetings in mid-September. The first relates to India and the second relates to the European Union.  Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi used October 2nd - the birth anniversary of Mahatma Gandhi--as the day for submitting India’s instrument of ratification to United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon. There remains some discussion about the exact procedures required for India’s submissions, but after uncertain comments from Modi relating to India's ability to ratify before the end of the year, it seems as though this latest ratification is the real deal. India’s ratification brings the emissions percentage up to 51.89, which gets us just a bit closer to the big moment.

And then we got even closer.

On Tuesday October 4th, the European Union agreed to its ratification in a historic vote. This brings us over the 55/55 threshold, and after 30 days, the Paris Agreement goes into force. By my calendar, the force will be with us (I thought of that all by myself), right around November 3rd -just in time for the COP 22 meetings in Marrakech, Morocco and a less than a year since the deal was struck in Paris. That may seem like a very long time ago for this relationship to be begin but, like I said, for diplomacy this moved really fast.

Today’s youth are energized to tackle climate change. They are supporting initiatives around the global to call for ambitious climate action. At the American School of Brasilia, during their annual basketball tournament, the #1o5C campaign was presented as a bold call to action.

Emil Raiser emphasizes: “Being able to represent the 1.5 campaign in our EAB Basketball Invitational was a huge honor. Not only was it a sublime success to advertise the logo on our tournaments shirts, but also, more importantly to spread the message conveyed by the campaign to an international audience. I hope for bright and flourishing future with the campaign.”

The #1o5C campaign, presented by the Sport4Climate initiative of the World Bank Group’s Connect4Climate program, calls for action to prevent global warming below 1.5°C. Key partners include the Climate Vulnerable Forum, UNDP, UNEP, GIP, Care, CAN International, Purpose and many more, who lent their efforts to materialize the campaign, brining more than 135 athletes on board during the Rio 2016 Olympics. 

Find out more about the campaign: 1o5c.org

[video: https://youtu.be/LGXIaUNNtbU]