Support The School Strike For Climate
Students strike in South Africa
Friday, March 15, 2019 witnessed one of the largest strikes the world’s history has ever recorded. Over 1.5 million young people in over a 100 countries thronged the streets of over 1000 cities in the world to make a clarion call on their governments to create safe pathways that secure the future of the environment.
Inspired by the action of Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old Swedish political activist, the strike is placing a demand on leaders of nations across the globe to as a matter of urgency align themselves to the Paris Agreement― to take steps and action to prevent continuous global warming, climate change amongst others.
Greta Thunberg, the pioneer for the Schools Strike for Climate
In a crusade that has been tagged, ‘School Strike for Climate’, young people decide not to attend classes and instead sit in front of strategic government buildings and offices where those in power can easily be assessed.
For Greta (a Nobel Peace Prize nominee) and her colleagues, if those in power do not act today, the young generation will be the ones to live through this failure. The picketers predict that those below the age of 20 will by 2080 see an earth warmed by up to 4°C. The effects of such warming they say would be utterly devastating.
“Rivers would flood, storms would wreak havoc on coastal communities and coral reefs would be eliminated. Melting polar ice caps would lead to dramatically higher sea levels, flooding coastal areas. Places on Earth will become uninhabitable,” they said.
Students Climate Strike in South Africa
It is often said that young people are tomorrow’s leaders but looking at the global destruction made to life on Earth, there may not be a future to lead if the young wait until tomorrow.
Young people across the globe have therefore decided not to ignore the impact of this predicted destruction.
Paris Agreement
The agreement basically aims at limiting the increase in global average temperatures to “well below 2°C above pre-industrial levels” – the level beyond which scientists say we will see the worst extremes of global warming.
It also aims to “pursue efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, recognizing that this would significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change”.
In order to actually limit warming to that level, the aim is to reduce by the second half of the century, the net carbon emission by zero.
To get there, countries should aim to “reach global peaking of greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible, recognizing that peaking will take longer for developing country parties, and to undertake rapid reductions thereafter in accordance with best available science”.
We at A Rocha wholeheartedly support this crusade. We urge all Ghanaian youth to join the School Strike For Climate. All efforts to salvage our depleting forest landscape, water heads should be welcomed.
If you are inspired to take action in Ghana, connect with us and let us act together for #ClimateAction today.