Since 1974 World Environment Day has been a major way in which the United Nations encourages environmental awareness across the globe.
The theme for 2017, “connecting people to nature”, is particularly relevant to us city dwellers, who now number more than half the world’s population. This World Environment Day we are encouraged to get outdoors and into nature, to appreciate its beauty and to think about how we are part of nature and how intimately we depend on it. We are fortunate that in Sydney, there are opportunities to do so close to home.
Appreciation, love, an awareness of interconnection motivate us to respect Earth in our everyday living and to call for structural solutions that help make respectfulness the norm. In Australia, no small part of this is a structural shift away from mining and burning fossil fuels to renewable energy.
Today dozens of protests are taking place across the country calling on the Commonwealth Bank to rule out finance for Adani’s proposed massive coal mine in the Galilee Basin. Commbank has been named the most sustainable bank in the world in the 2016 Global 100 (G100) Most Sustainable Corporations Index, yet its fossil fuel lending outpaces Australia’s other major banks.
Up until the end of June, Micah Australia is coordinating a community climate petition across Australia’s 150 electorates. The petition, which we are all invited to sign, reminds the House of Representatives that Australia’s greenhouse emissions are the highest per person among wealthy nations while our emissions reduction targets are among the weakest. It asks the House to commit to more urgent emission reductions; develop a plan to ensure Australia achieves zero net emissions well before 2050, and support families and communities affected by the transition; and provide additional assistance to help our poorest neighbours adapt to the harmful impacts of climate change.
Some might say that the time for climate petitions is past. But what aims to be the largest coordinated multi-electorate petition in Australia’s history would command our politicians’ attention.
