Bellisima Goddess

As I studied the WWF website these past two weeks, the topic “2009: The Year the World Decides” really caught my eye. The title alone sounded very urgent and pivotal. So what is being decided this year? Well, read on…

On December 7, 2009, the global community will meet in Copenhagen, Denmark to agree on a new global climate deal aimed at protecting our planet. WWF is hoping that 2009 will be remembered as the year the world found an answer to climate change. This is huge! This effects you and me and future generations–our children, our grandchildren and beyond! As with every crisis; however, there is opportunity. This crisis, along with the world’s financial crisis, provides us the chance “to bring the global economy back in line with global ecology” and “to put future development of the world economy on a sustainable foundation.” This is both a challenge and an opportunity that must be undertaken this coming December.

THE OPPORTUNITY as outlined by WWF is as follows:
1. The world’s climate and financial crisis have a common cause: living beyond our means.
2. Neither is sustainable.
3. Nature, our most fundamental capital asset, does not appear on company balance sheets or in most national economic data. So its depreciation goes unnoticed.
4. We cannot make another planet.
5. To make economics and ecology into enemies is to doom both. But to reconcile them is to open up the possibility of a richer, more sustainable, more profitable and fairer world!

WHAT MUST BE DONE?
WWF says there are 6 key tasks that have to be agreed upon at the Copenhagen meeting:
1. Rich countries, as a group, should set strong binding emissions reduction targets of 40% below 1990 levels by 2020. Most of those reductions should be undertaken domestically.
2. Funds and technology cooperation must be established to support the implementation of low-carbon economies in the developing world.
3. With the appropriate needs-based support, developing countries should commit to emissions 30% lower by 2020 than those they are currently projecting.
4. Actions by developing countries should include the halting of forest destruction and its concomitant emissions.
5. Rich nations need to leverage support to help the most vulnerable countries, communities and ecosystems, which are hardest hit by climate change, and finance their adaptation work.
6. All countries need to agree that global greenhouse gas emissions must be at least 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.

WHAT CAN WE DO INDIVIDUALLY?
WWF outlines 9 steps we can take as individuals to take effective and meaningful action in the run-up to the Climate meeting in Copenhagen. They are as follows:
1. Vote Earth! Vote Earth is WWF’s primary public campaign to get agreement from governments in Copenhagen.
*You can Vote Earth by simply declaring that you stand for ‘Earth’ over ‘Global Warming’.
*You can Vote Earth by doing something that helps reduce the impact of global warming. You might already be doing something positive for the planet – that can be your vote.
*You can register so that your Vote for Earth can be counted and shown in Copenhagen. Vote Earth builds on the success of WWF’s Earth Hour event.
2. TckTckTck! TckTckTck is a global alliance of organizations, of which WWF is just 1 partner, that together aim to get agreement from governments in Copenhagen. Just like Vote Earth, you simply sign up, and not only will your voice be combined with millions of other people, but TckTckTck will alert you to other actions and events that you can take part in during the run-up to the Climate Talks.
3. International Day of Climate Action! 350.org is calling on people around the world to organize an action on October 24 incorporating the number 350 at an iconic place in their community, and then upload a photo of their event to the 350.org website. 350.org will then collect these images from around the world and, with your help, deliver them to the media and world leaders. Together, we can show our world and its decision-makers just how big, beautiful, and unified the climate movement really is.
4. Raise Your Voice! Bring your voice to the world leaders at COP15 – the most important climate change conference in a decade. As nations seek an agreement to protect the world, they want your views from across the spectrum. What needs to be done? How do the issues affect you? Do you agree there needs to be action? Send in a video with your views, opinions and questions. The best contributions will be aired during the COP15 CNN/YouTube TV debate on December 15.
5. Seal the Deal! The UN-led Seal the Deal Campaign aims to galvanize political will and public support for reaching a comprehensive global climate agreement in Copenhagen in December. The Seal the Deal Campaign not only allows you to add your name to the UN-led petition, but also allows you to upload your own image into a photomosaic of the planet Earth.
6. Download This Video! Every download will count as a unique digital petition with people adding their names to demand world leaders reach an ambitious, fair and global deal at the UN Climate Change Summit in Copenhagen.
7. Watch More Videos! It’s not often we get a chance to have a good laugh at climate change but a bunch of young filmmakers are aiming to make us do just that. A Million Views on Copenhagen is a series of short, funny and irreverent climate change videos from the cream of the YouTube generation. Cult Youtube filmmakers including Ted Crusty, Keshen Matus and Eddsworld have been joined by emerging talent from Nepal and Namibia to create the videos which aim to attract one million views by the time of the Copenhagen climate change talks in December.
8. Hopenhagen! OK… so it is another petition…but with a twist. It asks you to become a citizen of “Hopenhagen”. It also asks you “what gives you hope for a better planet?” Then shows this on a living map along with what everyone else has said.
9. Change Something in Your Life! We can all make a positive contribution to reduce our impacts on our only planet! Even the smallest acts can add up to be something huge and planet-changing. After all, who’d have thought just leaving a TV on standby and forgetting to switch off a few lights would be some of the key contributors to the critical issues we now face with climate change?

If such small things can cause such huge problems, rest assured small things can also create HUGE solutions… Next week, I will post practical ways you can start making changes. For this week, please go to the sites above to learn more and put in your votes.

DID YOU KNOW…
*Thomas Edison (1847-1931), is quoted as saying, ”I’d put my money on the sun and solar energy. …hope we don’t have to wait ’til oil and coal run out before we tackle that.”
*The term climate change is often used interchangeably with the term global warming. “Climate change” is growing in preferred use because it helps convey that there are other changes in addition to rising temperatures.
*Beethoven’s 5th Symphony stimulates the subconscious brain in ways that promote creativity and help the brain to think better; Greenpeace used it to inspire people to fight climate change and asked them to perform the first minute of the first movement, in their own style, with their favorite instrument, and to make a video of their performance. These were posted on YouTube as a video response to Greenpeace’s video and each video that included the “Date and Map” option on YouTube appeared on Greenpeace’s around-the-world map. This was done as a collective effort to inspire the work of world leaders at the G8 summit in Tokyo in July 2008. This effort was called “Sync Your Mind for the Planet.”

FOR TODAY…I will make my voice and my vote heard. I will go to each of the links above to get involved, cast my vote, and learn more. I will continue to look for ways to reduce our household’s environmental footprint and will share more about this on my blog next week.