A youth-led green campaign inspired by activist Greta Thunberg is set at the Freedom Park on Friday.
Global Climate Strike, a youth-led movement led by Youth for Climate Justice, Ecoteneo and Students Environmental Alliance of Davao, have started to gather hundreds of youth and other stakeholders nationwide since Sept. 20.
According to Kim Fabular, program officer of Ecoteneo, it is not just any rally but as they are trying to send a powerful message.
“We are calling for a peaceful, clean, and sustainable life. Actually, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has published a study on Oct. 8, 2018 that vulnerable nations like the Philippines, we only have 11 years to go to feel the drastic changes of the climate,” Rara Ada from the Youth for Climate Justice.
She added that when we continue the ‘business as usual’ thinking and not address the issue of climate change, there is no turning back.
Meanwhile, Caile Dayrit, executive director of the Students Environmental Alliance of Davao, said that from their 11-member schools, 50 from each schools have committed to join the rally.
The Department of Education issued a memo last Sept.17 calling all school heads and teachers in public and private elementary and secondary school to “excuse students who will be joining the localized climate strike provided that parental/legal guardian consent is given.” ]
Greta Thunberg, a 16-year-old Swedish environmentalist, has become the face of the youth’s anger toward the world’s complacency in the face of the climate change threats. She inspired a global movement around her rallying cry, “School Strike for the Climate,” which calls on the youth to pressure policy makers into taking action.
In her speech at the UN Climate Summit yesterday, she took world leaders to task for feigning ignorance when the world is already facing “mass extinction.”
