Short Wave - The countries left behind in climate negotiations

Episode Date: October 29, 2021

NPR climate correspondents Lauren Sommer and Dan Charles join the show before the UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, Scotland (COP26) starts on Sunday. Diplomats, business executives, climate experts, and activists from all around the world will gather to discuss the question: Is the world on track to avoid the worst effects of climate change?Lauren and Dan introduce us to two climate activists from countries that will be heavily impacted by climate change. Hilda Flavia Nakabuye from Uganda and María Laura Rojas from Colombia. We learn what's at stake for them if powerful countries don't move faster to halt climate change. See pcm.adswizz.com for information about our collection and use of personal data for sponsorship and to manage your podcast sponsorship preferences.NPR Privacy Policy

You're listening to Shortwave from NPR. Hey, everybody. Rebecca Ramirez here today, along with NPR's climate team in the form of Lauren Summer and Dan Charles. Hi. Hey. You're here to introduce us to a couple of people who have big stakes in something that's going to be all over the news in the next two weeks, the international climate negotiations in Glasgow, Scotland. So, you two, what's this all about? It is a climate extravaganza, Rebecca. There will be diplomats from 190-some countries, 20,000 or so business executives and climate experts and activists, all focused on one central question.

Is the world on track to keep its promise, a promise that countries made six years ago in Paris, that they will avoid the worst effects of climate change? I mean, one thing I know for sure, we're very behind on reducing carbon emissions. Right. And that's why these talks are pretty pivotal. The science shows emissions need to fall fast over the next decade, but so far, nations aren't really stepping up. Here's the numbers. Their newest plans only reduce emissions about 7% in 2030 from the previous commitments. And according to the U.N., that needs to be 55% lower to keep warming at a critical threshold, which is 1.5 degrees Celsius or 2.7 Fahrenheit. So at that threshold, the planet will still be hotter than it is today. There will still be damage. But it won't be nearly as bad as what we're headed for right now. If we don't stop burning fossil fuels, we're looking at warming of something like 4 to 6 degrees Fahrenheit by the end of the century. And even more warming beyond that.

We'd be looking at truly unprecedented heat waves and droughts and storms. Destruction of ecosystems. I mean, coral reefs could be wiped out. Wow. Yeah. So if we want to avoid all of that, countries are really going to have to step up and cut emissions even more. Right. And for the most part, attention is focused on the biggest and most powerful countries. China's President Xi Jinping has declared that his country stopped building new energy projects abroad that use coal. The European Union has unveiled new legislation named it helping the bloc to meet its commitments for the cutting of greenhouse gas emissions.

President Biden originally proposed a fairly bold climate change agenda. The goal was to cut America's carbon emissions. Those big countries, you know, we're talking about the U.S. and China, India, Russia, those are the ones largely responsible for the warming. But there are countries that have even more at stake because that's where the harshest effects of climate change are already happening. And those voices aren't heard as often in these big negotiations. In the last climate negotiations, there were speakers from. some of these hard-hit countries, like Hilda Flavia Nakabia. She's a climate activist from Uganda. I came here to represent millions of African young people who are bearing the brunt of climate

crisis. As I speak to you right now, extreme weather events are killing people in my country. Developing countries have done very little to cause climate change. Their greenhouse gas emissions are low, but they're facing devastating impacts from more intense, storms and drought, putting millions of people at risk. We need leadership on climate action, not talks. For how long will you keep negotiating? You've been negotiating for the last 25 years, even before I was born. So today on the show, two climate activists.

And what's at stake for them if powerful countries don't move faster to halt climate change? You're listening to Shortwave, the Daily Science Podcast, from NPR. So Lauren, I want to start with the activist you spoke with, Hilda Flavia Nakabia from Uganda. We heard from her at the top of the show addressing that last big climate conference. How'd she end up giving that speech in 2019? Yeah, it wasn't easy for her because she does not like public speaking. She's actually pretty shy.

But she's been a climate activist since she was in college, because to her, climate change is personal. She grew up in a rural area with 10 brothers and sisters. And when she was a child, her family experienced the devastation of climate change. When I was young, we were farmers. And we had like a very big plot of land. So it had different curbs. It had bananas. It had maize.

And we kept some livestock like cows. And we started experiencing these heavy rains. The plantation was flooded. Most of the trees were broken. That year, she called. couldn't attend school since her family didn't have enough for tuition. They had to sell much of the land. But she hadn't heard of climate change then.

It was years later at university where she first heard about it. And as the speaker described what climate change was, she realized she'd already experienced it. It's at this moment that I felt very angry. I felt very annoyed that people know about it and they are doing nothing. So is that when she really started doing climate work? Yeah, Hilda helps start Fridays for future Uganda, which organizes protests and school strikes with other youth activists. She visits schools, giving talks about climate change, which she says often isn't taught.

But the impacts in Uganda are becoming clear. You know, extreme rain displaced hundreds of thousands of people when Lake Victoria, the largest lake in Africa, flooded last year. Hilda says she felt hopeful after speaking at the last climate. at negotiations. But little has happened since. You know, countries haven't committed to much more ambitious plans. This is a matter of life and death. It's a matter of survival. And our survival depends on the actions we take right now. For this year's negotiations, Hilda worries that COVID restrictions are making it even harder for the global South to be represented. She won't be there

this time and is sending her message from afar. So it sounds like she was disappointed by what happened after she gave that big speech back in 2019. How does she feel about the meeting in Glasgow this year? Yeah, she's not very optimistic, but she and her fellow activists are not stopping. They're doing everything they can to kind of get their message in front of people. I mean, I wish them all the best and really admire their determination. Okay, so Dan, I want to focus on you next, you also talk to an activist, and she is in Colombia, right? I did. And you know, the funny thing is, I heard she actually thought that she was the wrong person for you to interview at first, right? That's right. So her name is Maria Laura Laura Rojas.

And when I first got in touch with her by Zoom, I told her I wanted to talk to Colombians who are affected by climate change. And she sounded pretty hesitant. She figured I was looking at looking for somebody more like Hilda, who'd say, you know, lost everything in a flood as a child. I wouldn't be able to tell a story like that because I live in the capital city, like in the 7th floor in the building in Bogota, like to be very honest. She said, maybe I can put you in touch with somebody who has more of a personal story to tell. And then a few days later, I was kind of surprised to get another message. She was interested in talking again. It's been on my mind ever since, like, I must have a story because otherwise I would not be working on this.

So what is it? And what I think is really interesting of my own process about thinking of your question is like, why is it that my sort of distance from exposure to direct climate effects connects me to the movement? So at an emotional and justice level, I really truly care. And I've really been thinking there. there is value also in reflecting on climate from privilege. Huh. Reflecting on climate from a place of privilege really sticks out to me. Like, what does that look like for her? You know, she was saying, you know, she feels this impact of the warming climate emotionally, even though she might have the option of saying, oh, it doesn't really matter to me, as many people do, in fact. So her story is she grew up comfortably in Bogot,

but she always noticed suffering, she says, whether it was people in pain or emaciated horses pulling carts on the street. She went to law school, started thinking a lot about discrimination based on ethnicity or gender. She threw herself into advocacy for the rights of women. And then a friend recruited her for a job that seemed, you know, on the face of it completely different.

She became a climate diplomat, a climate advisor for Columbia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs. What I was told was like, you know, speak with the confidence that you're speaking on behalf of 40 million Colombians. And I was like, am I? Really? Because she was thinking about all the people in her country who don't get heard most of the time. She knew from her previous work that there is tremendous inequality in Colombia. Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. So she's thinking, am I really speaking for those people who don't have power? And who are those people she was thinking about in Colombia?

She brought up this one region in the country, up at the kind of northern end of it, La Guajira. Many of the people there are indigenous. There have been lots of droughts in that region. The seasonal rains they depend on are becoming erratic. Similar in a way to what Hilda was describing in Uganda about weather patterns getting disrupted. And that has at least two types of consequences that are differentiated for the people who live there. On the one hand, there is a lot of food insecurity, and this affects very heavily the children, but there is also, of course, a big impact on availability of water.

And it's usually women who, you know, go and find the water to bring it home. And when water is not available and women are forced to walk longer distances to find it, it drastically changes their day and how they use their time. and it even makes them more exposed to sexual violence because they have to work farther. Yeah, I mean, that is a very hard reality to have to face. And so those are the people that she was thinking about when you first approached her, huh? The ones who she felt were really being impacted. Yeah, exactly.

And she says the situation when you see it is shocking, but it's also disturbing how communities like this sometimes get used. She's been on official trips to La Guajira, also to places in African countries, which are set up to show how countries are vulnerable to climate change. You know, a bunch of people pile in a bus. They go see the communities that are struggling. And then the buses leave and often nothing much changes. So she says for her, climate activism is basically trying to fight for people like the women in those villages. And to me, climate is about justice. and the injustice of it

is what has always kept me moving and involved. She left that job in Colombia's Ministry of Foreign Affairs about five years ago. She said she was a little burned out. She co-founded a group called Transforma, which is focused on climate advocacy. So is she in Glasgow on behalf of her group? She is there in Glasgow.

She's not inside the meeting rooms because she's not working for the government anymore. She's actually working on a podcast from the negotiations that's aimed at people in Latin America. She'll also be pushing for more aid to vulnerable communities. I'm hoping to get together with her, actually, to, you know, see how she thinks the, you know, the talks are going from her perspective. You know, one thing that really strikes me about Maria and Hilda is that it's almost like they have an extra layer of people they need to convince, you know? Like, it's not just their governments, but other countries that need to make change. Is that working?

Yeah, developing countries have been building their influence. You know, one of the reasons there is a goal to limit warming to 1.5 degrees Celsius is because they pushed for that for years. And looking ahead, one of the big negotiation points will be about helping those countries deal with the impacts of climate change. Developed countries promised them $100 billion a year, but they aren't hitting that level yet. So there's a lot of frustration out there still that developed countries. just aren't listening. Yeah, I totally hear that. All right, well, Lauren Summer, Dan Charles.

Thank you so much for introducing us to these two climate activists and for bringing your reporting on the show. We really appreciate it. Yeah, no problem. Thank you. Today's episode was produced by Eva Tesfi, edited by Sarah Saracen, and fact-checked by Margaret Serino. Josh Newell and Alex Raywinskiss were the audio engineers.

I'm Rebecca Ramirez. Thanks so much for listening to Shortwave. Daily Science Podcast from NPR.