Camp for the climate
Home » Blog » Sophie Barclay » Camp for the climateLast weekend, a new movement to lead ordinary New Zealanders into taking action on climate change was born: the Aotearoa/New Zealand Climate Camp.
Sixty environmentalists, ranging in age from one to 80 years old, met at Parihaka last weekend for the first ever Aotearoa/New Zealand Climate Camp.
Inspired by camps held overseas, the Climate Camp was based around mobilising ordinary people into action against climate change. The camp had a jam-packed three-day schedule, involving forums and discussions in which all 60 participants were able to have their say about setting up a larger climate camp associated with a direct action goal.
The Spokescouncil of Climate Camp Aotearoa was established at camp to represent regional groups, and to help streamline the organisation of this larger camp which will take place at the end of the year.
Everyone has the chance to join this important discussion, says Laura Jardine-Coom, the spokesperson for Climate Camp Wellington. “Recently, there has become this huge ‘climate debate is only for the experts’ attitude, and it’s about trying to decentralise that and bring the discussion back to the everyday person who cares and wants to be involved.
One of the key aims of the camp to was “address the root causes of climate change” and find solutions to the underlying causes.
“It’s bigger than just saying ‘we need to recycle our paper’—we actually need to challenge the way society currently works. Maybe to have a sustainable future we need to critique some of the key economic and social ways in which we act as a whole,” says Laura.
Some of the key issues discussed at the camp included coal and its use for energy, pollution caused by dairy farming and the Kyoto Protocol. Attendess agreed that these problems need to be dealt with in an inclusive manner. With dairy farming, for example, “it’s important to say that the issue isn’t about farming per se," says Laura. "It’s about saying, ‘How can we do this in a more sustainable manner?’ Or, ‘How can we do this so we take climate change into account in our practices?’”
Wed April 29, 2009 @ 07:42 PM
