Home ยป Articles ยป DAVOS – World Economic Forum: Averting a Climate Apocalypse Greta Thunberg Full Speech

DAVOS – World Economic Forum: Averting a Climate Apocalypse Greta Thunberg Full Speech

Nothing can be more hypocritical than Trump attending the World Economic Forum, a meeting officially billed as ‘addressing inequality and climate change’.
Nepotism 2020 on display in Davos U.S. President Donald Trump reacts after addressing the World Economic Forum in Davos, Switzerland, Tuesday, Jan. 21, 2020. The 50th annual meeting of the forum will take place in Davos from Jan. 21 until Jan. 24, 2020. Left is Ivanka Trump. (AP Photo/Markus Schreiber)

Donald Trump is living proof that billionaires should be abolished. He spreads the politics of hate and greed. He has delivered huge tax cuts for his fellow billionaires. He has cut food stamps and health services for the poorest. While the world is burning and drowning because of the climate crisis, he keeps cutting climate regulations and steered the United States away from the Paris Agreement. He is a billionaire president, ruling on behalf of his billionaire friends. And now, he is attending the World Economic Forum, a meeting officially billed as ‘addressing inequality and climate change’. Nothing can be more hypocritical than that.
 
We need to reimagine a world where all billionaires, including Donald Trump, do not exist. Where their obscene wealth is spent on schools and hospitals, teachers and nurses, instead of being hidden in the secret bank accounts of billionaires. It is just common sense to abolish billionaires. The planet and the people cannot afford billionaires like Mr. Trump.

Njoki Njehu, Pan-Africa Coordinator of the global Fight Inequality Alliance

People are dying from climate change. Every fraction of a degree matters.

Our house is still on fire. Your inaction is fueling the flames by the hour. And we are telling you to act as if you loved your children above all else.

One year ago I came to Davos and told you that our house is on fire. I said I wanted you to panic. Iโ€™ve been warned that telling people to panic about the climate crisis is a very dangerous thing to do. But donโ€™t worry. Itโ€™s fine. Trust me, Iโ€™ve done this before and I can assure you it doesnโ€™t lead to anything.

And, for the record, when we children tell you to panic weโ€™re not telling you to go on like before. Weโ€™re not telling you to rely on technologies that donโ€™t even exist today at scale and that science says perhaps never will.

We are not telling you to keep talking about reaching โ€œnet zero emissionsโ€ or โ€œcarbon neutralityโ€ by cheating and fiddling around with numbers. We are not telling you to โ€œoffset your emissionsโ€ by just paying someone else to plant trees in places like Africa while at the same time forests like the Amazon are being slaughtered at an infinitely higher rate.

Planting trees is good, of course, but itโ€™s nowhere near enough of what is needed and it cannot replace real mitigation and rewilding nature.

Letโ€™s be clear. We donโ€™t need a โ€œlow carbon economy.โ€ We donโ€™t need to โ€œlower emissions.โ€ Our emissions have to stop if we are to have a chance to stay below the 1.5-degree target. And, until we have the technologies that at scale can put our emissions to minus, then we must forget about net zero. We need real zero.

Because distant net zero emission targets will mean absolutely nothing if we just continue to ignore the carbon dioxide budget โ€” that applies for today, not distant future dates. If high emissions continue like now even for a few years, that remaining budget will soon be completely used up.

The fact that the U.S.A. is leaving the Paris accord seems to outrage and worry everyone, and it should. But the fact that weโ€™re all about to fail the commitments you signed up for in the Paris Agreement doesnโ€™t seem to bother the people in power even the least.

Any plan or policy of yours that doesnโ€™t include radical emission cuts at the source, starting today, is completely insufficient for meeting the 1.5-degree or well-below-2-degrees commitments of the Paris Agreement.

And again, this is not about right or left. We couldnโ€™t care less about your party politics. From a sustainability perspective, the right, the left as well as the center have all failed. No political ideology or economic structure has been able to tackle the climate and environmental emergency and create a cohesive and sustainable world. Because that world, in case you havenโ€™t noticed, is currently on fire.

You say children shouldnโ€™t worry. You say: โ€œJust leave this to us. We will fix this, we promise we wonโ€™t let you down. Donโ€™t be so pessimistic.โ€

And then, nothing. Silence. Or something worse than silence. Empty words and promises which give the impression that sufficient action is being taken.

All the solutions are obviously not available within todayโ€™s societies. Nor do we have the time to wait for new technological solutions to become available to start drastically reducing our emissions. So, of course, the transition isnโ€™t going to be easy. It will be hard. And unless we start facing this now together, with all cards on the table, we wonโ€™t be able to solve this in time.

In the days running up to the 50th anniversary of the World Economic Forum, I joined a group of climate activists demanding that you, the worldโ€™s most powerful and influential business and political leaders, begin to take the action needed.

We demand at this yearโ€™s World Economic Forum, participants from all companies, banks, institutions, and governments:

Immediately halt all investments in fossil fuel exploration and extraction.

Immediately end all fossil 

Immediately end all fossil fuel subsidies.

And immediately and completely divest from fossil fuels.

We donโ€™t want these things done by 2050, 2030 or even 2021. We want this done now.

It may seem like weโ€™re asking for a lot. And you will, of course, say that we are naรฏve. But this is just the very minimum amount of effort that is needed to start the rapid sustainable transition.

So either you do this or youโ€™re going to have to explain to your children why you are giving up on the 1.5-degree target. Giving up without even trying. Well, Iโ€™m here to tell you that, unlike you, my generation will not give up without a fight.

The facts are clear, but theyโ€™re still too uncomfortable for you to address. You just leave it because you think itโ€™s too depressing and people will give up. But people will not give up. You are the ones who are giving up.

Last week I met with Polish coal miners who lost their jobs because their mine was closed. And even they had not given up. On the contrary, they seem to understand the fact that we need to change more than you do.

I wonder, what will you tell your children was the reason to fail and leave them facing climate chaos that you knowingly brought upon them? That it seemed so bad for the economy that we decided to resign the idea of securing future living conditions without even trying?

Our house is still on fire. Your inaction is fueling the flames by the hour. And we are telling you to act as if you loved your children above all else.

Thank you.

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