Category: Advocacy

We need environmental reporters who will widen the scope of a narrow media lens.

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Woman reporter looking at a smartphone. Pixabay License.
Woman reporter looking at a smartphone. Pixabay License.

By Yasmin Dahnoun, The Ecologist  (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0).

Our media landscape is changing drastically – an ultrafast information age is pushing commercialisation and the concentration of ownership to a new level.

Rupert Murdoch’s influential media empire casts a shadow over upon local, organic, and investigative reporting. We hope that the Ecologist Writers’ Fund is a way of creating a fairer publishing model that works in the public interest, and not against it.

The climate crisis is shamefully underreported. At the same time, the conversation around climate breakdown that is taking place in the media is dominated by a few voices, marginalising those feeling the brunt of climate breakdown. 

Displaced

Just three companies dominate 83 percent of the UK national newspaper market, according to the Media Reform Coalition. A devastating lack of diversity in journalism is bred from low-paid, insecure, and exploitative working conditions.

And while the mainstream media is failing us, there is a generation of independent reporters emerging from around the world – who are well placed to tell stories that aren’t represented within the Murdoch agenda. 

I studied the role of community radio in Colombia’s long history of the violent struggle for my journalism degree. I found community-run radio stations had a vital role to play for those people who were in the firing line during the conflict.

These radio stations would play music, and discuss trivial village issues. And they would also alert other villages when para-military men or rebels were close to attacking. 

In various other projects, displaced children in Colombia would use community media projects to take pictures of their surroundings.

Grief

Such projects enabled them to interact with and understand unfamiliar territory, grounding their understanding of a new place through photography and voice recordings. 

And while social media is responsible for the saturation of information, false news, and tunnel-visioned views funneled through algorithms – it is also an opportunity for new and fresh perspectives to get heard.

For example, the story of three Amazonian Munduruku women who wield drones and cameras as weapons against miners in their territory. 

Telling our stories is a way to knit together the frayed seams of breakdown, whether social or environmental or both. Our words are a way of processing and expressing grief, exposing injustice, and most importantly – demanding change. 

Exploited 

My own journey into journalism hasn’t been an easy one. Even when I began my studies at the University of Westminster I was acutely aware that 60 percent of us students would end up in marketing and PR – and not journalism.

Our words hold power, they are vehicles of hope, a remedy for the heavy turmoil – a way out of the climate crisis. If only they are listened to.

I stubbornly resisted this grim statistical fate. Instead, I drifted in and out of low-paid care, warehouse, and bar work before finally landing on a career path that would accommodate my interest and skills. But for some time, it felt as if the minimum wage grind was killing my energy, drive – and dream. 

For most writers in the journalism industry, we’d do anything to get a piece published. Our naivety is exploited, we are tripped up and ripped off. What most writers don’t understand is that their words hold more meaning and value than they could ever comprehend.

Reporters carve history with their pens. They bring forward the realities of war, for example, the failing pursuit of Vietnam. Movements from the Montgomery bus boycott to Black Lives Matter have been captured, reported, told, and retold throughout history.

If we don’t have representative voices now, future generations will see the past through the skewed lens of the mass media. 

Ecocide 

We are currently witnessing the death of journalism – as an art, profession, and a viable career. Disillusioned, most reporters churn out press releases, also known as ‘churnalism’, or succumb to the pressure of writing clickbait articles – with their only purpose being to gain attention for advertisers.

And at the same time, we’re faced with issues that need our attention more than ever, in an age of attention deficit. As climatic conditions worsen, and corporations commit ecocide after ecocide and get it away with, we’re slowly losing the only chance we’ve got to survive as a species.

Having witnessed loggers chopping down vast areas of supposedly protected National Parks across South America first-hand, I knew that my heart and mind needed to be in environmental journalism.

As protectors of the planet – journalists stand with indigenous peoples, exploited minors, and families that have been poisoned by mercury in their water systems.

Power 

Our words hold power, they are vehicles of hope, a remedy for the heavy turmoil – a way out of the climate crisis. If only they are listened to.

The Ecologist Writers Fund aims to provide a scope for writers from marginalised communities, and countries that are most affected by the climate crisis. 

All donations will go directly towards supporting our writers. So far we’ve reported on stories from around the world, including: The fight to safeguard nature in rural Turkey, Fear over India’s dangerous dams, and Minds left behind in the global south. 

Do you have a story to tell? The Ecologist Writers Fund is currently accepting applications here.

Hot planet made deadly South African floods twice as likely: climate scientists

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Flash flood in Palapye, Central District, Botswana. Heavy rain caused a small dam to burst on the Lotsane River, which flows through the village. The mud walls of traditionally built houses dissolved like icing sugar, leaving just the roofs: the breeze-block buildings in the background survived intact. A young goat has become entangled in a wire fence and drowned, but it's believed no human lives were lost. Taken 1995 on film. Author: JackyR, CC BY-SA 3.0
Flash flood in Palapye, Central District, Botswana. Heavy rain caused a small dam to burst on the Lotsane River, which flows through the village. The mud walls of traditionally built houses dissolved like icing sugar, leaving just the roofs: the breeze-block buildings in the background survived intact. A young goat has become entangled in a wire fence and drowned, but it’s believed no human lives were lost. Taken 1995 on film. Author: JackyR, CC BY-SA 3.0.

“We need to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to a new reality where floods and heatwaves are more intense and damaging,” said a co-author of the study.

“If we do not reduce emissions and keep global temperatures below 1.5°C, many extreme weather events will become increasingly destructive.”

By Jessica Corbett, Common Dreams (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

Intense rainfall that led to deadly flooding and landslides in South Africa last month was made twice as likely by the human-caused climate crisis, a team of scientists revealed Friday, pointing to the findings as proof of the need to swiftly and significantly curb planet-heating emissions.

Experts at the World Weather Attribution (WWA) initiative found that heavy rainfall episodes like the one in April that left at least 435 people dead can be expected about once every 20 years versus the once every 40 years it would be without humanity warming the planet.

WWA climatologists warn that without successful efforts to dramatically reduce emissions, the frequency and intensity of such extreme events will increase as the global temperature does.

“If we do not reduce emissions and keep global temperatures below 1.5°C, many extreme weather events will become increasingly destructive,” said study co-author Izidine Pinto of the Climate System Analysis Group at the University of Cape Town. “We need to drastically reduce greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to a new reality where floods and heatwaves are more intense and damaging.”

During an April speech announcing a disaster declaration, South African President Cyril Ramaphosa said that communities in the eastern part of the country were “devastated by catastrophic flooding,” noting that it “caused extensive damage to houses, businesses, roads, bridges and water, electricity, rail, and telecommunications infrastructure.”

Ramaphosa also highlighted the death toll, sharing that when he and other officials visited affected families, “they told us heart-breaking stories about children, mothers, fathers, sisters, brothers, grandparents, and neighbors being swept away as their homes crumbled under the pressure of the flood waters.”

The city of Durban was hit particularly hard and its port—the largest in Africa—had to suspend operations because of the extreme weather.

Friederike Otto from Imperial College London, who leads WWA and co-authored the new study, pointed out that “most people who died in the floods lived in informal settlements, so again we are seeing how climate change disproportionately impacts the most vulnerable people.”

“However, the flooding of the Port of Durban, where African minerals and crops are shipped worldwide, is also a reminder that there are no borders for climate impacts,” she added. “What happens in one place can have substantial consequences elsewhere.

In addition to the chances of an event such as the mid-April rain disaster doubling due to human-induced climate change, the WWA team found that “the intensity of the current event has increased by 4-8%.”

The New York Times noted that “the work has yet to be peer-reviewed or published, but it uses methods that have been reviewed previously” and “the finding that the likelihood of such an extreme rain event has increased with global warming is consistent with many other studies of individual events and broader trends.”

WWA’s previous work includes a review of last year’s fatal heatwave in the Pacific Northwest, which the scientists concluded would have been “virtually impossible” in a world without the climate emergency.

“Our results provide a strong warning,” that WWA analysis said. “Our rapidly warming climate is bringing us into uncharted territory that has significant consequences for health, well-being, and livelihoods.”

‘Big news’ for climate as global insurance giant shifts away from fossil fuels

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Otogidemon, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons
30 St Mary Axe. Also known as the Swiss Re building, or Gherkin. Source: Otogidemon, CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

The new policy by Swiss Re “is not perfect yet,” said one campaigner, but the world’s second-largest reinsurer “is headed in the right direction.”

By Kenny Stancil, Creative Commons (CC BY-NC-ND 3.0).

After Swiss Re, the world’s second-largest reinsurer, announced Thursday that it is moving to end coverage for most new oil and gas projects, climate justice campaigners who have long pushed for the insurance industry to shift away from fossil fuels offered cautious praise.

“Swiss Re is one of the world’s ultimate risk managers and the policy which it published today sends a strong message to fossil fuel companies, investors, and governments: oil and gas operations need to be phased out in accordance with climate science or they may become uninsurable by the end of the decade,” Peter Bosshard, global coordinator of Insure Our Future, said in a statement.

According to Reuters:

In its annual sustainability report on Thursday, Swiss Re said it would no longer insure projects that get the go-ahead from their parent company from 2022, unless the company has an independently verified, science-based plan to reach net-zero emissions.

By 2025, Swiss Re said it wanted half of its overall oil and gas premiums to come from companies aligned with such a net-zero by 2050 plan, and by 2030 all its clients in the sector should have done so.

Also, from 2022, the company said it will no longer insure companies or projects with more than 10% of their production in the Arctic, apart from Norwegian producers.

On the issue of treaty reinsurance, whereby it insures bundles of risk in a job lot, Swiss Re said it expected to finalize a policy for the oil and gas sector in 2023.

“By taking steps to stop insuring new oil and gas projects and companies that won’t aim at aligning their activities with climate science by 2030, Swiss Re is headed in the right direction,” said Reclaim Finance director Lucie Pinson.

“The policy is not perfect yet,” she added, “and we encourage its peers to build on it to fully align with a realistic 1.5°C scenario.”

The International Energy Agency (IEA) said last May that there is “no need for investment in new fossil fuel supply” if the world is to achieve a net-zero energy system by 2050 en route to meeting the Paris agreement’s more ambitious global warming target.

Swiss Re, said Pinson, should respond to the IEA’s landmark report by “drawing a red line against fossil fuel expansion and excluding both projects and companies that cross that line well before 2025.”

Sharing a detailed Twitter thread by Bosshard, Oil Change International celebrated Swiss Re’s move. Becoming the first major oil and gas insurer to deny coverage for most new fossil fuel projects is “big news,” said the group.

Arguing that “ending support for oil and gas projects is gaining real momentum,” 350.org also praised Insure Our Future and encouraged its campaigners to “keep up the good work.”

According to Bosshard, Swiss Re’s phase-out commitment represents “a first for the insurance industry” because it “not only applies to the up and midstream sectors, but also to downstream companies (oil refineries, gas utilities, petrochemical plants etc.) without credible net-zero plans.”

However, he continued, “the new policy includes some important gaps and contingencies.”

“It will not cover new production projects which oil companies move forward as part of their ongoing operations,” said Bosshard. “It also exempts Norway from its definition of Arctic oil. The IEA doesn’t make any such exemptions.”

“Most importantly, the policy hinges on the development of a credible oil and gas framework by the Science Based Targets initiative [SBTi], by which oil companies’ net-zero plans will be measured,” he added. “It’s crucial that the SBTi framework reflect the findings” of the IEA and the United Nations.

Swiss Re’s new policy follows similar policies adopted last week by Hannover Re and Mapfre, said Bosshard, who pointed out that “these three companies cover 21% of the global reinsurance market.”

“Now, the Insure Our Future campaign calls on Munich Re, Lloyd’s, and SCOR, which together account for 26% of the global reinsurance market, to make commitments which build on Swiss Re’s approach by the time of their annual general meetings,” said Bosshard.

“We’ll be watching,” he added.