UN Climate Talks in Copenhagen

Climate Defenders Launch Massive Campaign Leading Up to Kyoto Plus

Sep 13, 2009

Over 10,000 scientists, NGOs, world leaders and delegates will meet in December to reach an agreement to cut global greenhouse gas emissions for 2012 onwards.

Greenpeace, Avaaz and dozens of other leading international Non-Governmental Organizations (NGOs) have launched massive awareness and action campaigns leading up to the UN climate talks set to take place in Copenhagen, Denmark in December 2009. The talks will focus on the post-Kyoto period of 2012 onwards (the "Kyoto Plus" period), as the current climate agreement, Kyoto, ends in 2012.

Leading up to the meeting, NGOs around the world are working hard to turn up the heat on world leaders and pushing them to take an aggressive stance on cutting greenhouse gas emissions. The global campaign is named TckTckTck to remind the world of the ticking clock on action to address climate change. Greenpeace has a petition already with tens of thousands of signatures and is urging members to talk to friends, neighbours and co-workers to get them to take action as well.

Drastic Change Needed

Time Magazine called the lead-up to the talks in Copenhagen "the world's last good chance to craft a new global warming deal." According to Greenpeace, scientists agree that to prevent catastrophic climate change the average global temperature increase must be as far below two degrees Celsius as possible. In order to do that, Greenpeace and others are desperate to reach an unprecedented international agreement that will see countries agreeing to substantial cuts in greenhouse gas emissions in the coming years.

Flash Mob Events for September 21, 2009

The global campaigning group Avaaz is also urging members to get active and make their voices heard to politicians leading up to the climate talks. On September 21, Avaaz has encouraged over 350 Climate Wake-Up Call events in 54 countries on five continents. Various activities are planned for the events, but the main aspect will be flash mob events where sudden groups of people form to make noise to raise public awareness or to alert public officials to the urgency of the climate situation. Activists will be flooding their local politicians and representatives' offices with phone calls urging they take an active stand on the issue.

The events on September 21 will be the first time the Avaaz online community has gone offline to take action on an issue. Other organizations actively working on climate change issues with Greenpeace and Avaaz on the TckTckTck campaign include Oxfam, Care, Amnesty International, World Wildlife Foundation, Equiterre and the Global Call to Action against Poverty.

The copyright of the article UN Climate Talks in Copenhagen in Environmental Activism is owned by Gemma Richardson. Permission to republish UN Climate Talks in Copenhagen in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.