I was featured in the local paper yesterday with a promotion for Walk Against Warming (which has completely taken over my life at the moment).
“At 22, Erland Howland [sic] is helping co-host Australia’s biggest day of community action on climate change.”
Yes, they did spell my name wrong, but at least they got the Nature Conservation Council of NSW correct in full – that’s got to be a first. They also plugged our local Climate Action Group (the Hills Against Global Warming) film night that I’ve just got home from and ClimateMovement.org.au which is probably the best thing.
We actually screened two films tonight – “Carbon Connection“, a film about two communities affected by the global carbon market. One community was Grangemouth in Scotland where petro-chemical companies had been polluting the local environment for decades and the other was Sao Jose do Buriti in Brazil, where carbon offset companies have cleared native forest to plant huge monoculture eucalyptus plantations used as carbon offsets under the Kyoto Protocol’s ‘Clean Development Mechanism’ for the very companies who continue to pollute and cause health problems in Grangemouth and other Western cities. The monoculture plantations in Brazil have caused many problems including loss of indigenous medicinal plants and a lack of water for local people. The second film was a short video put together by Make Poverty History about climate change, development and Australian climate policy.
Anyway, I’m spending every waking hour (which accounts for a bigger share of my total 24-a-day allocation than I’d like at the moment) on Walk Against Warming until this Saturday. If you’re in Sydney, please come – it’s not only a critical time to let the government know the community is demanding a strong emissions reduction target, it’ll make me feel better for all the sweat, blood and tears, not to mention the sleep, I’ve lost over it. Better yet, help postering, letterboxing or on the day as a volunteer. One of the aspects that’s currently least organised but I’m most excited about is having a ‘meet and greet’ for local communities – Walk Against Warming participants wil have the opportunity after the (short, trust me) speeches to meet and find out about their local community climate groups and will be given assistance to start a new climate action group in areas of Sydney where there isn’t one already. Here’s the kind of guide we’ll be giving people, and here’s a map of all the Climate Action Groups we currently know about.
Finally, my job is now up for grabs – it’s advertised on our site and applications close next Monday. I finish work on Dec 12 and leave Sydney on Dec 19. My bus, bus & train to Darwin are booked, my flight from Darwin to Ho Chi Minh is booked and now I just need to get visas and bookings for the trip through Vietnam, China, Mongolia, Russia, Belarus, Poland, Germany and to Rennes in France. Ahem.
