This webinar, sponsored by the Rockefeller foundation, Skoll World Forum, and Connected Women Leaders is hosted by Jessica Fleuti and Patt Mitchell. They are joined by panelists Mary Robinson, former president of Ireland; U.N. High Commissioner for Human Rights; Hindou Oumarou Ibrahim, co-chair of the International Indigenous Peoples Forum on Climate Change; Xiye Bastida, indigenous youth climate activist and organizer; Katherine Wilkerson, climate and gender activist and author; and Megha Sood, director of production at Exposure Labs. The panel discussion highlights parallels between the immediate crises of both COVID-19 and climate change. There is an emphasis on the need for a change in the narrative — for example, white, affluent men in the global north need to focus more on intersectional stories, particularly of women in the global south. There is a heavy emphasis on the need for solidarity between communities and how, in order to make positive change for our climate, we need to combine knowledge with scientific facts. As shown during the pandemic, science and human behavior matter and the data reveals that our individual and global action has affected the COVID Crisis. We should apply those same actions to the just-as-immediate Climate Crisis. The panelists state how the return from COVID could be a pivotal moment for positive environmental change, and that, as a society, we have to ensure that the Climate needs are prioritized over a swift economic recovery. Wilkerson, while highlighting specific scientific facts, states that we have the tools and proven solutions in order to avoid extensive Global warming, and that the experience with COVID-19 suggests that solutions are a matter of economic and political will.
