Youth and Climate Crisis

Climate  crisis is  has now become a phenomena that is affecting millions of people worldwide. For farmers the climate crisis means erratic rainfall, changing weather patterns, prolonged drought and in extreme cases death. It also means loss of biodiversity and emergence of diseases. For pastoralist communities it meals less pasture for animals, forced migration in search of pasture and water for animals and  increased conflicts due to competition over pasture and water.

For young people engaged in agriculture, the climate crisis means lack of adequate rainfall , disrupted food production and household food insecurity. It also means conflict among pastoralists and herders as conflicts over pasture arise. It also means young people have to migrate from their home areas to other localities to look for alternative ways of survival leaving behind  families .It also means more push of young people  from rural areas to urban areas to search for  job opportunities and other forms of economic engagement to eke out a living.

Africa's contribution to global emissions is among the lowest in the world , but contradictorily , the burden imposed on Africa to address the climate crisis is very high. Furthermore, Africa has become home  to false solutions to the climate crisis  examples including carbon trading .These create a platform where polluters pay communities but sadly they are allowed to export pollution to poor countries because in many developing nations , regulatory systems are weak and  people in power do not care much about citizenry .

When disasters strike for example the cyclone Idai[1] affecting Mozambique,Zimbabwe and Malawi,  prolonged drought  in Southern Africa region, flooding in east Africa region in countries such as Kenya .These disasters are largely causes by changes in climate  and result into massive losses , displacement , destruction of property and death. It is quite unfortunate that  countries that suffer from the negative impacts of climate crisis are the same countries unable to cushion themselves from these negative impacts either economically or socially. It also implies that  communities are forced to migrate to other regions .Additionally even access to local relief becomes problematic as relief aid cannot reach the people in dire need due to weather conditions.

The month of September 2019  is a very significant month when it comes to issues of climate change .It is the same month that Greta Thunberg organised a climate strike in which school children participated and included strikes in different parts of the world running from August to September namely future Fridays.

In Kenya , university students  members of Your Voice Matters Project (http://www.fahamu.org/your-voice-matters/)activists and social justice actors took part in  the Global Climate Strike to make demands to the government  to demand action.Since climate issues are global issues  and we live in a shared environment, it is the responsibility of everyone to take part in tackling the climate crisis.

[1] https://reliefweb.int/disaster/tc-2019-000021-moz