What’s common between a man lighting villages across Ladakh with solar energy, an aeronautical engineer-turned climate change activist based out of New York, and a youngster helping farmers adopt sustainable practices in Tirunelveli? They’re part of a thousands-strong alumni network that has seen, with their own eyes, the heartbreaking impact of global warming on Antarctic ice shelves. And they’ve been moved enough to do something about it.
The network — Robert Swan’s Auburn, California-based 2041 Climate Change — has had a growing number of Indian members over the years. They currently have 800 members spread across the country. “Most of them are working for climate change in their own way, either full-time or part-time. But we thought it was about time all of us came together and started building a concrete base, at least in the larger cities,” says Shaivya Rathore.
The idea is to form a larger network of climate change activists and people affecting real change on the ground, with people who want to help but are not sure how. Rathore, and fellow climate enthusiast Walter Clint Fernando, are in the process of reaching out to environmental experts, in order to sit down and discuss a concrete, implementable carbon emission reduction plan designed according to the city’s environment and needs. They have similar plans for a number of other cities, including Bengaluru and Mumbai.
The two are among a host of youngsters to have thrown themselves into climate work, after their eye-opening trip to the Southern tip of the world. “We spent 11 days on board a ship to Antarctica, with marine biologists, glaciologists, ornithologists, people who had been researching specifically on Antarctica for years,” recalls Fernando, adding, “Antarctica regulates temperature all over the globe; the Southern ocean is the only ocean that touches the Indian, Pacific and Atlantic oceans. Before we saw everything up close, we were just laymen and climate change victims, with a vague idea that something had to be done.”
Rathore, for instance, had no connection to climate change two years ago. Though trained in aeronautical engineering, she worked as a Teach For India Fellow in Chennai, till she saw the fury of Nature up-close in the devastating floods of 2015.
“The affect it had on my students was huge. The part of Kodambakam where I would go to teach was quite inundated; the schools were shut, the community was hit, the parents lost their jobs, which impacted not only the kids’ education, but also their day-today-life. It took three months for life to get back to normal, and those three months really put them back,” she recalls.
That’s when Rathore signed up for the 2016 expedition. She has been working for the organisation ever since, helping spread the word and attending Climate Change conferences.
Fernando, on the other hand, has been working with Tamil Nadu’s farmers since January last year, enabling them to use drip irrigation to save 40% water usage per acre, and adopt organic practices. “In January 2016, we established a registered a farmers-producers company with 250 farmers as equal shareholders, thus bringing in the concept of Farm to Folk — eliminating the middle men and selling produce directly from the farm to end markets,” he says. His ambition is only growing, and he, Rathore and others of a similar bent are looking for more people to work with.
ClimateForce Chennai Event will be held at Backyard, Adyar on October 22, from 10 am onwards. For details, call 9176223719.
