When I first began reporting on climate change in the late 1980s I never imagined that 30 years later we’d be facing an existential crisis.
A hole in the earth’s protective ozone layer had been discovered but the global community responded so quickly to protect it that it gave me hope common sense would again prevail and measures to phase out carbon emissions would also be adopted. Unfortunately the greed and might of the fossil fuel industry proved too powerful and we now face climate extremes.
If you, like me, sometimes feel overwhelmed by the enormity of the crisis, I would encourage you to focus on your own circle of influence. Find a patch of green in your neighbourhood and cherish it. Protect it. Fight for it. We don’t have many ‘green patches’ in the west anymore, and those that remain need protecting. Money talks, but so do individuals when they join forces. World Environment Day is June 5 so in this edition I hope you’ll find some ideas for getting involved with nature, to help improve the health of our local ecosystems, for us, and our future generations.
Barbara Heggen
