Attenborough’s hope for future
SIR DAVID Attenborough yesterday called on the COP26 summit to kickstart “a wonderful recovery” from climate change.
The 95-year-old natural historian and broadcaster told an audience of world leaders at the SEC that it should be possible to save the planet by working together.
High-polluting countries are under pressure to limit temperature rises to 1.5C.
Attenborough said: “People alive now, or the generation to come, will look at this conference and consider one thing – did that number stop rising and start to drop as a result of commitments made here? We have every reason to believe the answer can be, ‘Yes’.
“If working apart we are a force powerful enough to destabilise our planet, surely working together we are powerful enough to save it?
“In my lifetime, I’ve witnessed a terrible decline. In yours, you could – and should – witness a wonderful recovery.”
Attenborough asked: “Is this how our story ends – a tale of the smartest species doomed by that all too human characteristic of failing to see the bigger picture in pursuit of short-term goals?”
He added: “People affected by climate change are no longer some imagined future generations but young people alive today. Perhaps that will give us the impetus we need to turn this tragedy into a triumph.”
Barbadian PM Mia Mottley stressed the impact of adverse weather events on developing countries.
She said: “1.5C is what we need to stay alive. Two degrees is a death sentence.
“We do not want that dreaded death sentence and have come here to say, ‘Try harder, try harder’.”