The Green War
[Music]
how is it possible
that the most intelligent creature to
ever walk the planet is destroying its
only home
i see myself as the girl next door who’s
just a tad unsure
about the idea of an exhausted art
an exhausted mother with a little me
means big task ahead
but i also see dangerous possibilities
that blind my focus from her beauty and
strength
art which is a home to all of us is
supposed to be beautiful
but our actions have made it ugly
a mother having 10 children with nine of
them mistreat her
can be compared to the number of the
people responsible for the planet’s
destruction
versus the few people struggling to
protect it
and quebec from the same mother are
expected to live happily
but human beings are killing and
poaching
their brothers and sisters from the same
mother
mother earth
millions of species are at a risk of
extinction
and suggests that we are in the middle
of the six months
extinction caused by human activities
scientists are also warning that by 2030
will have the worst impacts of climate
change
and that means you only have nine years
to act right
so that we can prevent the worst impacts
of climate change
and for me conservation is not about the
next generation
it is about my generation first and then
the next generation
because in 2030 i’ll be 30 years old
three years ago i decided to dedicate
all my birthdays
to growing back the trees that my
community had lost
this is when i turned 18. i also decided
to educate them on the importance of
conservation
and so far with the help of my team
we’ve been able to plant
three thousand trees plus
in my community a lot of people are
still using firewood
because they do not understand that we
have alternative sources of fuel
and the few people who understand this
look at these alternative sources of
fail as expensive
and this is leading to mass
deforestation
i’m scared because the jungle i played
in as a child is quickly disappearing
i’m afraid my children may have to walk
miles and miles and mouth
before finding a single tree i remember
swimming in the great mara river and
every time we had too much
rain we could not even cross the river
today as we speak the river is turning
seasonal
people are crossing the river without
necessarily having to use the bridge
this is because small forest which is
the source is in danger
forests are the lungs of the earth
and destroying these forests is like
when you have
lung problems and it affects your entire
body
i’m passionate about environment
conservation especially the advocacy
part in the tree growing parts
i do not have any educational background
on the same and that does not make me
environmentally unconscious
at all because i believe that the only
qualification you need for you
to conserve the environment is the fact
that you live on this planet
i remember in high school we used to
plant trees and participate in a lot of
community projects
and at that time i did not understand
what planting trees was
i was planting trees because anita is a
scout
and scouts are planting trees and i did
not come here to lie to you that
i started planting trees at the age of
three or at the age of four i knew about
climate change meant
after my high school i had too much time
before joining university
and at this moment i realized i wanted
to discover my purpose as early as 17.
i joined a lot of mentorship programs
and after being mentored i realized i
just wanted to be a social change
catalyst in the society social change
activists
but then i came across the sustainable
development goals
at this point i came across zero hunger
not to poverty
and i was confused so which one am i
going for
but then again as i continued reading
about the sustainable development goals
i came across sdg 13 which is climate
action and at this point
i learned about global warming climate
crisis
climate emergency climate action
and as one guy madai puts it
we tend to put the environment last
because we think we need to eradicate
poverty fast
but what we are forgetting is we are not
eradicating poverty in vacuum
we are doing it in an environment so
this is when i realized
this is the path i was going to take
environment conservation
but then again looking at this giant
climate crisis climate change
i realized i was not going to do it
alone
and the secret is leaving no one behind
so i decided to come up with a movement
of young people
who are interested in the same just like
me did not
have any educational background on the
same this is what they put from my
social media platforms
huckle tell me hi anita i see you
planting trees can i join you
and still at that time they just wanted
to plant trees with me
but did not understand why they were
planting trees and so i brought them
together and educated them
on why the environment fast
why the young people and why now
this is war the earth is under attack
and has been struggling to put up a good
fight
but the bad guys are getting smarter
we have different tools when it comes to
environment conservation
walls that deplete resources and cause
irreversible pollution
environmental activism that saw the
likes of my role model when gary mother
tortured and abused
then of course we have green washing by
companies that tend to pretend
to be environmentally conscious
with their products full of recycling
signs yet we still find these products
in the landfills and in the water bodies
meaning they have no plans to take back
their products for recycling
imagine yourself putting on a mask and
this time
not because of covet 19 or other related
diseases
air pollution air pollution kills a lot
of people worldwide
and in 2019 millions of deaths in india
were attributed to air pollution and
this was like
one in five people
in urban cities like nairobi where we
have a lot of emissions from
vehicles and industries we have the
cutting of trees
as well and these trees are being cut to
pave way for
roads they call development the same
trees are cut to pave way for lifeless
billboards people have started to
experience this and people have started
feeling that the air gets worse every
other day
the people that contribute less to
climate change are affected the more
countries have started experiencing this
evidence through floods
droughts changing weather patterns and
rainfall distribution and all this
is a threat to human health
food security there is no water
social and economic development
when we talk about changing weather
patterns
this means the farmer is affected
farmers
no longer know what to farm next
after harvest and when the farmer is
affected it means the food
is the food production is affected when
food production is affected
the food consumer is affected the food
con who’s the food consumer
we are not spared either
few months ago the lakes in the rift
valley started rising
lake bulgoria and lake baringo which are
1.5 1.25 miles apart are about to meet
these lakes are salty water lake and
freshwater lake respectively that means
there will be a lot of contamination and
aquatic life is going to be affected
a lot of people are displaced
there has been destruction of hospitals
schools
churches homes and the people
affected directly are now starting
to be scared they do not know what will
happen to them next
in the case of droughts we’ve seen wild
animals such as elephants and lions
leaving their places
in touch of water and this is causing
human wildlife conflict
what annoys me the most is the fact that
these people living around conservancies
and national parks
are the same people who play a very big
role in conservation
yet they are the first people to feel
the effects of climate change
africa emits less greenhouse gases
but we are the same people with
inadequate resources and capacity to
build resilience as we deal with this
monster
while we have a lot of conferences
talking about how africa is affected
just like we have a lot of conferences
full of old people speaking about how we
young people are affected
then we have the seemingly unseen war
from few people who are trying to change
this few people who are trying to make
the environment cleaner and greener
be it an unknown student somewhere
trying to change their lifestyle
or somebody from a high policy changing
position
we all can do something to tip the
scales
five years ago one leader signed an
agreement
which was meant to keep the temperatures
well below 1.5 degrees
they agreed to to hold the temperature
increase
well below 2 degrees celsius right now
we have we are at 1.2 degrees celsius
which is too much
the planet is getting hotter and hotter
every day too much for me
it’s too much for africa and for sure
too much for the world
in the words of this month to 25 years
ago people could be excused from not
knowing much and doing much about
climate change
but today we have no excuse we need
action now
kusama we need to start applying the
three hours
reuse reduce and recycle and i’m even
thinking we need to start
refusing environmentally and friendly
products and services
with alternatives i still insist
we as your children are starting to feel
your betrayal
our mistakes as your children are your
responsibilities as our parents
the personality of the future generation
depends on your action
what if the people in charge of
environmental policies were really
interested in environment and its
protection
i’m sure we could have entrusted them to
work on the policies
to make the planet better what if every
lawmaker were educated about the
environment
and why we need to protect it they will
make
laws that enable human beings to live
happily as we protect the environment
today and tomorrow
and what if everyone leader acknowledged
that we are in the middle of a crisis
and treat
this as a crisis it is
i could probably have hope that my
future is not
threatened anymore
how is it possible
that the world most intelligent creature
to work this planet it’s destroying its
only home
thank you