G20 youngsters raise pressure in push for bold global action on climate change

The push for bold climate action in the world’s major economies is set to strengthen as public pressure mounts especially amongst young people, a major public opinion poll published by the UN Development Programme (UNDP) and University of Oxford has shown.

According to the UNDP poll, a growing majority across the G20 countries see climate change as a crisis, with strongest demands for climate action coming from youngsters under-18s.

The poll showed how public support for climate action is set to strengthen in the near future, as climate-aware teenagers become of voting age, enter the workforce, and move into positions of greater influence.

The new survey, called the ‘G20 Peoples’ Climate Vote’ polled over 689,000 people, including over 302,000 people under the age of 18, and was published ahead of the crucial G20 summit in Rome, Italy this weekend, as well as the COP26 climate talks in Glasgow, UK next week.

The world’s major economies are the biggest polluters and highest contributors to the global greenhouse gas emissions. China is the world’s top emitter, producing more than a quarter of the world’s annual greenhouse gas emissions, which contribute to climate change. The Asian giant is the world’s largest contributing country to CO2 emissions—a trend that has steadily risen over the years—now producing 10.06 billion metric tonnes of CO2. Other big emitters are the USA, India, Russia, the European Union, Canada, Brazil, and Japan.

The biggest culprit of CO2 emissions for these countries is electricity, notably, burning coal. Burning fossil fuels releases gases and chemicals into the air.” And in an especially destructive feedback loop, air pollution not only contributes to climate change but is also exacerbated by it. Air pollution in the form of carbon dioxide and methane raises the earth’s temperature.

Africa is the least emitter of GHG; but sadly, the continent is the biggest loser in the vagaries of climate change at the cost of between $7 billion and $15 billion annually, according to the African Development Bank (AfDB).  The International Monetary Fund (IMF) says the loss could rise to $50 billion by 2040. From the locust swarms devastating thousands of hectares of cropland in East Africa, perennial droughts and encroaching deserts that lay bare the vulnerability of the Sahel of Africa, scotching lives into misery and driving migration, to the inundation of coastal towns and villages, the continent is beleaguered on every side.

According to the UNDP, building on a first round of polling released earlier this year, the new results provide fresh insights into how under-18s support a variety of climate policies in G20 countries.

In all of the G20 countries surveyed, a majority of under-18s said they believed climate change is a global emergency, ranging from Argentina and Saudi Arabia (63%), to Italy and the UK (86%). In most countries, under-18s are more likely to believe this than adults, and often by large margins, such as Australia (eleven percentage points), the United States (ten points), and India (nine points). Without bold action from G20 countries, which account for 80 percent of the global economy and 75 percent of global emissions, it will be impossible to keep global heating to 1.5C, as required by the 2015 Paris Agreement.

“This new Peoples’ Climate Vote shows that, on average, 70 percent of young people in G20 countries believe that we are in a global climate emergency,” says UNDP administrator Achim Steiner.

He further said: “Given that they are about to inherit this climate emergency, young people are sending a message to global leaders that is loud and clear: they want climate action now. The world is now watching – hoping that countries will come together at COP26 in Glasgow to make bold, historic decisions that will literally change the future.”

He said the most popular climate policies among under-18s in the G20 countries surveyed were conservation of forests and land (59%), using solar, wind and renewable power and using climate friendly farming techniques (both 57%). Support for these policies was stronger among young people by three per-centage points for the first two policies, and by four percentage points for climate-friendly farming.

The gap between children and adults was greatest on policies like increasing access to good, affordable insurance, which enables people to recover more quickly from the impacts of extreme weather events, and using more clean electric cars and bicycles, at five percentage points. The generational divide on climate change policies could be even larger in individual countries, depending on their particular characteristics, and highlights a potential near-term shift in demand for climate policies, as young people become old enough to vote.

For Stephen Fisher, a professor at the Department of Sociology, University of Oxford, the findings show that younger people within the G20 want a bold and broad set of policy responses from governments. As they come of age, political leaders cannot ignore the higher expectations of this emerging climate-aware electorate.

The polling took place from September 2020 to June 2021. It featured respondents from all G20 members, excluding China and the European Union (EU) – although France, Germany, and Italy were included as nation states. Indonesia and South Africa results were available only for people under 18.