A climate walk to remember: from Rome to Paris

Thousands of environmentalists from various civil society groups and faith-based organizations started today (September 30) their 60-day pilgrimage from Rome to Paris just in time for the United Nations-backed climate change summit in December where countries are expected to hash out a new agreement to limit their carbon emissions.

Leading the People’s Pilgrimage is Filipino climate activist Naderev “Yeb” Sano, also a former Climate Change Commissioner who dubbed the Paris climate talks as the last chance to limit climate change to the 2 degrees Celsius target set under the 2009 Copenhagen Accord.

“The pilgrimage has garnered support from all over the world, with people from different communities embarking on their own walks. The fight for climate justice continues and we are nowhere near our aspiration of seeing world leaders and their governments acknowledge climate change as an issue of equity and justice, or as a problem that affects human rights,” Sano told the Philippine EnviroNews.

Sano and his group brought with them a copy of Pope Francis’ Encyclical Laudato Sii as well as the 100,000 signatures obtained so far to the Climate Change Petition launched last May by the Global Catholic Climate Movement, showing the Catholic faithfuls´ worldwide support for the Pope´s call for climate action and signed on his behalf by the Pontifical Ceremonieri, Monsignor Guillermo Karcher. The petition will be presented to political leaders present at the UNFCCC in Paris.

The People’s Pilgrimage is organized by Our Voices, a global organization campaigning for climate action.

Over the last few months, climate activists have embarked on a walk for climate starting from storm-ravaged Vanuatu to Australia’s Great Barrier Reef, Africa, the United States and Europe to build pressure on climate action to climate negotiators and world leaders.

“ We wanted to give inspiration as well as greater political push for world leaders to join our call and act against climate change,” Sano said.

On the Philippines climate action plan, Sano hopes that the government delivers a robust, comprehensive and transformative plan.

“ The country’s climate plan can only be coherent and credible if it embodies a phaseout from dirty fossil fuel dependence and strongly pushes for a development model that does not rely on the market logic. It must embrace a paradigm that insulates the economy from the vagaries of the global industrial model.,: he said.

The 21^st Conference of Parties (COP 21) of the United Nations Framework Conference on Climate Change (UNFCCC) will start on November 30 to December 12 in Paris, France.