Take (Digital) Climate Change Action for Earth Day 2020!

Wednesday, 22 April is Earth Day! It’s not a calendar event with huge notoriety in Australia, but at Koskela we believe it’s worth getting behind.

During these turbulent COVID-19 times a lot of the heat (pun intended) has gone out of the climate change conversation. Almost everyone has experienced upheaval and turned their focus to doing life in lockdown.

But this pandemic will not last forever. Once the virus is no longer an immediate threat, we must battle a far more epic enemy – the warming of the planet – which could have far more consequential and devastating effects on our society.

This year is the 50^th anniversary of Earth Day so we think it’s especially important to commemorate.

The very first Earth Day in 1970 was organised by Gaylord Nelson, a junior senator from Wisconsin. He inspired 20 million Americans (10 percent of the U.S. population at the time) to take to the streets protesting the impacts of 150 years of industrial development, which had left a growing legacy of serious human health impacts.

Today, Earth Day is widely recognised as the largest secular observance in the world, marked by more than a billion people every year as a day of action to change human behaviour and create global, national and local policy changes.

Amidst the Coronavirus pandemic Earth Day is going digital. The theme is Climate Action and the goal is to unite citizens of the world in a call for creativity, innovation, ambition and bravery to meet our climate crisis and seize the enormous opportunities of a zero-carbon future.

There are three ways you can participate:

Join the global digital surge

The Earth Day Network has put together an amazing social media toolkit. The plan is to flood the digital landscape calls-to-action from everyday folks. Inside the kit you will find some amazing artwork and messages you can post to your social media. Easy as!

Watch Earth Day Live

The world’s largest civic event is going digital for the first time in history. Tune in for an Earth Day unlike any other with messages, performances and calls to action from Zac Efron, Dr. Slyvia Earle, John Kerry, Van Jones, Cristina Figueres, Al Gore, Licypriya Kangujam, Zdeno Chara, Paul Nicklen, Nahko and Arizona Muse.

Watch live at earthday.org

Take action

The Earth Day Network has put together a comprehensive list of ways you can take action, even during lockdown. On 22 April they will issue a new call to action every hour. Through 24 hours of action, Earth Day 2020 will drive actions big and small, give diverse voices a platform and demand bold action for people and planet.

Share Your Air: Document Your Air Quality With The Ec2020 App
The Great Global (Solo) Cleanup
Create For The Earth
Ask Your Faith Leader To Sign The Climate Action Pledge
Make Climate A Class
Become A Citizen Scientist
Make Your Next Meal Plant-Based
Reach Your Representative
Help Us Protect Species By Taking Our Pesticide Pledge
Sound The Call For Climate Action
Advocate For Climate Action At Your University
Call For Green Spaces
Act On Plastic Pollution
Plant A Forest
Start A Community Climate Discussion
Go Clean Energy
Commit To Vote Earth

We have seen that the Australian community can come together and make big changes to avoid a COVID-19 catastrophe. We need to do the same to avoid a climate change catastrophe. Most of us are finding we have some extra time up in our sleeves during quarantine, use that time for climate change action!

If you do participate in the Earth Day activities, we would like to know how – please tell us in the comments. Hands up if you are getting behind this movement and committed to keeping the climate change conversation alive!