So many young people are at the frontlines of climate action, and in South Africa, hundreds of future ‘climate changers’ applied to be part of a boot camp aimed at important eco-impact—a good sign of the times!
Gauteng, South Africa (11 September 2023) — In climate action efforts across the globe, young people have and continue to showcase determined efforts to raise awareness and facilitate a proactive change in attitude toward tackling climate change. A step further, many young South Africans are also pushing for their input toward influential stakes like climate policies. After all, as WWF South Africa highlights, they are the group most likely to be affected by accelerating climate change.
This push to be heard in climate policies was evident in a recent Youth Climate Champions (YCC) boot camp where over 800 applications were made to be part of the programme.
“We were very excited to see how much interest there was in this year’s bootcamp. We received over 800 applications which we had to narrow down to only 20 slots. This meant the calibre of participants and level of engagement was extremely high. The enthusiasm and energy in the room was fantastic,” shares Ivanna Katz, youth engagement coordinator with WWF South Africa.
The YCC boot camp (now in its second year) aptly took place at Cradle Moon in the Cradle of Humankind in Gauteng. Its mission is to empower people to understand they can take meaningful action through engaging with critical climate policy and processes as well as supporting collaborations between young people and youth organisations interested in climate change.
Putting parts of the public and the planet’s future in the same room also lends itself to other forms of positive climate action awareness, like sessions dedicated to green careers, climate justice and equality and learning about instruments that influence climate policy.
The spark in interest shows us that while eco-anxiety is very real for young people in our country, so is the push to get involved and lend a voice to the planet’s future—and that’s what we call active citizenship!