Elizabeth May in Conversation with Paul Beckwith – At COP15 in Montréal

Elizabeth May, MP for Saanich-Gulf Islands, Co-leader of the Green Party of Canada, and long time environmental activist joins Paul Beckwith in a discussion about the recent United Nations CBD-COP15 and UNFCCC-COP27 events. Elizabeth draws from years of experience to provide insightful historical context for the two treaties as well as her perspective on their outcomes.

This video was recorded on December 15th, 2022 and published on January 12th, 2023.

Some of the topics discussed:

– How since the Framework Convention on Climate Change was first signed in Rio in 1992, humanity has emitted more greenhouse gases than from the time of the beginning of the Industrial Revolution up to when the convention was signed.

– How the negotiations at these UN conferences are like a basketball game. One plays for 2 hours and the game is often decided at the last minute.

– How the climate crisis is the largest single threat to preserving species, and the single largest cause of potential extinctions.

– How Canada is no exception in that it continues to hack away at the forest cutting through old growth forest, poisoning biodiversity through our use of pesticides, and pursuing minerals underground getting forests out of the way to get them.

– How the target of 30% by 2030 is more complex than one might initially consider when a country’s biodiversity impact can be primarily caused by its consumption rather than what it is doing within its own borders since this consumption impacts other parts of the Earth.

– The importance of the indigenous peoples when one considers that 30% of the land base has to have no people on it. Should this mean we dispossess the Indigenous people from their lands in order to preserve biodiversity?

– How In terms of the goal of 30% by 2030, the biggest obstacle will be that those repositories of biodiversity, which have the most potential for us to set aside and preserve, are in developing countries where it’s simply not possible for biodiversity to be set aside without financing to ensure that those countries are compensated for what they give up in development.

– And much more . . .

Links:
– COP15 ends with landmark biodiversity agreement
https://www.unep.org/news-and-stories…

– UN Biodiversity Conference CBD-COP15 Scores Historic Goal for Nature
https://www.natureunited.ca/newsroom/…

– Former Environment Minister, Green Party of Canada and Green Coaltion call on Canada to set an example
Canada and Green Coalition call on Canada to set an example and be a leader on biodiversity
https://www.greenparty.ca/en/media-re…

– Philippines delegate refuses to eat until action on climate change ‘madness’
https://www.cnn.com/2013/11/12/world/…

– Climate Endgame (CEF Video)

– Canada in deepwater: behind the Trudeau government’s approval of the Bay du Nord development project
https://thenarwhal.ca/bay-du-nord-new…

Special Guest:
Elizabeth May – Canadian politician, environmentalist, author, activist, and lawyer who is serving as the leader of the Green Party of Canada since 2022, and previously served as the leader from 2006 to 2019. She has been the member of Parliament (MP) for Saanich—Gulf Islands since 2011. May is the longest serving female leader of a Canadian federal party.
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Regular Panelist:
Paul Beckwith – Climate Systems Scientist. Professor at the University of Ottawa in the Paleoclimatology Laboratory as well as at Carleton University

Video Production:
Charles Gregoire – Electrical Engineer, Webmaster and IT prime for FacingFuture.Earth & the Climate Emergency Forum; Climate Reality Leader

Heidi Brault – Video production and website assistant, Organizer and convener, Metadata technician, COP26 team lead for FacingFuture.Earth and the Climate Emergency Forum; BA (Psychology); Climate Reality Leader

Acknowledgement:
We’d like to acknowledge these two organizations without which our attendance at COP15 in Montréal, Quebec, Canada, would not have been possible.
– Vita Sapien – https://vitasapien.org/
– Facing Future – https://www.facingfuture.earth/

Our Website:
https://climateemergencyforum.org/

Attributions:
Background Music:
– Title: Through the City II
– Author: Crowander
– Source: Free Music Archive
– License: CC BY-NC 4.0

Image and Video: https://climateemergencyforum.org/ass…