When I'm sixty-five...

Last week, representatives from the International youth climate movement met with members of the Australian delegation to talk about, you guessed it, young people and climate change!
Left to right: Ben Pryor (delegation); Fiona Lord (delegation), Thomas Spencer (Germanwatch), Hansha (International youth rep, Nepal) Skye Glenday (delegate), Anna Keenan (International youth rep, Australia), Louise Hand (Ambassador for Climate Change), Blaine O'Neill (International youth rep, USA), Kristin Tilley (delegate), Deepa Gupta (International youth rep, India), Bruce Wilson (delegate), and me, Cara Bevington.

In this photo we’re all smiling at the end of a productive meeting after crunching through a number of issues, from encouraging the Australian government to play a role in ensuring that young people from the Global South are able to attend and participate in these complex international meetings, to informing them about the largest youth climate summit to be held in Australia ever - Powershift. Of course, we also spoke about the topic on everyone's lips… targets.

As young people, we have a special affinity to the target numbers being thrown around by scientists, negotiators, governments and civil society. They spell out our futures. At the moment climate negotiations don’t look much beyond 2050. In the year 2050 I will celebrate my 65th birthday. I know that I want to be eating birthday cake on a planet where carbon concentration in the atmosphere has stabilised and then declined, where ecosystems and biodiversity is protected, where people can live on their island homes, and have land that isn’t destroyed by floods or droughts and can grow their crops and live in safety. I also know, from reading the science, that the emission reduction targets which most developed nations have committed to, do not safeguard our futures. There we were, a gaggle of passionate youth with a joint question on our lips – why not a stronger target?

The delegates, speaking on behalf of our government, explained to us that Australia is committing to an ambitious target, in the context of a global agreement. And that their work is in line with keeping the carbon in the atmosphere to 450ppm or below. Their role is to do their very best for our national interest. And, through all of the analysis that they have done, an upper level of a 25% target is ambitious.

Our conversation seems to be “Australia needs to do more” vs. “this is what Australia can feasibly achieve, and it is a positive step toward a safe climate future”.

I see that our challenge is to continue arguing our case, and for the Australian people to demonstrate that stronger targets are in our national interest. Australia can achieve a 40% target by 2020 – sure it will be difficult, but the consequences are so much worse. As Nicholas Stern famously said, the cost of inaction will far outweigh the cost of action.

While you can negotiate about climate change, you can't negotiate with it.

- Cara