This Saturday saw the culmination of a two month WWF climate change campaign in Fiji with a big public event at Suva’s central park – Sukuna Park.
The EARTH HOUR event hosted a number of local entertainers, an excellent Meke performance (traditional Fijian dance), while the popular Hong Kong rugby 7s tournament was projected on a big screen and a lot of candles were lit as the lights around the park were switch off as a symbol to encourage people to think more about climate change.
The general consensus was that the campaign was a success – a large number of people turned out at the park with many more people across the country participating at home and over the two months leading up to Saturday the WWF team handed out thousands of climate change information leaflet.
Climate change receives near universal support in Fiji. Many people, especially those on the coast are already reporting changes in their environment like rising sea levels and with high profile events like the two destructive cyclones to affect the country this year, people are very receptive to the issue.
Earth Hour is a yearly event that started in 2007 and this year over 120 countries participated reaching an estimated one billion people.
Related Earth Hour posts can be found HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE and HERE - god it was hard work!
Perhaps it is time not only to turn out the lights for an hour but also for an hour-long global outcry by great numbers of people.
Many more people are going to have to speak out loudly, clearly and often about what is somehow true, as each of us sees what is real, so that the whole world can hear our voices. I do not believe that it is ever too late to do the right thing; but it is getting “late in the day” to make necessary changes away from soon to become patently unsustainable global human overproduction, overconsumption and overpopulation activities. Even though a colossal wreckage can be apprehended in the offing if silence prevails over speech-to-power, there is still enough daylight for us to see dimly that adequate space-time exists in which to move forward fast toward sustainability.