Climate Change article

Thousands flock onto the streets of the Lahore Press Club on a busy Friday afternoon. Despite
the sweltering heat, teens and students in their school uniforms march together in a large
crowd, holding eye catching handmade slogans such as “Winter is Not Coming”, and “There is
No Planet B!” while chanting “What do we want? Climate justice!” Activists gathered together to
deliver speeches about climate change and concluded with an open mic.

A climate strike was held nationwide in Pakistan including Lahore on the 20th of September.
Countries around the world also began holding such strikes. These climate strikes were called
on by Greta Thunberg to protest the side effects on the environment caused by global warming.
Many teens and youth from a variety of schools gathered to protest--for the sake of their futures.
Despite contributing to less than 1% of greenhouse gases in the world, Pakistan is one of the
ten most affected countries of global warming in the world, according to the 2019 Global Climate
Risk Index, affected by extremely hot temperatures, droughts, and intense monsoon seasons,
threatening the population, especially those under the poverty line.

Climate change is not only causing more hotter summers each year, but also our agriculture,
health, and our air quality. Politicians are not recognizing this global issue as a proper threat, so
it is up to bring more awareness to this issue, because if we refuse to act now, we will suffer the
consequences in the future. According to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
(IPCC), if we do not take immediate action, there will be so much heat trapping carbon present
in the atmosphere that it will be irreversible, if we do not decrease global warming to 1.5
degrees by 2040. Small changes in your daily routine such as using cloth bags instead of plastic
bags, switching to a reusable water bottle instead of a disposable plastic bottle, and carpooling
or biking instead of driving can not only reduce your carbon footprint but also make a difference
in the world we are living in today.

This call for climate justice has been around since before the start of the Industrial Era, and has
dated back to ancient times , where the Romans noted how waste caused the air and sea to
become polluted, and in the 14th century, many diseases had an effect on the human
population due to accumulated waste.