The biggest victims of climate change are not yet born, but the argument for giving them legal rights has been mafe before by a young lawyer in the Philippines who launched a unique legal action in 1990. Saddened by the quick depletion of his country's natural resources, Antonio Oposa sued the environment minister and demanded the cancellation of logging concessions which threatened the 4 per cent of the country's virgin forest still intact. He named the plaintiffs as 44 children, including his own three sons, and the unborn future generations of the Philippines. Not surprisingly the case was rejected, but he appealed to the Supreme Court, laying his case on the concept of intergenerational equity created by American law professor Edith Brown Weiss. The Supreme Court ruled to hear the case and before a decision was made, future logging was prohibited by the Government. Is intergenerational justice a reality nowadays? This is a serious question and while most kids prefer spending their time on the Web playing online games, we have decided to spend part of our time combatting global warming causes.
Rob Clews, 19, a student from the Aberdeen University has been chosen to represent UK youth at the United Nations climate change negotiations. Delegates from 197 countries are meeting in Copenhagen, Denmarkto to agree about a successor to the Kyoto Protocol. The UK Youth Delegation, which has been organised by the UK Youth Climate Coalition will act as a moral voice for young people in the UK, urging world leaders to limit their carbon emissions and protect the environment, protect people and promote a green economy. Most of the negotiators representing the UK will be long gone by 2050, while the current youth generation will be living with the consequences of the decisions made in Copenhagen. Hence the youth delegation must ensure to be represented at the talks and to campaign for a positive outcome. Understanding the frameworks within which the United Nations works is an additional benefit for the delegates, some of whom had previously been involved with the UK Youth Parliament, representing young people and organising conferences about terrorism and violent extremism. The UK Youth Delegation consists of 23 young people who have travelled by land and sea to Copenhagen, where they have lobbied the UK and other Government for a fair climate change treaty. These inspired young people have travelled from the UK to urge our government to take strong and equitable action on climate change. This year's UN Climate Change Conference is a critical stage in negotiating a global deal on climate change to take effect after 2012. The UK Youth Delegation (UKYD) is a self-organised group of 18 to 25-year-olds who are passionate about the need to equitably reduce greenhouse gas emissions right away, in order to avoid dangerous climate change. This is a generational issue: peer-reviewed science predicts fundamental impacts on the world's climate and agriculture system, the system that humanity has been intimately linked to throughout history. The decisions made at Poznan will shape the world we grow up in. Young people comprise about 50 per cent of the world's population and are the largest group represented at these talks. This year, 500 youth delegates from more than 50 countries are expected at the conference. They have encountered a steep learning curve during the first few days of negotiations, as the urgency of the situation became more apparent. Rather than crush our hopes, this has made them more determined to make their voices louder.
We would like to say a big thank you to all those of you who took the time out to fill out the surveys and express your views so they could be expressed in the communique, which was presented to the leaders. You made our job much better and representative. We must admit the UK youth delegation did you proud, earning a reputation for being hard workers, diplomatic but firm. We got along well with all those we came into contact with. We were able to make great contribution to the communique, working alongside, Germany, Russia, France, the United States, Japan and Canada. We learned about the key themes particularly food security, maternal health, Antartica research and climate change. The UK Delegation was delighted to be invited to discuss the youth perspective on the G8 issues (climate change, nuclear non-proliferation, maternal health and food security) with Prime Minister David Cameron over a cup of afternoon tea. Also present were Chancellor of The Exchequer George Osborne and the British High Commissioner to Canada. All were supportive and encouraging, telling us many a time that we were not just the leaders of tomorrow but the leaders of now. Of course Cameron, being a world leader after all, would be pressed for time, so he dominated the discussion. He asked us questions about what we have all been doing in the negotiations and what we thought about other G8 nations' delegations and their views. Naturally we answered honestly, telling him that we had learnt so much about the negotiating processes at this high level, and that the discussions and negotiations were particularly refreshing amongst all the delegations.
Primarily we thought that as young people we had little to no conflicts regarding our stances on issues in the negotiations. This is because the tact and tenacity that we globally share as young people means we all had general consensus on putting forward common values and fresh forward thinking policies into the communique. Consequently we argued for the importance of youth participation in international decisions, meetings and events; that we are capable of achieving great things and deserve a serious influence on policy rather than being viewed as tokenistic. We explained to Prime Minister Cameron about our consultation survey and that climate change was the top priority of the UK youth agenda. James Mummery in particular made a fantastic effort to fight for the importance of climate change in policy. We explained that target figures were vital when it comes to cutting carbon emissions, and Cameron fully acknowledged this argument. The Prime Minister was soon swept away as he had a flight scheduled to return back to the UK. Although the meeting was fast and we were left wondering how great an impact we had left with the Prime Minister, we are truly grateful to David Cameron for providing us with this opportunity. To have even secured this meeting with our country's leader at the G20 summit was a big victory for youth involvement in decision processes. We are pleased that Cameron has acknowledged our work, and that now he has provided us with a tangible platform to continue dialogue with the relevant ministers now that we are back in the UK. Also through this meeting, we believe Prime Minister Cameron has set a precedent for other leaders to also open a dialogue with the youth of their countries. Climate change is a serious issue for all of us but more importantly for future generations and this is why it is so difficult to prioritize it in front of the day to day issues of Government duties. We are thankful that all leaders of the world are really concerned with the problem and let us, the youth generation, get involved in the negotiations.
In the USA as in Europe, anti-pollution legislation only targets determined sources of pollution because it is based on the control of discharges from discharge standards. It is true that such sources constitute the major part of the polluting sources. However, one should not forget that pollution can be introduced into aquatic environments from atmospheric fallout, infiltration, drainage ... In fact pollution problems form a whole insofar as, for example, the fight against water pollution alone will be insufficient if it is not accompanied by a fight against air pollution. Non-localized sources of pollution therefore constitute a problem not to be overlooked when searching for sustainable waste management solutions. The Clean Water Act, although mainly concerning discharge activities, contains some provisions which demonstrate that the legislators have been aware of this problem. Despite the difficulties of regulation of this non-localized pollution, the American text is concerned at two levels, on the one hand at the level of local states' plans for improvement of water quality, and secondly at the level of inventories of water quality. But at these two levels, it is more a matter of wishful thinking than of real attempt at regulation.
We know that we are some of the most serious youths in our age group and most other kids prefer to play online poker with a pokerstars bonus code 2014 or any other code that let you earn money. Yes but someone has to tackle more difficult issues and we are the ones who will suffer the most from global warming effect, so it is up to use to act on our strong beliefes for our future and the future of our children. By the way future climate changes might include a potential ice age, before the next wave of global warming. One sure thing is that climate will be severely disturbed with negative consequences for all of us.