No time to lose – collective action for our common future: Make Change Happen podcast episode 9

In the New Year edition of Make Change Happen, we look ahead to 2021 as a super year driven by global action to tackle environment and development challenges.

Article, 05 January 2021
Collection
UN biodiversity conference (COP15)
A series of pages related to IIED's activities around the 15th Convention on Biological Diversity conference (COP15)



IIED’s ‘Make Change Happen’ podcast provides an opportunity to hear our researchers and guests discuss key global development challenges and explain what we are doing to support positive change. 

In the first episode of 2021, we learn that early action, youth participation and collaborative policymaking are pivotal to making change happen and a better future for us all.

Hosted by Liz Carlile, this episode’s conversation features IIED director Andrew Norton; Ineza Umehoza Grace, founder and chief executive officer of the Rwandan organisation The Green Fighter; and Dr Tara Shine, chair of the board of trustees at IIED and director of Change by Degrees.

A big challenge ahead of us

2020 set us back in achieving environment and development progress, leaving an unprecedented challenge ahead. But recovery is possible if we learn from last year and move ahead quickly.

If 2020 taught us anything, it is that radical change doesn’t have to be slow and incremental. The global response to the COVID-19 pandemic has shown that immediate and collective action is possible and effective to halt other critical global crises too, such as climate change, biodiversity loss or severe damage to livelihoods.

In this episode, we hear how Norton thinks that it’s in fact a decade of super years that is needed to fight the scale of the challenge in front of us, Dr Shine calls for collaborative leadership and immediate action, and activist Grace demands more and better participatory spaces where youth voices are included and heard.

Find out more by listening to the episode.

Additional resources:

Contributors

Head and shoulders photo of Andrew Norton

Andrew Norton is director of IIED. He is an applied anthropologist working on a range of issues related to social and environmental justice. He oversees the implementation of IIED’s five-year strategy focused on addressing five interlocking crises – climate, biodiversity loss, inequality, urban risk and unsustainable markets.

Head and shoulders photo of Tara Shine

Tara Shine is chair of the board of trustees of IIED and director of Change by Degrees. She is an experienced policy adviser and climate negotiator, and has worked with several governments and development organisations.

Head and shoulders photo of Ineza Umuhoza Grace

Ineza Umuhoza Grace is an eco-feminist and the founder and chief executive officer of The Green Fighter in Rwanda. She also works on the Loss and Damage Youth Coalition

Head and shoulders photo of Liz Carlile

Liz Carlile (host) is director of the Communications Group at IIED. She is an expert in strategic marketing and communications, with a particular focus on research communications and policy influence, and has published on social learning and climate change communications.

How to listen and subscribe

The ‘Make Change Happen’ podcast will provide informal insights into IIED’s work to create positive change and make the complex issues we face more accessible to wider audiences. The title refers to IIED’s 2019-2024 strategy, which sets out how IIED plans to respond to the critical challenges of our time.

You can subscribe to the podcast on your favourite podcast app as follows:

You can follow some of the people you have heard in this episode on Twitter via @lizcarlile, @andynortondev, @InezaGrrace and @shine_tara. Follow the podcast on @IIED_Voices for all the latest updates.