2009-12-16
Here they are - the ladies and gentlemen, boys and girls we have been waiting for to enter Copenhagen. As a Swedish immigrant from Stockholm, I do not know for sure if I even can call myself a Copenhagener but with my passion for the environment, ecology and climate I have been looking forward to that this Nordic, vibrant hub closest to the continent should become a place we would remember for the good solutions surrounding the planet's climate problems.
The climate conference - or COP 15 (Conference of Parties, the 15th in rank, Kyoto was the 3rd) - is prepared in every detail, the security is double and triple checked, events and happenings in regards to the climate can be found all over the city and organic food and culture is popular.
Everyone knows that we have a common problem - an international problem - that must be experienced and resolved by all senses.
In the midst of everything, I want to send a greeting "home" about the feeling that exists down here. And there is good reason for Establishing Abroad´s readers to really be aware of this - because it is just like this media advocates: the good examples are national, but the solutions (read opportunities) can best be resolved internationally.
The latter by sharing experience, knowledge, hopes, fears and address them across borders. The climate issue - the question of how we save this planet from temperature increases and sea level rises that will cause us, and especially our children, to may have to give up the idea of the family's summer house near the shore and no longer be able to travel without being environmentally criminal. This is something we cannot solve nationally.
There is such strong evidence of how the good examples, as Denmark's wind power and large investments in sustainable technologies, are fantastic but cannot solve the climate issue alone. As far as climate goes, the global and international mechanisms are so integrated that they must look outside their own garden fence. Along with globalization came a lot of unexpected consequences and problems - but also a fantastic forum for solutions across borders.
I have worked with NGO's up until the climate conference and now also in the conference press department. In that role, I daily watch observers and journalists from around the world write to their home countries. Many times I have thought that Establishing Abroad should revieve their greeting and praise to make it completely accurate. No one knows if there will be a legally or even politically binding agreement in about a week when the city managers return home. But an attempt was made, closer to 30,000 people were present, to create something internationally.
And no matter which beautiful or frightening example one may present from home, the hope of a solution is what makes people work long days (12 hours) here. I am tired in my feet after walking several kilometers in the massive conference complex, Bella Center, tired in my head by the impressions from all sides but I am happy and hopeful and I will continue to be until the 19th of December. Because then everybody returns home and Copenhageners will spend time on a different international compromise of national examples - Christmas. Merry Christmas and a happy New Year!
I, Johanna Olesen works at the UN's climate conference at COP15's press department, and previously at People's Climate Action, which promotes the Danish and international NGO's interests in connection with the conference. I have been living in Copenhagen for six years and been a regular columnist for Establishing Abroad. Most of all, this Christmas I will miss Christmas "julmust" (Swedish "herblike" rootbeer) and a traditional Aladdin-box (chocolate) since I will not have time to go to Malmö before Santa arrives.