Marking 50 years of World Environment Day – climate change is a race that we have no option but to win

This is why we won’t stop fighting to restore Lake Chad and the Great Green Wall that are key to Africa’s resilience and stability

A girl collects water with a bottle in the Shabelle river in Gode, Ethiopia in April. The worst drought to hit the Horn of Africa for 40 years is pushing 20 million people towards starvation (AFP via Getty Images)

Sunday, 5th June, marks the 50th anniversary of World Environment Day with the theme of “Only One Earth”. And yet we are still in the talking phase rather than implementation and accountability.

We are in a race against time. Why, then, are we making commitments of carbon neutrality by 2050?

According to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, 2050 is a potential point of no return depending on our carbon budget. This is a race that we have no option but to win by phasing down fossil fuels.

Climate change and environmental degradation are caging in the future. The many disastrous global events occurring simultaneously are already posing serious risks to health, clean air, safe drinking water and sufficient food.

The World Health Organisation estimates that 4.2 million people die prematurely every year from outdoor or ambient air pollution, accounting for one in eight deaths worldwide. Unfortunately my country, Nigeria, has the highest number of air pollution-related deaths.

According to the UN, an estimated 55 million people globally are affected by drought each year, and 129 countries will experience an increase in drought linked to the climate crisis. In East Africa, one person dies every 48 seconds from acute hunger, Oxfam reports.

Climate change is a so-called “threat multiplier” to national security and can cause conflict among communities struggling to survive, as seen in the fights for natural resources among farmers and herdsmen. As water resources become scarcer, it will lead to further loss of livelihood and potentially more armed conflicts.

Much of Africa has already warmed more than 10 degrees Celsius since 1901, according to the IPCC, while the continent is the most vulnerable to climate impacts under all scenarios above 1.5C, says the African Development Bank. Climate change is no longer a threat but a reality.

We don’t have multiple Earths to rely upon. This is why we won’t stop fighting to restore Lake Chad and the Great Green Wall that are key to Africa’s resilience and stability.

And the threat is not only to Africa. Just like Lake Chad, the US’s Colorado River is shrinking, and posing huge risk to the millions of people who depend on it.

Cop27, being hosted by Egypt, is around the corner. But how many Conference of Parties do we need before we address the climate crisis? We have a list of commitments from Cops - but how far have we gone in achieving these goals?

This is where the importance of activism comes into play. The danger of inaction is that it denies us the justice we need, and makes us a slave of it.

Regardless of whether we are white or Black, young or old, male or female, we should all be environmental activists. Everyone is needed in defending our planet because when we fail, we go down together - and when we win, we rise as one.

Adenike Oladosu is a Nigerian climate activist, eco-reporter, eco-feminist and the founder of the I Lead Climate initiative in Nigeria. She specialises in equality, security and peace building across Africa, especially in her native Lake Chad region where 90 per cent of the region’s water has disappeared in the last 50 years