COY16
The 16th UN Climate Change Conference of Youth
Hello there! Another month, another newsletter!
Welcome to the August issue of the COY16 Newsletter!
Each month, we will deliver this bulletin filled with information and insight on the organisation of COY16, our progress, and how you and others can help!
About COY16
COY16 is the 16th United Nations Climate Change Conference of Youth.
Our Conference is organised by young people from all over the world. We are divided in 7 different Working Groups, and one overall Coordination Committee which has representatives from each Working Group in it. We are also joined by our implementing organizations: UKYCC, XR Youth, UK Youth for Nature, UKSCN, FFF Scotland, UNMGCY and YOUNGO that continue to accompany us and strengthen the efforts put forth by our organization.
Global Innovation Competition
COY16 have partnered with Aker Horizons to launch our Global Innovation Competition to showcase youth ideas and innovation to solve big climate and energy challenges! We are looking for smart, scalable and interesting ideas to solve key questions in renewable energy, carbon capture and green finance. Participants choose one of the innovation challenges below and submit a solution by October 14th 2021.
These will be assessed by a panel of corporate and finance leaders. The winning submissions will win cash prizes and be showcased at COP26 in the Blue Zone to world leaders.
Join the competition and help us demonstrate how youth have the answers to our greatest problems! Answer one of these problems:
How might we address challenges around water consumption as green hydrogen production scales up?
How can we deploy the next digital offering to support the energy transition? (e.g. blockchain, predictive analytics, machine learning)
How can we provide large volumes of sustainable biogenic CO2 fit for carbon capture?
How can we assess the future demand for deep-water real estate?
How can green finance play a larger impact on the energy transition?
1. The COY16 Global Innovation Competition invites entries from all youth (aged below 35 as of 01 January 2022) from any country in the world.
2. Participants can sign up through this form.
3. Participants can work individually or in teams of up to 5 people; teams can be self-selected or selected by the COY16 team after the application deadline of 23rd September 2021. We will connect the teams by email, but after this, it is up to the individual team to decide how best to communicate.
4. Participants can register for multiple challenges, but must submit a separate entry form per challenge.
5. Entries can be in any format (e.g. video, scale model). A key tip is to make sure your submission is visual and engaging!
6. All entries must be submitted to [email protected] by 14 October 2021.
7. Entries will be shortlisted by an expert panel combining industry and consulting expertise, with shortlisted participants invited to pitch their idea in person or virtually at COP26 to a panel of corporate and finance leaders.
8. The winning entries will be awarded cash prizes and have the opportunity to network with corporate and finance leaders over a dinner.
Prizes
1st prize $2000
2nd prize $1000
3 x $500 prizes
Sign up here.
Plastic Week
During August, COY launched a social media campaing during the span of two weeks urging their followers to change their relation towards single use plastic. Together with the hashtag #NoPlasticWeek, the campaign shared information and proposed ideas for differents way to avoid plastic waste and consumption. Although plastic pollution is one of the biggest problems we are facing in our race against the climate crisis, every bit of information and inspiration shared can create positive change and have an impact in our fight. How are you avoiding plastic in your life?
Working Groups Updates
As a Conference made by and for the youth of today, COY is made up of a diverse variety of essential Working Groups. These are divided into 7 Working Groups (WGs) in combination with one central Coordination Committee. COY16 volunteers work tirelessly on a daily basis to continuously raise the bar and build a Conference that both current and future generations can take pride in.
Finance
Done deal! Finance has secured Aker Horizons as a COY16 Sponsor. As part of this sponsorship, the company in collaboration with COY, will organize a youth competition and provide prizes. They have also finalised a deal with Equanet as COY16 official digital partner. The Scottish Government is now the principal Sponsor and Host of COY16, and the UK Government will also help fund our Conference. The finance team is still working on securing more sponsorship deals as we countdown to the international conference.
Communications and Outreach
The Communications Working Group has been diligently working towards continuing the relations with sponsors and partners for the Conference, planning in-person volunteer activities, and looking for different opportunities for its attendees to enjoy the city of Glasgow during the event. They have also led a six-part no plastic week challenge, to inspire COY followers to reduce their plastic consumption and embrace sustainable alternatives.
Access and Inclusivity
The Access and Inclusivity Team has spent the past month finalizing the COY16 Safeguarding Policy, and has drawn up multiple conceivable and potential options for implementation. The Team is also preparing translation and interpretation plans for the days of the Conference, in addition to exploring various other measures to make the Conference more inclusive for all.
Global Affairs
The Global Affairs Unit has been directly involved in and hard at work on the Delegate Management process for the Conference, mainly focusing on both the various Visa processes as well as Arrival coordination. Additionally, the Global Affairs Working Group has taken the past month to ensure the global dissemination of the “Unmute Form” for individual Youth Statements.
Logistics
Logistics has been hard at work on finalizing contracts, booking and securing accommodation for the people travelling for COY, preparing materials and details for the in-person Conference. They are also looking for UK-based volunteers to join their task force. If you live in the UK and are interested in joining COY as a volunteer, submit your application here!
Programmes
The Programme Working Group has been working hard over the course of the past month with each of their individual Taskforces! The Sessions Taskforce has been diligently working to finalize the agenda and room allocations for the Conference and is engaging in discussions with Workshop leaders to design the ideal schedule for both attendees and hosts. They are also working hard to welcome academics in the Climate Justice field to attend panel sessions and leading talks. The Ceremonies Taskforce is deeply engaged in discussions on the Art Space by securing the inclusion of works done by several young climate artists. These works will be displayed in Strathclyde’s Unions Event Space. The Policy Taskforce has been further collecting the Global Youth Statement inputs while also working on the video on the Global Youth Statement. Finally, the Cross-Working Group Coordination Taskforce continued to ensure the Programmes Team is working diligently alongside the other COY Working Working Groups to coordinate finalizations regarding initial financing and volunteer numbers for the Conference in October!
Volunteer Coordination
The Volunteer Coordination Team has been working out which volunteers will attend COY16, and which roles will they take during the in-person event, which has been an enormous task. They are also allocating four COP26 Blue Diamond Delegate badges to some COY16 volunteers, following a fair selection process based on their work on the organization of the Conference.
Blogs of the Month:
By Kate L. Ferguson
As a part of COY’s ongoing chats with young climate activists, we had the opportunity to conduct an interview with Dr. Mya-Rose Craig, a young environmentalist, naturalist, and social justice activist also known as ‘Bird Girl’.
During this conversation, we discuss the importance of intersectionality in conversations around climate justice, the role of young people in the Climate Justice Movement, as well as her personal work on the subject and what it means to her.
To find out how “global climate justice is pushing for equity and equality in the global climate movement, on various different levels, whether that’s at the grassroots level, national level, or an international level in international politics”, what the “key for ensuring the sustainability of the movement on climate change” is, and understand “the importance of hearing everyone’s voices” you can find the full article on our blog!
We’ve certainly learned a lot from speaking to Mya-Rose and hope reading this blog will leave you wanting to learn more about climate justice. Or if you’re already well-versed in the subject, will inspire you to follow in Mya-Rose’s footsteps and keep writing, speaking, listening and getting involved in the conversation around climate justice.
By Jane Kim
“I am a 22-year-old climate activist and the Founder and Executive Director of the Force of Nature.“ This is how Clover Hogan introduced herself when asked to launch her identity to COY16. Among the numerous titles she possesses, such as researcher of eco-anxiety, director and host of a podcast, TED speaker with 1 million + views, or plant burger enthusiast as her Twitter bio says, Clover settled for this. Looking back now, her self-introduction is very accurate, a complete package of all who she is and more.
Clover grew up in tropical north Queensland in Australia, where she found herself to be very much in nature, as she described, “my living room had about three walls, so I spent more time outside than in,” she chuckles. “Nature was my greatest place I found awe and wonder in, and it was where I found safety and solitude.” However, her bubble popped at the age of 11, when she started to watch documentaries like The Cove, and the Inconvenient Truth. “I was filled with these difficult emotions that I didn’t know what to do with. In retrospect, I would definitely describe that as eco-anxiety and something more nuanced- eco-phobia, which relates to the feeling of powerlessness in the face of ‘cataclysmic environmental change.”
Like many of us, she found herself confused, she could not understand how it was the first time she was learning about the climate crisis. “We hadn’t talked about it in school, we hadn’t talked about it around the dinner table, I hadn’t read about it in the media. So while I tried to make sense of the issues, I also tried to make sense of how the adults in my life tried was so good at pretending that they didn’t exist.”
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Thank you for reading this month’s COY16 newsletter!
From COY16, to you.
