Guest speakers from Hollywood at COP 23

At the Conference of the Parties (COP 23) in Bonn that brings together delegates from 195 countries who are  working on agreements and rules in order to follow the Paris climate agreement, various guest speakers from Hollywood are also expected to attend the event. Among the big stars is the actor, former Californian governor and environmentalist Arnold Schwarzenegger whose nonprofit environmental organization R20 helps sub-national governments around the world to develop low-carbon and climate resilient economic development projects. Earlier this year, he launched a database of legislation to help combat climate change. Arnold Schwarzenegger also met with French President Emmanuel Macron, another participant at the COP 23. At their Élysée Palace meeting it was a key issue that U.S. President Trump anounced to leave the Paris Climate Agreement.

 

Annother Hollywood star and Academy Award winner that might show up at COP 23 is Leonardo DiCaprio who addressed the severe challenges of climate change on our planet in his opening speech at the UN General Assembly in 2014. He had to face the impact of global warming when he was shooting The Revenant, as he reported in his speech at the Academy Awards in 2016  where he was awarded the Oscar for Best Actor.  The Leonardo DiCaprio Foundation (LDF) support projects around the world that build climate resiliency, protect vulnerable wildlife, and restore balance to threatened ecosystems and communities.

 

The LDF also launched a project to protect the oceans. Global Fishing Watch analyzes data from the Automatic Identification System (AIS), which is collected by satellites and terrestrial receivers, to identify apparent fishing behavior based on the movement of vessels over time. At the COP 23, DiCaprio’s documentary Before the Flood will be presented that shows how lobbyists in the U.S. are launching billion dollar campaigns to manipulate the public and deny the factual climate change so that they can go on with their dirty businesses.

 

 

The mission to fight climate change is the key topic for  former U.S. presidential candidate Al Gore who raised international public awareness of global warming with the Academy Award-winning documentary An Inconvenient Truth. About ten years later, he is back on screen with the documentary An Inconvenient Sequel: Truth to Power that presents various solutions to fight climate change. During his trip to Bonn, he will be accompanied by U.S. democrate Michael Bloomberg, the former mayor of  New York  City. As Al Gore told Green Film Shooting he met with members of he German parliament to discuss climate protection activities when he visited Berlin in August.

 

 

 

Another prominent speaker in Bonn is the Californian governor Jerry Brown. Despite the Trump administration’s environmental rollback, he launched a specific program to to slash emissions and boost renewable energy. The Under2Coalition  is a group of ambitious governments from around the world committed to combating climate change. A total of 188 jurisdictions representing 39 countries and six continents have signed or endorsed the climate agreement, known as the Under2 MOU (Memorandum of Understanding). Collectively, they form the Under2 Coalition, which represents more than 1.2 billion people and $28.9 trillion in GDP – equivalent to 16 percent of the global population and 39 percent of the global economy.

 

 

"If we all work together, humanity can rise to the existential threat of climate change," says Governor Brown. While national governments negotiated the Paris Agreement, its goal – to limit the increase in global temperature to under 2 degrees Celsius – can only be achieved if subnational state and local leaders, businesses, scientists, students, nonprofits, and others step up. All of them will be brought together at the  Global Climate Action Summit that is going to take place from September 12 to 15, 2018 in San Francisco.  The Summit will also help strengthen the push for greater emissions reduction targets at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change’s 24th Conference of the Parties (COP 24) in December 2018.

 

Photo: © BMUB-Dominik-Ketz