Global Challenge: Climate Change

Author: Charlene Goh & Lou Si Yuan

Date: last updated on 04 NOVEMBER 2022
Extracted article from: https://www.todayonline.com/singapore/today-youth-survey-climate-
crisis-fear-pessemism-government-policies-2034066?login=success

Instructions:
As you read the article
1. Highlight in yellow the various people or organisations mentioned.
2. Highlight in red the problems or challenges faced.
3. Underline in red the current measures or solutions that can help with problems/
challenges.
4. Underline in blue the causes of the problems or challenges faced.

TODAY Youth Survey: Climate crisis strikes fear,

pessimism but youths believe Govt policies can
make the most impact
Having been fascinated by animals since she was a child, 25-year-old Woo Qiyun is alarmed
at how wildlife species are becoming extinct at rates that have surpassed those in
history, and the part that climate change plays in these occurrences.

“(It) is very sad to me… knowing that even if we do something about it, there are things lost
that we will never get back,” she said.

Still, Ms Woo, who is a sustainability consultant, said that she wants to remain cautiously
optimistic, believing that there is still time to make decisions that will change this trajectory.

For Ms Aishwarya Iyer, a 20-year-old student who is a permanent resident here, climate
change has been hitting too close to home, wreaking havoc in the form of more frequent and
intense natural disasters in places she has ties to.

Unprecedented floods ravaged her friend’s hometown in Pakistan this year and she feared
for her family in Chennai, India — a city by the coast.

“It’s harder to have a positive outlook on how climate change will affect you when it’s already
affecting… people from where I'm from and where my friends are from,” she said, adding that
social media and the news media generally paint “a very bleak picture of the future”, which
does not help to stem her anxiety and worry.

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While the climate crisis evokes a range of feelings among the young in Singapore, the TODAY
Youth Survey 2022 found that the top three feelings mentioned by respondents when
thinking about climate change were negative — 45 per cent were fearful, 31 per cent were
sad and 29 per cent were hopeless.

The online survey, conducted in September, polled 1,000 Singaporeans and permanent
residents aged 18 to 35.

CHANNELING PESSIMISM INTO POSITIVE ACTION

Commenting on the TODAY Youth Survey 2022 findings, Ms Melissa Low, a research fellow
with the Centre for Nature-based Climate Solutions at the National University of Singapore,
said that the pessimism among young people should not be ignored because it could turn
into cynicism if not addressed.

However, Dr Andie Ang, president of the Jane Goodall Institute in Singapore, had a more
optimistic view. Feeling negative about climate change may not necessarily be a bad thing,
she pointed out, because the climate crisis is a threat to people's existence or survival,
thereby motivating people to act on it.

“It is important that we do not become paralysed by this negativity. We can feel negative
about it and yet be hopeful at the same time that it is not too late to act,” Dr Ang added.

Agreeing, Associate Professor Koh Tieh Yong, a weather and climate scientist at the
Singapore University of Social Sciences (SUSS), said: “Some of the youths will be leaders of
our society tomorrow. So if they are moved by the gravity of climate change to champion for
sustainable development, the positive impact will be tremendous.”

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WHO SHOULD BE RESPONSIBLE?
When asked which of three options would be most impactful in mitigating the effects of
climate change, the respondents ranked government policies (43 per cent) the highest,
followed by individual action (33 per cent) and finally, corporate actions (24 per cent).

Some of the youth interviewed by TODAY said that seeing more open conversations and
accountability from countries that make pledges such as net zero emissions would help them
feel more hopeful in this bleak situation.

Ms Aishwarya said: “We need actual accountability in some form, like maybe economic
sanctions or something actionable… To me, that would be a sign of real progress.

Ms Woo, too, said that she would like to see corporations and decision makers put money
where their mouth is.

“When corporations say that they are reducing emissions, I want to see numbers that
actually reflect that.”

Meanwhile, Mr Darryl Ho, 19, who described climate change as the "crisis of a generation",
lamented that individuals are not doing enough.

The third-year psychology studies student from Temasek Polytechnic said: “There are so
many things that can be done, but no one’s actually doing it. I have been recycling, I have
been using reusables... People say they're sad but then they don't do anything (to help the
environment)."

For Miss Dorcas Tang, 22, it is the Government who should be taking on more of the burden
in this fight.

Ms Tang, who sees herself as an activist and is known as “earthtodorcas” on Instagram, said:
“Government policies… can make sure that corporations are transparent with their
sustainability goals and it can also make sure that things like environmental assessments are
done properly.”

However, experts told TODAY that there is no right answer to who is best in pushing for
changes.

Dr Ang believes all three parties — individuals, corporations and governments — are key to
making changes.

Individuals make choices that can influence decisions from the bottom up, while policies and
strategic directions can drive systemic changes from top down.

However, Ms Low from the Centre for Nature-based Climate Solutions was of the view that
government policies are impactful in mitigating the effects on climate change, since much of
corporate and individual behaviour can be shaped by regulations and policies.

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Agreeing, Assoc Prof Koh of SUSS said: "There are many aspects of climate action, especially
those linked with infrastructure and economy, which require governments to initiate
changes and coordinate development.

"But at the end of the day, it is the individual who decides to support the political leadership
and the individual who makes choices as consumers of goods and services.

So I think the core drive for climate action still lies with the people.”

HOW THE YOUNG ARE SUPPORTING FIGHT AGAINST CLIMATE CHANGE

The TODAY Youth Survey showed that young people were trying to walk the talk, with one
in two respondents in the survey saying that they were actively taking measures to combat
climate change. About half (51 per cent) of the people surveyed said that they took public
transport or walk more, 48 per cent recycled more and 44 per cent used reusable bags when
shopping.

Ms Tang the activist is trying to spread awareness and start conversations among the
community about the climate crisis.

An artist and storyteller, she creates creative content around climate change, ranging from
bite-sized social media posts to posters displayed in exhibitions and wall murals.

Her goal is to “invite the wider community into the climate movement through art and
storytelling, in a way that's not just throwing facts and figures at them, but really trying to
communicate these issues on a very human level”, she said.

Ms Woo, the sustainability consultant who is also science communicator behind the
Instagram account The Weird and Wild, said that she tries to make decisions that align with
her values of being environmentally conscious. However, she admitted that she does
sometimes wonder: “Do all this for what?”

“But on the other hand, I see how using my own bottle to get drinks or choosing to eat
vegetarian food or introducing my friends to vegetarian food do change their minds about
certain things or heighten their sensitivities towards topics that connect their consumption
to climate change,” she said.

Ms Aishwarya is another youth who has become more conscious about her lifestyle choices.
She does not go for fast fashion due to the large amount of waste it produces. She used to buy
four to five pieces of clothing every month in 2020, but can now go for months without
getting a new item because she would either make her own clothes or buy clothes that she
knows she will wear again, instead of following fleeting fashion trends.

For her and other youth who are doing what they can to do their bit for the earth, these
actions may be small but not meaningless. As Ms Tang put it: "It shouldn't matter what
actually happens in the future — whether we avert this crisis or catastrophe, or not. It's more
about, 'Did we try our best and did we do the right thing, given our knowledge of the
situation?'’
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 After annotating, consolidate your findings in the table below.

People/Group involved: _______________________________________________________

Challenges/problems faced Measures that can help Causes of

with challenges/problems problem/challenges
1.

2.

3.

Delving deeper into one of the causes: _____________________________________________

Head

Heart

Hands