A Regional Youth Roundtable: Justice for the Environment
by Research Associate Siu Tzyy Wei
With only 27 years until the 2050 Paris Agreement, twelve years until Brunei’s Wawasan 2035 and amidst the current heatwave across Southeast Asia, the Global Analysis team of Global Awareness and Impact Alliance (GAIA) held its first ever hybrid youth roundtable on Friday, 12th May 2023. This roundtable tackled current issues that environmental policies face in terms of equity and sustainability. “A Regional Youth Roundtable: Justice for the Environment'' was held at Ruang Belia Kitani, Pusat Belia.
The youth roundtable was led and moderated by Research Associate Siu Tzyy Wei. Together with fellow Research Associate Dr. Mu’izz Abdul Khalid and colleagues Hariz Yahya, Ayesha Salleh as well as Natasya Leong, the team put together four young leaders from the non-profit and academic sector in Southeast Asia namely Dr. Angela Tritto and Joshua Belayan (Brunei), Zulaikha Ishak (Singapore), and Aubrey Padilla (Philippines), with eleven Year 12 students from the Jerudong International School (JIS) for a conversation on equity and sustainability of current and incoming environmental policies.
Held in a hybrid setting, the youth roundtable encouraged two interactive, solutions-focused sessions on equity and sustainability issues of present-day environmental policies. In line with GAIA’s mission towards “Empowering Thought, Generating Change”, the roundtable was designed for all parties to think of the aforementioned issues in a more critical and strategic manner; first in roadmapping the current-day reality of the climate crisis, second in prioritising issues to focus on and third, in brainstorming for practical solutions to tackle the highlighted issues.
Over the course of 2.5 hours, participants and speakers deliberated extensively on what became a three-step model to tackle the aforementioned issues:
Maximise the potential of social media. Given that most of us have access to basic internet and are superglued to our phones, micro-steps like sharing Instagram posts and/or Youtube videos (among many others) that address environmental issues, developing (substantive and constructive) opinions on sites like Reddit is a valid and active step in highlighting climate issues. Creating ripples virtually is better than letting stagnancy and the absence of action fester.
Empathy is the first step to equity. To champion for the rights of the marginalised, is not to become their superhero. Instead, it is to give them a safe space and help them when they need in order for them to take up their own rightful space by themselves in this shared fight.
Think globally, act locally. The Bruneian context is undoubtedly unique from the rest of the world, and therefore Brunei’s effective contribution to tackling climate change is dependent on strategic reframes and reforms in the current conversations and collaborations all individuals as stakeholders of our shared environment are having amongst ourselves.
In moving forward, it is imperative to have consistent discussions that encourage the sharing of different perspectives on issues that matter. More importantly, it is crucial that these discussions are also focussed on discovering solutions that can be implemented by everyone regardless of our individual differences. GAIA looks forward to continue engaging with local and regional experts and the broader public in contributing to critical conversations that can create a future-proof and environmentally-resilient Brunei.