Sir David Attenborough: climate change threatens ‘collapse of civilisations’

On Monday, legendary naturalist and the voice of your favourite animal doccies Sir David Attenborough gave a rousing and urgent plea for nations to address climate change.

Speaking at the COP24 UN conference in Katowice, Poland, the 92-year-old man represented the “voice of the people” and spoke of future hardships, of the collapse of civilisations, and the extinction of species if climate change is not addressed.

“If we don’t take action, the collapse of our civilizations and the extinction of much of the natural world is on the horizon,” he told the delegation.

The message was buoyed by a montage of people’s experience of climate change, and how the altering weather patterns have affected them.

Sir Attenborough also spoke of the ActNow.bot, a Facebook Messenger bot which will “recommend everyday actions – like taking public transport and eating less meat – and track the number of actions everyone individually is taking” to reduce users’ carbon footprint.

“The world’s people have spoken. Their message is clear. Time is running out. They want you, the decision makers, to act now,” he concluded.

Watch the full rebroadcast, courtesy of The Guardian here. (Sir David Attenborough’s speech begins at 1h11).

The COP24 Conference, which began on Monday, will run until 14 December 2018. The delegation aims to discuss how best to implement the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.

Feature image: Bryan Ledgard via Flickr (CC BY 2.0)