28b. Politics, the media, and the environment (Omnia El Omrani)

After decades of struggling for recognition, environmental issues, including biodiversity conservation, have exploded onto the global scene in recent years. This is incredibly encouraging and gratifying, but are we sufficiently aware of the risks that come with such vastly increased public support? How much is politics influencing the public discourse on the environment? Are we paying enough attention to other, interrelated, societal goals and the trade-offs between them?

In the last episode Esther Krakue provided a fairly critical view of environmental activism with a focus mostly on climate change. With that in mind, I am joined this time by Omnia El Omrani, a young Egyptian medical doctor and self-described climate activist. Omnia has worked with organizations like the WHO, the UN climate convention, and the Global Climate and Health Alliance, and she was the youth envoy to the President of COP27 - the big UN climate conference hosted by Egypt in late 2022. Omnia comes from a different perspective to Esther, and I think that this provides an interesting contrast - I suggest you listen to these two discussions as a set, but not in any particular order.

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