 So if you have any question, you can drop it on the ether part. So at the end of our presentation, we'll have time to go through the questions and probably interact and get to understand the topic better. This session will be divided into two parts. I would take the first part, then Jeremiah would come up and take the second part before we attend to the question. So where the presentation is on, you can drop your questions and we'll attend to it all at once. So I'll be sharing my slides and thank you everyone for joining us. So I'll be sharing my slides right now. So, so you might can you please just confirm that my slide is visible. Visible visible. Okay, thank you so much like I did mention. My name is Amoradion Okwangai. My name is Amoradion Okwangai and we're looking at climate change. It has become a global concern as to how we treat our environment, how we treat the planet and how we treat environment because issues surrounding climate change are becoming important issues today because it's not just affect us as individuals. They are fed the entire ecosystem from the human perspective, even up to marine lives and other lives. So that's why it's attracting so much attention. And today we are calling on so much actions to be taken so as to help combat climate change. As we go further, we'll look at what is our responsibility because it is not just for governments alone. As individuals, we also have collective responsibilities to play in order for us to effectively combat climate change and achieve the sustainable environment. But first of all, what do we understand by climate change. Now, there have been different explanation as to what constitutes climate change. Why some have defined it as extreme weather conditions. Different school of thought have had different definitions, but the one that struck me was the one defined by Amnesty International in 2022. They define climate change as rising temperature and also extreme weather events leading to rising sea levels and shifting white populations. But also the United Nations gave a simplified definition to climate change. They defined it as a long-term shift in temperature, which has resulted in change in weather patterns. So this increase in the Earth's temperatures has led to extreme weather conditions. For example, it's rainfall in some areas such that it has affected the safety of different regions. Then again, there is also the manufacturing of goods, products, transportation, all this on its own. Generally, because of probably what we tend to use, they tend to help, they tend to, on the long run, affect our climate. That is why there is an urgent call for the use of renewable energies. For example, wind or solar, so that we can actually reduce the burning of fossil fuels so as to help save our planet. Now, I'll leave you with a perfect description of what we talk about when we talk about the causes and its effects. Sorry, I will just go back to that slide now. I want us to take a look at this slide. It gives us a pictorial illustration of the causes of climate change, how it occurs, and its effects on the long run. Now, we have seen, for example, that too many causes is deforestation or cutting down of trees and also 44 combustion, which is the use of coal, gas, oil for our different activities, whether it is production or it is transportation or whatever it is. Now, all this leads to what we call greenhouse gases. And the major greenhouse gases that leads to climate change are carbon dioxide, which is our CO2, methane, which is our CH4, nitrous oxide, and water vapor. And when these gases trap the sun rays in the atmosphere, it allows the earth to eat up and thereby lead into global warming, which has a huge impact on climate change. You know, because it is a system, it is not just a system, it changes in one way, it affects another aspect. So, for example, when there is a change in weather conditions, it can lead to droughts. And when it is poor farm produce, it can lead to farming. And you see the system, it goes round, it goes round. That is why it affects the system. That is why it is very imperative that everyone collectively join hands together to address climate change. And we are coming up as Wikimediands. What can we do as Wikimediands on our own path to address climate change? Apart from causing farming, for example, there are also other dangerous effects of climate change on the long run. Now, what we have witnessed in the last, in recent time, has been consistent increase in the earth temperature. So if we continue to do what we have been doing, say, in the last four to five decades, if we continue to do it until the end of this century, it is going to be much more difficult for people to live in some places in the earth, say, in the next century. So what this means is that places like Saudi Arabia, for example, the Sahara desert will be too hot for some persons to live in. Just to summarize what I've been trying to say, climate change, part of its effect is earth temperature, which also, when there is earth temperature, can lead to increased white fire. And when there is equal white fire, we know that there's going to be loss of plants and animals. And we know that also we're going to experience loss of biodiversity, which we are already saying. And also, there are other effects. I know, perhaps, many of us may have been familiar with, oh, that there may be lots of species, not enough food when there is, as a result of climate change. But there's one striking effect, which was, as a result of the finding by international crisis group, it explains that one of the effects of climate change could be increased conflict in some region. And it gave an illustration, for example, in Nigeria, which is the western part of Africa, that climate change, which has led to drought in some areas, has led the headers to move into the southern part of Nigeria. And as intensified, the already existing conflict in many areas in certain parts of Nigeria, because these headers are in search of water, in search of grape pastures for their animals. And as a result, they have consistent clash with farmers. So in a way, climate change beyond just leading to increased drought, or beyond leading to loss of species, it adds a way of intensifying conflict in regions. Now, the effect is just so numerous that if we decide to say, let's analyze this one after the other, we find that it's something that we all must actively, we must actively put us together to fight, because its effects on the long run is going to be very devastating. Because the United Nations, the World Health Organization, explained that climate change is the most, is the single most, most, I'm not sure, single most, but the health condition that it has ever seen, something, just to paraphrase what the World Health Organization said regarding to climate change, climate change in temperature is even going to lead to increasing changes in some, it's going to lead to increased amount of some temperature related diseases. So these are some of the effects that we have seen in climate change. And there are some statistics, some key facts to back up some of these things. For example, it was recorded that the concentration of carbon dioxide in our atmosphere at start July 2021 was around 200, the same pass per million. Now, this is staggering compared to the last three decades we've had, compared to the last three decades we have, the conservation.org identified that deforestation alone contributes 11% that is significant, 11% of the total greenhouse gas. So we can imagine when we decide to say, okay, let's address deforestation, for example, let's try to reduce the cutting down of forests or trees, and how much we'll be able to save carbon dioxide for going into the atmosphere. And if part of the fact we have seen is that we have already earlier mentioned is for deforestation greenhouse gas emission, got my time, I'll just quickly run through. So tropical forests, tropical forests can provide at least a third of the total climate change mitigation actions. Yes, this solution only received about 3% of the total climate funding. So it therefore raises question as to what exactly are we doing to address climate change. Apart from, yes, I've been discussion here and there, and we actually make it action in this regard, like planting of trees, so as to address climate change, because statistics have shown that planting of trees and forestation actually contributes significantly to the fight against climate change. And as of July 2021, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the United States reported that July 21 is the hottest month in human history. Now, that is a staggering fact. Just last year, July 2021 is the hottest month in the whole of human history. Now, since 1980 to this, we have had consistent increase in the in the in the air temperature consistent increase. And it shows that there are things we are not doing correctly that we must address. Now, July this year, July this year was the third highest third hottest month in the United States as reported by National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration of the United States. Costa Magus also saw up 10 times carbon per hectare as tropical forest despite being just 0.7% of world forest. Now, there are a lot of staggering facts. If I should start bringing them up, not to look at the facts, but the fact is that attention, we all need to start paying attention to climate change and the action starts from us as individuals. Now, some countries have started taking themselves as taking significant steps, for example, has the creeping. If you look at countries from, for example, in Africa and Asia countries, which in the United States, countries, which in the end may actually have Asia and Africa, for example, those many of many actions are still needed in order to successfully address climate change. But it is wanted to note that about 190 countries have ratified the Paris Agreement, which seeks to address the release of greenhouse gas. So, apart from climate change, does it mean that there are no other environmental issues in Africa, for example, of course there are, but somehow they are interrelated to climate change. For example, we have Africa in many countries in Africa, even in Nigeria with experience water pollution, air pollution, as well as land degradation, which in a way are also connected to climate change. We have had deforestation, lots of biodiversity, and so on, as different challenges, which constitutes, which affects the environment, but it really is that we all have responsibility to address this change. If we must, if we must achieve a sustainable environment and on the, on the long run, achieve the sustainable development goals, but what exactly are our responsibilities. How do we save the planet? Know fully where that, if we continue in this trend, the next century is going to be very difficult for the next generations. How do we then save our planet? And how does Wikimedia come into play in this regard? So I'm going to hand over to my colleague, Jeremiah, who is going to take us through the solutions and how Wikimedia projects can help in combating climate change. So, Jeremiah, over to you. All right, thank you, Mr. Amorador, for that wonderful introduction. Okay, I'm going to share my screen now. So I'm going to be starting from how do we save our planet? Mr. Amorador has made mention of a lot of issues associated with climate change. If we are not careful in the coming years, in the coming months, in the coming weeks, it may be done with so many sicknesses. Not because they came out from nowhere, but because our activities, our behaviors can be linked to be the causal factors in respect to this climate change. So what do we do? What do we do to remedy the situation? What do we do to save our planet? So what part of what we are going to be doing? We are going to divide our role into three hours, reduce, reuse our cycle. What do I mean by reducing? It's time for us to reduce the contamination. A lot of us are careless with the way we handle things. A lot of us, when it has to do with plastic, we dispose there. Wherever we are, we just dispose them roughly. Some of those disposters lead to blockage of the oceans, of the seas. Some persons in some countries in Africa also you find out that there are illegal refineries. And all these illegal refineries always lead to a mission of bad gases on the air. And on the long run, these gases come back to affect the human. So it is time for us to reduce all these contamination. When we are able to reduce all of these, we cannot create room for reusing. Because if you don't reduce what you are doing, you cannot think about reusing it. So if we are talking about the aspect of reusing, it's time for us to start thinking outside the box. We have to pay attention. If we are talking about okay, we don't want to contaminate the sea again with our plastic containers, with our bottles, with our cans. What do we do with those cans and bottles? It's time for us to now start thinking about how do we refine? How do we convert these cans and bottles so that we can be able to reuse them effectively? How do we convert these air, these gases that are emitting, these activities that we are doing that it seems as if, wow, we are causing a big problem to the planet. How do we think about reusing it? And the perfect way to reuse them is to recycle them. It's time for us to pay attention to recycling. As a matter of fact, a lot of countries are already doing that. Some of them are already recycling their nylons, they are recycling their bottles, they are recycling their cans. A lot of them, the years of flushing water down the septic tank into the reservoir is gone. Those waters, they channel them to farms, to other areas where they can now recycle, instead of wasting that water, or on the long run, it gets to the ocean. Now, they recycle it and use it for something else. Now, these are the roles we have to play as individuals if we want to save the planet because we have to save the planet. One of the great philosophers talked about, if you don't save the planet, there are not two planets. You only have one planet, irrespective of where you are, whether you're in Africa, whether you're in Asia, whether you're in America. The moment the air is contaminated, the moment the land is contaminated, the moment the sea is contaminated, it will also affect you on the long run. Now, also as Wikimedias, what is their role we have to play? Does Wikimedia projects such as Wikipedia, Wikidata, Wikicommerce, do they play any role? Yes, they play some roles in this aspect of climate change. And one of the roles I can say this is the most, or the major role that these aspects of Wikimedia projects play is they create public awareness of these climate change issues through Wikipedia. By organizing trainings, by organizing a data tour, you create an awareness and through that awareness, you educate people. If you do a research on the project by the youth climate council in Ghana, you find that that project comes across various aspects of Wikimedia foundation. And the idea behind that project was to create awareness on areas in Ghana that are already passing through this climate change issue. And also to open the eyes of the citizens to the fact that we can do better, we can change these. So in that aspect, you find that Wikimedia project has already created that awareness, that public awareness, by campaigns, by taking it to schools, taking it to mosques, taking it to playgrounds, creating that awareness because a lot of persons don't know that the behaviors, the lifestyle they are living in is in another way affecting the climate, which on the long run is going to disturb us. Another role which this project can play is also documenting important climate-related data using Wikidata, using Wikicode. Through Wikidata, Wikimedians can come together and document data that has to do with climate change. Maybe in your location, something is already going wrong. And as a Wikimedia, you can see that, wow, if we don't rise up to the tax in the next two or three or four months, there will be issues. And we'd like to give an example like something that took place in one of the areas in Nigeria. We find that after a while, a lot of persons began to fall sick and not just fall sick, some of them began to die. And when the research was done, it found that there was some part of the mineral resources on the floor. Through illegal refinery, those resources contaminated the water they were consuming in that village. And before the authorities could take note of it, a lot of people had lost their life. But through Wikidata, through Wikicode, Wikimedians can come together and document these issues as they come up to create an awareness and not just creating an awareness, but in return, send these documents, these data to the relevant authorities so that they can act early enough. And also finally, as part of this role, which we are supposed to play as Wikimedians, we are supposed to volunteer and not just volunteering, but volunteering to join Wikirrelated groups and campaigns that are focused on climate change. There are so many projects on Wikimedia, there are so many projects on Wikipedia, there are so many projects on Wikidata that are focused on climate change. And as Wikimedians, we must be ready to volunteer to contribute our quota, to contribute our quota in the society where you find yourself, in the locality where you find yourself, where I am situated now in Nigeria, there is an issue that has to do with climate change in my locality. And the only way I can come in now to change the narrative is to join groups, create groups, create campaigns that we open the eyes of the individuals to the fact that there are a lot of things that need to be done to change the narrative. And also, just as we are saying what we need to do, also there are some other climate change related Wikimedia projects that have been done before. Some are also on the about to be done and some will still be done because I'm sure that after this training, after this conference, a lot of persons will be interested and we say, okay, it's time for us to change the narrative. We cannot continue to live our lives as if we, the climate, we are not causing a harm to the climate. The moment your eyes is open to the fact that you are doing something wrong. I think as a Wikimedia, as somebody that have the thought of the society, as somebody that want to live where, as somebody that want to live long, you would do a lot of things to change the narrative. Now, some of the climate change related Wikimedia projects that have been done, some that's the ongoing we said there was the Wikipedia for peace and climate justice 2021. This was done by the service civil international in Switzerland, and this was in cooperation with the Wikimedia Switzerland. As a Wikimedia, you can search out there and know what they did, look at the areas they covered, look at how they did their project, because don't forget that foundation, we talk about what are your outcome, what do you expect to achieve. And all of these, when you put them side by side, it can also help you to conduct the same related projects in your locality and also there was the African climate change editor turn which had in South Africa in 2019. Some volunteers as a Wikimedia came together to create awareness by training individuals on climate change areas of Wikipedia, improving the content. And also, recently there was the Wikipedia, there was the advert for the Wikipedia and in residence fellowship, which is to which was the idea behind this is to help to fight climate denies in Africa. In 2022, and many others, all of these projects are yet to was changing the narrative, and we have to change the narrative just like Mr. Moradio has said there are so many issues that consciously and unconsciously we are already affecting our climate and if we don't rise up to the tax, if we don't rise up to the tax and doing that as soon as possible, we find that a lot of us will be stuck in the box wherever we are because moving forward some persons may begin to fall sick with so many sicknesses, so many issues. You go for treatment and you can notify them not knowing that I was part of the cause for this issue. That's why as Wikimedians, as Wikipedians, we have to ensure that we go about changing the narrative. Encouraging projects, joining project volunteering to change the narrative. And also I want to share an experience we had as we are talking about the Wikiped for the climate change and environmental issues. Also we will share an experience on one of our projects which we had in Nigeria recently and we targeted the green wiki for climate and environmental sustainability in Nigeria. With the case study of a new state, the project was a success, and through the project we found that more than 40 participants with an average of 80% of the participants were all new volunteers from the campaign, from the awareness that was created before the project. We found that a lot of persons are interested, they want to contribute their quota to change the narrative. And through that project, we found that at the end of the project, we realized that overnight articles were edited and improved, even though the awareness we were not able to cover the awareness the way we would have loved to. Through the project, you find that a lot of persons were encouraged, they were interested, oh, this is what we can do, oh, these areas, they need improvement and money more. And also through that campaign, we found that over 18,000 words were added and we also had 239 references added. And from that way, you find that we have been able to successfully document climate change issues in those states and in particular in Nigeria through that campaign. And moving forward from that, because we understood and at the end of the campaign, we noticed that, wow, there's so much that needs to be done, we have a lot that needs to be done. We decided, okay, that we are going to be moving that campaign now from those states to river states and we turned the campaign to wiki for climate and environmental literacy in river state because we understand that you can only change what you know, you cannot change what you don't know. So before the individuals, before the volunteers, before the students, before the community, before the youth, before the country, before the state can change the narrative, they must be aware of it. That is why we are moving about we want to create that literacy, open the eyes to the fact that so many things need to be done. There are so many areas that needs to be changed and we are also doing a pilot study in two schools, and the schools in view in respect to this project of river state university, and we are looking forward that at the end of this project we are also going to extend this because we have a very particular issue in river state which prompted this climate change and environmental literacy because recently river state in Nigeria is one of the oil producing states and because of the attitude of the government, attitude of the individuals, attitude of the citizens, you find that we have so many oil spillage, we have illegal refineries here and there at so many areas which are not supposed to be. So because of that, you find that there is an issue that has to do with climate change, our air is already contaminated. If not then now that we are the rainy season now, if it isn't the dry season, you find out that when you look at the sky, you can't even see the blue sky anymore. You begin to see dark, dark sky, which is as a result of the black soup that is coming from all these illegal refineries because the authorized refineries they know how to dispose all of those air, but these are the individuals that are just going about to get their money. They just want to do whatever they want to do and on the on the long run they don't know that they are contaminating the climate, they are contaminating the air in the state, moving forward in some years to come, in some weeks to come. You may find out that there will be so many people in river state that will be done with cancer and cancer is not going to come through magic, it's going to come because of the air they breathe. And the air they are breathing is not good, the air they are breathing is already contaminated as a result of this illegal refineries. That is why we as Wikimedia, I and my colleague Mr. Amoradon and also the Ponteva Wikimedia hub decided to come together and say okay now it's time to take this campaign out. We'll be taking it to schools, taking it to market, taking it to the youth, taking it to the government also to open their eyes to the fact that we need to change the narrative. Because if we don't change the narrative moving forward, a lot of us will be sold down with various sickness. This is an experience for Nigeria and also an experience from river state which I'm trying to share in particular and also as Wikimedias, just like as I'm sharing my experience from Nigeria, you also have the experience for wherever country and listening to me from, for wherever stage you are listening to me from. And it is time for us as Wikimedias to arise to the tax, to change the narrative, to ensure that we adjust, we complement, we turn things around in respect to climate because we do not have to climate. We only have one word, aside the earth we are, it's another planet earth together. Unfortunately a good number of us are only living on the earth, we cannot live elsewhere. And also to end this my session, I would like to take a code from Chai Jin, we said, the strongest government on earth cannot clean up pollution by themselves. They must rely on each ordinary person, like you and me, on our choices, they must rely on our choices and on our way. So it is time for us to rise up and change narrative. Thank you very much. I'll hand over now to Mr. Muradion. Okay, I think right now we would love to take questions, if we have questions from our listeners, you can drop them. Thank you so much, Jamia. I think I was going through the chat to why you were talking and I wanted to make sure that they, and it's been very engaging in the chat so thank you so much Jamia for highlighting some of the solutions to climate change and also how it is at the intersection between climate change fights and the Wikimedia project. And it's been the discussion also in the chat has been very interesting. There's also the Wikimedia food development user group owned by Wikimedia within the foundation within the community, so that those who are interested in climate change fight and climate change development can actually be a member of the user group. So Alex has also been sharing some interesting information here. So but I don't know if aside that I don't know if there are questions, other questions that you want to ask, I know some questions that have been answered from YouTube. So just quickly go for it. Sorry, I'll just clear it. And Brice, Brice noted that it is important to feel climate change information gaps in Wikipedia to create locally relevant content. And this of course I agree because I'm closing the Wikipedia content gap is actually a crucial step to fighting the climate change. So we have to first of all address the knowledge gap and the information gap, because it is only when, as noted by Jamia, it is only when they know what the problem is that they can actually know how to combat it. And given that the fight is a collective fight. So there are a lot of comments here. So I was asking about the Wikipedia and residence link, which has already been shared. The residence that has been organized by Code for Africa. And also, and it has also been noted on the group that the Wikimedia UK, also the also settling for Wikimedia irresistible with a focus on the solutions to climate change. So there are so many information on the chat. But I don't know if you have more questions probably before our time runs up we'll be happy to take the questions. So there is also an information on the group. There's also an information on the group that we'll be having. There will be training for local organizers who are interested in carrying out campaigns on climate and environmental change. There will be training for local organizers. There's a message that was drawn by Alex in the group for those interested in organizing so you can reach, you can reach the community via email can write to campaigns at Wikimedia.org, and you'll be able to get the necessary supports that you need. So I'm just trying to go through the chat to see if there are other questions. What we are doing is cool. I don't care I can drop my trash I can do this and do that, even because of that lack of this attitude. That was another weakness we have in respect to climate change information but I think as Wikimedians, it's not for us to change that narrative. We should encourage those documentations by ensuring that our outreaches, our trainings are properly documented, are properly covered. If possible, you can invite government to all of those trainings because there are so many things they can learn from it. You're going to invite present individuals too, because the moment you invite them, they begin to see that yes, there is a problem, and that problem needs to be tackled. I'm very sure that the information on climate change, both on Wikipedia and also on the internet on it will be increased drastically. There are so many climate change issues in Nigeria, some of the states, some of them they are already having a Russian issues. Some of them golly issues, some of them flaunt issues, some of them the desert is crazily encroaching into their dwellings. So if all of these are not documented, how we didn't know how to solve it. Just like during my presentation I shared the case of one of the locations where people began to foresee some of them even lost their lives. And they didn't know what is the problem. It was after there was a test, some persons took it upon themselves and said this is not normal. What is the life that is going on here, maybe something is wrong here, and they began to test their water, test their food, test even the air. You find out that when they were done with those testing, that was when they realized that the water they were drinking had been contaminated by illegal mining. And because of that contamination, you know, anybody that consumes the water is as good as your system is trying to be a mess. So I think in a way to increase that climate information, we have to ensure that there are documentations, proper documentation and encourage our locality, encourage individuals, encourage SDGs, asides we can, we can mediate. There are also various projects, SDGs projects that has to do with climate change, encourage the coordinators, encourage the volunteers to ensure that they document whatever they find out, they document whatever they see, they document whatever they go to, just like the project in Canada was done. When you look at our project, you find out that, aside the edit at all aspects, there was also a plodding of pictures of areas that needed attention of various locations that were already being eaten up by climate change issue. And you find out that if the government, if people in government, if the authorities are privileged to layhound, layhound on those pictures, is a reasonable government, a government that wants its citizens to be alive. We spring into action immediately to try to change the narrative. So I think in that way, we can help to calm or fill up that aspect of the weakness that has to do with very, very poor information on climate change. Yeah, somebody says, so regional documentation, Femke, yeah, exactly, regional documentation is very important. And also, from Alex, Alex said, you have to also ensure you reach out in the global south on topics that they will search for, for example, the cities, local government, local conservation, gaps around water bodies. All right. So at this point, we are going to be rounding up now. I appreciate everyone for their time for being in this session, for spending time to listen to me. It's the Jeremiah Glebo and my colleague, Mr. Moradiam Okongai. We're glad to have we, we are glad all of you were on the call and we appreciate the questions and the contributions. Thank you so much. And we hope to see you again next time hopefully with your elaborate and more interesting climate related topic. Thank you very much.