Fiji to Kick-Off Largest Ever Survey of Climate Change

Fiji to Kick-Off Largest Ever In-Depth Survey of Global Public Opinion on Climate Change

10,000 Citizens in 79 Countries Engaged on What They Want from the Paris
Agreement and Beyond

Press release: World Wide Views on Climate and Energy
Location: 79 countries all around the world
What: 100 World Wide Views on Climate and Energy citizen consultations
When: 6 June 2015
Web and social media: http://climateandenergy.wwviews.org/ and #WWViews and
#cop21 and #article6 and #citizenparticipation

10,000 citizens representing a cross section of society in 79 countries
will meet on Saturday to make their voices heard in the international
climate change negotiations leading to Paris, France this December.

Groups of around one hundred citizens per location will attend daylong
meetings to deliberate on some of the most important issues facing the
world today: climate and energy.

Preliminary results from this unique event will be presented next week (10
June) at the June sessions of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
(UNFCCC) taking place in Bonn, Germany in advance of the UN climate
conference (COP 21) 2015, and at several other key meetings over the coming
key months.

From dawn in Fiji to dusk in Arizona
With 100 debates worldwide and 79 participating countries, World Wide Views
on Climate and Energy is going to be the largest ever global citizen
consultation on climate change.

Beginning at dawn in Fiji and ending at dusk in Arizona, at least 100
citizens in each location, reflecting the demographic diversity of their
country or region will discuss issues of climate change and vote on an
identical set of questions.

The results from this voting will be published immediately on
http://climateandenergy.wwviews.org/results/, making it possible for
everyone to follow live the statements of lay citizens to the challenges
confronting policy makers at COP 21 – and to compare the views of
citizens in different countries and groupings relevant for these
negotiations.

How concerned are the citizens about the impacts of climate change? Should
policy makers decide in Paris to do whatever it takes to limit global
warming – or be less ambitious? Should a Paris agreement be legally binding
for all countries, or only for some? And how do the answers to these
questions differ between citizens in developed and least develop countries
– or between people living in islands and the whole world as such?

Voting on well informed basis
The simultaneous meetings around the world will focus on five thematic
sessions:
* Importance of tackling climate change
* Tools to tackle climate change
* UN negotiations and national commitments
* Fairness and distribution of efforts
* Making and keeping climate promises

Prior to the meetings, all citizens have received an information booklet
about pros, cons and views on different climate and energy policies,
targets and measures.

On the day, a short video will introduce each theme. After discussing the
actual theme, the citizens will vote on the questions related to it.

How to follow the voting and results live
Visit http://climateandenergy.wwviews.org/results/ to follow the voting
live. As the meetings go on in nearly all time zones, the results will come
in during more than 24 hours. On June 5, the information booklet and videos
will be published at the web page
http://climateandenergy.wwviews.org/project-essentials/. On June 6, the
questions will be available here as well.

Unique contribution to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
The initiative has received France’s official COP 21 label, and it is an
important contribution to the awareness raising efforts of the Convention,
underlining the need of public participation in addressing climate change
and its effects and developing adequate responses.

Christiana Figueres, Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC, said: “This is a
unique engagement with men and women, with adults and teenagers from
countries world-wide coming together to share their ideas and crystalize
their opinion on one of the greatest challenges of this generation”.

“I hope that decision makers will find this initiative an important echo
chamber of citizens’ concerns, hopes and aspirations for the kind of world
they want for themselves and their children. It is also an important
contribution to galvanizing public understanding of what can often seem a
highly complex topic, but one that goes to the heart of everyone’s lives. I
look forward to presenting the preliminary results next week in Bonn and at
a press conference on June 10,”she added.

More information
The project is coordinated by the Danish Board of Technology Foundation, in
collaboration with Missions Publiques and the French National Commission
for Public Debate. It is co-initiated by the UNFCCC Secretariat and
implemented by partners in the World Wide Views Alliance.

For more information on the project, the partners, and the meetings
worldwide, visit the web page: http://climateandenergy.wwviews.org/ and
follow the hashtag #WWViews on Twitter.

Funders
The project is funded by the French Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable
Development and Energy (MEDDE), the National Commission for Public Debate
(CNDP), 14 French Regions through the Association des Régions de France
(Aquitaine, Auvergne, Basse-Normandie, Centre-Val-de-Loire, Franche-Comté,
Guadeloupe, Haute-Normandie, Île-de-France, Martinique, Nord-Pas-de-Calais,
Poitou-Charentes, Provence-Alpes-Côte-d’Azur, La Réunion, Rhône-Alpes),
ENGIE (GDF Suez), the Presidency of the French National Assembly, the
German Federal Environment Agency, the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and
International Development (MAEDI), the European Space Agency (ESA), the
Fondation de France, the EE-LV group of the French Senate, the Danish KR
Foundation, the Norwegian Ministry of Climate and Environment,
Grenoble-Alpes Métropole and the city of Paris.

ENDS

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