Climate Week in New York City
As over-tourism continues to become a concern there are key destinations who are leading the way in responsible thought-leadership to champian a global force of good and become leading advocates in sustainability. The Mayor’s Office used Climate Week NYC to launch their new City campaign “Bring It” – a mulit-channel campaign empowering and encouraging the younger generation to minimise waste through advocacy and action. Climate Week NYC is the largest Climate Week in the world and as one of the key summits in the international calendar, which runs alongside the United Nations General Assembly, has been driving climate action forward since its launch in 2009.”Bring It” launches with a year long partnership with reusable bottle company S’well. The first year will engage and mobilise NYC public school students and be supported with a wide range of programmes and events to raise awareness around sustainability, cultivate green job mentorship opportunities and encourages students to take action for their schools, city and planet. “With humans around the world consuming a staggering one million plastic bottles per minute, we are thrilled to see the launch of the BRING IT campaign, putting NYC youth at the lead for reducing single-use plastic bottles,” said Debby Lee Cohen, Executive Director of Cafeteria Culture. “NYC’s BRING IT campaign will not only reduce the unacceptable amounts of fossil fuel derived plastics entering our oceans, landfills and incinerators, but can shift entire school communities away from costly and polluting single-use plastic to-go lifestyles and towards a healthy reusable culture. This is really a great way to drive home the concept that one simple local action can have a global impact!”
New York City has been taking bold action on climate change and the City is committed to hitting the highest goals of the Paris climate agreement. “Our goal is to leverage the City’s significant and growing sustainability efforts to position the destination as ‘the Capital City of a Responsible World,” said Fred Dixon, President & CEO of NYC & Company.
Led by NYC & Company’s UK office/Hills Balfour, NYC & Company partnered with London based, The Climate Group, whose mission is to accelerate climate action to achieve a world of under 2°C of global warming. They do this by bringing together powerful networks of business and governments that shift global markets and policies. For this 10th Climate Week, approximately 10,000 people gathered from over 40 countries to attend 150 events, including panel discussions, concerts, exhibitions and seminars. International leaders and brilliant innovators from across the public, private and government sectors around the world attended to showcase and discuss global climate action in New York City.
The aim this year was not only to celebrate this global event on it’s 10th anniversary but to also remind citizens, travellers and event organisers that even small decisions can have a profound impact on the future of our planet, as highlighted in NYC & Company’s newly created ‘green guide to NYC’ and for Meeting Planners ‘10 tips for green meetings’ — one more way NYC is taking the lead as “The Capital City of a Responsible World.”
Using the power of a big event, the activation involved New York City’s most famous buildings being turned green to dramatic effect on the eve of Climate Week, which symbolically spotlighted the global need for climate action. New York’s famous skyline was transformed as some of the world’s most iconic buildings, including the Empire State Building, Madison Square Garden and One World Trade Centre, were lit up in green.