Paul's Letter

To my partner Berni,

I am greatly worried about climate change and biodiversity loss. If human beings do not moderate their impact on the planet and quickly then it is inevitable that large swathes of what used to be liveable land will become uninhabitable by humans and other animals. Indeed this is already happening in areas where drought, wildfires, flooding and other extreme weather events are destroying life and causing mass migration. Acts of war and violence are also causing loss of life and further mass migration of people which is unsustainable. These events are also affecting the food supply and the availability of clean drinking water either by complete loss of supply or causing price inflation that millions cannot afford leading to starvation and damage to health.
I have never had children because I did not want to add to the rapid population explosion that has increased three fold in my lifetime. I was also afraid of what kind of world would I be leaving for my children to live in. Even so I am concerned about the plight of other children who are growing up now and what the present generations are leaving for their children’s later years. Will they have to participate in wars fighting over drinking water supplies?
Governments are still thinking short term. But the costs that will be incurred by taking no action or taking insufficient action or not taking action quickly enough will vastly outweigh the costs of action taken today. Nobody and I genuinely mean nobody cannot be selfish and live just for today as if there will be no tomorrow. We have only one planet to live on and we must leave a planet that is at least as good a place to live in as we inherited when we were born.