In forests yet to be

The importance of small, local stories.

Kia ora, welcome to Future Proof. Thanks for joining me. This week: Vanuatu’s big climate case, and Denmark puts a tax on cow burps. But first: tata for now, TTFN.

Te Kohuroa Matheson Bay. Image credit: Ellen Rykers.

This will be the last edition of Future Proof as the newsletter goes on hiatus (more on that here, in case you missed the email). Thank you for all your kind words, and for reading. It has been a privilege to write for you these past two-and-a-half years, covering climate and the environment in a slightly different way.

I was having cuppa with a friend recently, and she asked me what I was excited or hopeful about in the climate space. Was there anything cool I was writing about, or getting stuck into, she wondered? I drew a blank. I’d fallen into a funk of angst and anxiety, like I think many of us tapped into environment news do from time to time.

I’d read a nearly 100-year-old book by the naturalist H. Guthrie-Smith, who recounted his visit to an island off the south-west tip of Rakiura – a remote refuge where wildlife were “not affected by the changes that have elsewhere transformed New Zealand into a second England”. With bird numbers of many species “woefully decreased” on the mainland, he wrote that trapping of predators “could no longer be postponed”. Even a century ago, we knew that introduced predators were sending unique species to oblivion! We knew there were things we could do to stop it! I was angry, not just for the species lost to extinction since then, but also because it felt all too familiar. That old chestnut of facing an existential threat, knowing how to solve it, but not quite getting it together.

In prepping this last newsletter, I went all the way back to the very first Future Proof, where I wrote about penguins, and a man working hard to protect them on the Leigh coastline north of Auckland. Since I wrote that back in 2022, another community-led initiative has cropped up nearby: Te Kohuroa Rewilding Initiative is working to restore the marine habitat in a local bay. Initiated by a local freediver, the nascent project is mobilising the community for kina harvests and citizen science.

When I get frustrated or weighed down, I think that stories like these – of people who care and are talking and planning and doing in their local patch – are part of the antidote. We’ve got fired up and grumpy about the state of things, now here’s what folks are doing about it. It doesn’t have to be big and grand to be important. I highlighted some of my favourite solutions stories back in July for the 100th edition of Future Proof.

In any case, that’s what I hope Future Proof has been for you: a hopeful but honest spark in the climate dark.

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Climate inaction on trial at top court

“The stakes could not be higher. The survival of my people and so many others is on the line,” Arnold Kiel Loughman, attorney-general of Vanuatu, told the International Court of Justice (ICJ) earlier this week. Proceedings have opened for a case championed by Vanuatu that will hear 98 countries over the next two weeks, including a delegation from New Zealand. By mid-2025, the court will deliver an “advisory opinion” on whether states have a legal obligation to act on climate change, as well as what consequences should arise if they fail to act.

What happened in Baku

Climate activists are looking to the ICJ case for a path forward after the climate summit Cop29 in Baku, Azerbaijan last month delivered a disappointing deal. The talks focused on climate finance for vulnerable nations, but the final sum of $300 billion is a far cry from the hoped-for $1.3 trillion. A bad deal is better than no deal at all, writes Newsroom’s Marc Daalder, who covered the summit on the ground in Azerbaijan. Carbon Brief has a full analysis of key outcomes if those details are your jam. A couple of details I found intriguing: Singapore was giving away free beers made from recycled toilet water at the summit, and the host nation loves its fossil fuels so much you can even bathe in crude oil at a spa. Yuck.

Plastic talks fail to make treaty stick

In South Korea, negotiations for a global treaty to tackle the plastic pollution crisis failed to reach an agreement. The sticking point was whether to cut plastic production, or just address waste through better recycling. Ninety-five countries wanted a binding pledge to cut down on how much plastic we make in the first place, but were blocked by a handful of oil-producing states. Meanwhile, the plastic industry has been ramping up efforts to counter the rising tide of anti-plastic sentiment, including paying TikTok influencers.

More stories

• ICYMI: yesterday’s Bulletin discussed bird flu, including how conservationists are preparing to protect critically endangered birds like kākāpō and takahē. (

  The Bulletin
  )

• Bike racks on buses are no-go at the moment. Shanti Mathias covers what that means for cyclists around the country. (The Spinoff)

• On TikTok, fashion DIYers and “underconsumption core” are pushing back against fast fashion and rampant consumerism. (Dame, Grist)

• The pessimists among us might be highly motivated by climate messages that talk about threats, and how to avoid them. (Undark)

• Denmark has become the first country in the world to pass a climate levy on agriculture. (The New York Times)

• New Zealand drops seven places in the global Climate Change Performance Index and the maths suggests our next Paris agreement target will be a “damp squib” compared to UK plans to slash emissions by 81%. (Newsroom)

• The world agreed to put the brakes on the spread of nuclear weapons with the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty in 1970. Could we do the same with fossil fuels? (BBC)

• Doing good improves happiness, reduces pain, and might be a fundamental part of being human. (Washington Post)

Kākā at Zealandia. Image credit: Ellen Rykers.

To finish this issue, I spent some time last week hanging out with the kākā at Zealandia Te Māra a Tāne in Wellington. Walking through the bush, the Jurassic Park theme song played in my head as raucous parrots squawked overhead, and prehistoric tuatara lounged in the sun. I thought of old mate H. Guthrie Smith, who wrote, “In forests yet to be, coming generations of New Zealanders will listen to the song of the woods as it was heard and recorded a century ago by Cook.” This place has transformed in the almost 30 years since its inception, and now it’s absolutely chocka with birdsong. It is tangible proof that good things happen when people come together around a shared vision.

Yes we kākā-can,

Ellen

PS – I’m still keen to cover climate and environment stories in 2025. If you’d like to stay in touch, you can follow me on Bluesky or send me an email.

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