What are your ideas and actions to mitigate climate change?

These suggestions were submitted by Steven Myburgh from Durban as part of our call for ideas on how to take action to mitigate and adapt to climate change. Read the other suggestions on our participate page and add your own ideas. See more information on our resources section.

1) Government assistance in conversion to sustainable businesses.
New city policies for sustainability may create unemployment from unsustainable industries. Government could promote re-hiring of these workers to make change more politically acceptable.

2) Voluntary carbon offsetting at supermarkets and other commercial venues.
The offsets, calculated together with the customer receipt, could initially be calculated using aggregate carbon emissions associated with all products sold in that store. These funds would go to planting food and indigenous trees, capturing carbon, providing a source of jobs for locals and a means of food security. In addition, it would bring nature closer to residents, which in turn is linked to decreased levels of crime and stress and an appreciation of the value of nature.

3) Education and knowledge are key.
Teaching children is particularly effective. Schools can be excellent locations for recycling stations, as it is the kids that teach adults about these new trends and parents regularly drop off and pick up kids from school. Encourage activism amongst children, we are likely to listen to them more. In addition, make pledges to devote a certain portion of public radio/TV/outdoor-adspace/other media to climate change issues and energy awareness.

4) A tax on private car ownership to pay for clean and safe mass transit or subsidies for bicycle trailers.

5) Car-free zones around city and suburb centres, with parking on the outskirts and connected with mass transit.

6) Taxi stalls in the suburbs along every other street corner, for registered Bajaj motorbike rickshaws to park and wait, licensed to serve a zoned area such as a suburb or part thereof, and connect with shopping centres and public transport hubs.

7) Provision of recycling bins that collect organic waste from homes and relevant businesses(using reduction on rates for encouragement), as well as recyclables and non-recyclable wastes, so they may be composted by municipalities. Wealthy countries and cities waste up to 50% of their food. We are throwing away nutrients, representable as energy.

Mandate energy efficient appliances and behaviours, many already mentioned here. In addition, in much the same way as a bank gives loans for a home, local banks could give loans for business and home energy retrofits: solar and thermal PV, double glazing, geyser blankets, etc. They can be charged at a monthly rate no more than your normal electric bill would be, and in this manner eventually pay for itself, providing you with free electricity thereafter and largely eliminating emissions related to buildings.

9) City planning to encourage more compact living and reduce reliance on the automobile.
If we curtail urban sprawl with the right policies, we could have safer, more vibrant, appropriately peopled, energy efficient neighbourhoods with citizens close to cultural amenities such as parks and sports grounds, and close to employment and other community safety nets. Companies would use the space they have more wisely, reducing energy overheads, and we would travel shorter distances. Hong Kong is a great example of this.

10) Just as we have book libraries, have user-contributed tool, appliance and toy libraries. This will reduce consumption, and if carefully executed, will foster the trust needed to share more.

11) Community gardens can reduce food miles and improve food security. Unused private and city land, staying vacant for longer than a certain amount of time and serving no useful purpose, should be allowed to be used by community collectives. If they intend to be built on or developed, the collective should be able to be given several months to vacate. Collection and composting of organic waste as previously mentioned, could contribute to the success of these collectives.

12) Supermarkets and other food retailers could be incentivised by the city to open a local and organic aisle for dairy, fruit and veg and miscellaneous, in hopes of boosting local employment and low ecological-footprint agriculture. They may also be incentivised to provide hardy, returnable containers for certain products – that customers put down a deposit on and return for cleaning – rather than the throwaway plastic packaging filling methane releasing landfills today. As a bonus, costs would be reduced for the customer and market brands could tout their green credentials.

13) That’s a wrap.