#Arts4Climate

To mark the annual United Nations Climate Change Conference currently taking place, here’s a good example of harnessing the arts and communications for social change.

Connect4Climate is a global partnership programme launched by the World Bank Group and the Italian Ministry of Environment, in collaboration with the German Federal Ministry for Economic Cooperation and Development. The initiative tackles climate change by promoting solutions and empowering people to act. Within the programme, various initiatives are directly related to the arts and communications:

Fashion4Climate focuses on making manufacturing processes more environmentally sustainable.

Music4Climate engages the music industry to spread the climate change message. For example, in 2011 the partnership launched the Rhythms Del Mundo: Africa CD featuring collaborations between established and up-and-coming African artists. In collaboration with MTV, some of the songs were featured in New York’s Times Square. In 2012, the partnership hosted the Voices4Climate competition, which included over 1,000 music video entries calling for climate action. Watch the winning music video below.

Music4Climate also brought together musicians for Global Citizen 2015 Earth Day, held in front of the White House in Washington, D.C.

Film4Climate is dedicated to greening the film industry. The initiative aims to help develop a concrete plan to mitigate the environmental impact of film production, as well as raise awareness about climate change through cinema. In 2015, the initiative hosted a competition, Action4Climate, which challenged filmmakers to raise awareness of climate change, share experiences and inspire action by creating a video documentary. Watch the winning documentary below.

This year’s Film4Climate competition invited filmmakers between 14-35 to create a short public service announcement or film about climate action. Submissions for the competition are closed, but you can see the more than 860 entries here. The awards ceremony for the competition will take place at the United Nations Climate Change Conference, taking place 7-18 November in Marrakech, Morocco.