1 Million Women
Mobilising 1 million Australian women to take personal action on climate change.
A few years ago I was doing absolutely nothing on climate change. I was completely disengaged. I had my head buried deep in the sand. I used to think I was only one person and I couldn't really make a difference. That change has got to happen from governments down. And that when governments put the right policies in place, then OK, people like me can then act!
I would sit around a dinner table and debate and analyse the issues around climate change, and then carry on business as usual. There was this huge disconnect. I had some awareness of the problem, but that wasn't translating into doing anything about it. I didn't even have my head around recycling.
Then a huge shift in public awareness began sometime during the middle of 2006 and I finally got the point on climate change. And at the very moment of doing something, I think it started with simply changing a light globe, I took ownership of the problem.
At the same time as I was having my epiphany, a girlfriend of mine Michelle Grosvenor asked me if I would like to join with her in starting Climate Coolers – a non-profit organisation that exists to engage the women of Australia on climate change. It was perfect timing.
Right from the start our vision was big. We wanted to reach women right across the country. Women who were like I was – disengaged, too busy, confused, overwhelmed, not connected and not really knowing how to get involved. We wanted to find a way to unite women everywhere from the city to the bush, and all ages and backgrounds.
And so the concept of the 1 Million Women campaign was created. A campaign that would inspire, empower, motivate and mobilise 1 million women of Australia to take positive action on climate change. A call to action to do something very defined – to collectively cut 1 million tonnes of CO2, the main greenhouse gas pollutant, with each of us making a personal commitment to cut 1 tonne in our daily lives.
1 million tonnes of CO2 is like filling up 2.1 billion wheelies bins, or 20 billion balloons, with pollution … and if we continue to cut that every year it would be the equivalent of taking 250,000 cars off the road.
Why just women? Well that was simple. There is something so incredibly powerful about women joining forces to fight for the good of our society. We have been doing it forever. Women make around 70% of the consumer decisions around the home and we are natural networkers.
We believe this campaign plays to the unique strengths of women in society, and also that climate change is a deep challenge for women around the world. There is an increasing focus on concern that climate change is in no way ‘gender neutral', with developing world women disproportionately suffering in weather-related natural disasters like floods and hurricanes.
There's also evidence that women are showing stronger concern than men about the environment. Women are significantly more likely than men – 56% to 46% – to expect the highest environmental and climate performance from businesses, according to a national poll by AMR Interactive unveiled at our launch. More women (45%) than men (35%) also think the global recession makes action on environmental sustainability more important now.
However, over half of the women among the 4600 Australians who participated in the online poll in March-April 2009 say they have never sought out information to help them to improve their own environmental performance. These new poll findings should put all businesses and governments on notice that women are stronger in their environmental concern than men, and will be demanding more from everyone.
Women will be led to our website http://www.1millionwomen.com.au/. It's the hub of our campaign, the connection point. It's there they will be able to chose their CO2 cutting activities and be able to monitor their progress as they go along. And we will be able to capture the data of what activities women are doing, what age groups are engaging, what are our challenges, how different regions are acting, and much more.
We will be able to report on our aggregated savings and activity choices, building understanding of what works and what needs to be improved on. We need to reach around 1 in 8 women. And as our campaign grows we will be finding all sorts of ways to ways to connect with women everywhere.
But the campaign will not succeed if we just build a website and wait for women to log on. It's the physical presence of the campaign that will make it successful. When women everywhere take ownership of it and take it into their own communities, that's when reaching 1 million women will become achievable.
I can't name all of our 100-plus ambassadors from around the nation here. But for a flavour, there's principal ballerina Darcey Bussell; cooking legend Margaret Fulton; senior politicians including Anna Bligh, Carmel Tebbutt, Tanya Plibersek and Senator Christine Milne; AFL commissioner Sam Mostyn; Woman's Weekly Editorial Director Deborah Thomas; environmental law academic Rosemary Lyster; businesswoman Wendy McCarthy; media personalities Nell Schofield and Lisa Forrest; TV executive producer Anita Jacoby; indigenous film-maker Rachel Perkins; country singer Melinda Schneider (her song ‘Courageous' is our theme song); children's author Anna Fienberg and many more.
We believe our success will be measured by how many women we engage and how focusing on that first 1 tonne cut actually leads to real, significant and lasting behaviour change. So, although it's an integral part of the campaign, cutting 1 tonne of CO2 is really only the catalyst to empower women to do more and more themselves, and to demand more and more from our political and business leaders. Everything we do is about inspiring climate action!
Natalie Isaacs is CEO and co-founder of Climate Coolers, creators of the 1 Million Women campaign launched at the University of Sydney 19 May 2009. Visit www.1millionwomen.com.au
Natalie Isaacs is the founder and CEO of 1Million Women. She is a mother of four with a deep concern about the world her children are inheriting. After training in aromatherapy and natural therapies in London as a young woman, Natalie came home to Australia in 1986 to found and run her own skin and body-care business. In 2006, Natalie saw an urgent need to utilise her skills and passion as a business woman and communicator to take real and significant action on climate change and launched 1Million Women in 2009.
Nick Mallory
May 25, 2009 at 10:25 am
A question or two
So how many members do you have?
How will you substantiate anyone's claim to have reduced their 'carbon footprint'?
It's not clear if you're aiming for people to save one ton per year or in total. What are your criteria for success or failure?
Who is actually paying for you to be 'CEO' of this?
Happyjoe50
June 28, 2009 at 11:04 am
Australian envirionmental Issue for Women
Oil from Rubbish and sewerage are yet to appear on any news medium in Australia. See youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CWf9nYbm3ac&feature=related This could totally remove Australia's sewerage pollution and rubbish pollution – and remove the nations dependency on Oil. As a side benefit it will reduce Carbon emmissions.
Will women stop issues like this being supressed in Australia?