Ghaya Al Ahbabi

Gulf News

Ghaya Al Ahbabi, known as “Green Ghaya,” has emerged as a powerful voice advocating for climate action and sustainability.   Read the full story here:   See more videos at https://gulfnews.com/videos Read more Gulf News stories here: https://bit.ly/2HLJ2km

Transcript

00:00I'm Ghaya Al-Hababi, I'm the youngest senior staff youth advocate for COP28, as well as

00:07the youngest sustainability ambassador from Y4Us at Masdar, and leader and founder of

00:12Furgonbutt community team.

00:14I was called Green Ghaya by Sheikh Abdul Aziz bin Ali Al Na'imi, and getting called by

00:18him has a long story, and to summarize that up when I met him at a volunteering initiative,

00:24among all children there, I was the only one to feed a cat, so he came up to me and he

00:28told me that, you're going to be the next environmental leader, and here I call you

00:33Green Ghaya.

00:34At a young age, I had a really deep connection with the environment around me, by that nickname

00:40Green Ghaya, actually gave me the motive to start making an action towards our environment.

00:46It's something that I realized is that what we give for our planet, we're always going

00:50to get it back, and it's our choice whether if we want to live in a good and a sustainable

00:55way, or even neglect it and live it in a really bad way.

00:58I was actually only six years old when I wanted to be an environmental activist.

01:04By then I didn't know sustainability by its deep and dedicated meaning, but I wanted to

01:10have something with the environment around me.

01:13Talking about my personal experience at COP28, I was really, really honored.

01:18Leaders from all around the world come together to save our planet, to aware people of what's

01:23going on.

01:24COP isn't about talking and talking, it's about making an action, delivering to people

01:29that are really in need and that are facing the climate crisis right now.

01:33In the start and the beginning of every year, I have a list of goals that I want to do.

01:39By the end of each year, me and my family come together, and then we sit together and

01:44each one have a paper, and we write our goals.

01:47After we write the goals, we actually take the goals, for me personally, I take the goals

01:52that I want to focus on, and then separate them into parts.

01:56What can I do to achieve that goal?

01:57The first goal is to make my Green Bus community more diverse, especially that we've been getting

02:03requests from many countries, from many Emirates, from the UAE, that they want to join our team.

02:10So that's what we're working on right now, that's the first goal.

02:14Many people think that living in a sustainable way is actually really hard or really complicated,

02:20but once they adapt to living in a sustainable way, they realize that it's much more better.

02:24People could actually start adapting to a sustainable lifestyle by, for example, using

02:30solar panels in their house.

02:32Starting from their house, they could implement solar panels, they could even convert using

02:39normal energy to renewable energy, and even small steps, like for example, using bamboo

02:46instead of using plastic.

02:47Like, for example, there are many plastic products that people have been using in their

02:51daily lives, but instead they could use bamboo, it's more sustainable, and actually, once

02:57you throw it out, it can regrow again.

03:00The bamboo tree can regrow again.

03:02So that's something really, really important.

03:06Me and my fellow climate activists are always talking about climate change and its impact

03:11on our Mother Earth and our land, but now I want to actually talk specifically about

03:17the impact of climate change into our mental health and to quality of life.

03:22And it's something really, really important, that people are getting into depression or

03:27getting eco-anxiety all because of the impacts of climate change.

03:33The climate change has a really deep effect on our mental health.

03:36It can also affect losing one of our most crucial seasons in the UAE or even Gulf countries

03:42in general, which is the gale season, and it's known for the dates harvesting.

03:48And imagine we keep on getting the air depression more frequently in our atmosphere, unfortunately,

03:53the gale season will be gone, we won't get any harvesting dates, and I don't think anyone

03:59would want to lose their culture.

04:01And now in the European countries, they're facing a lot of heat waves, which is affecting

04:05their farming.

04:07When I get asked this question, I always say that you can start by small steps into achieving

04:11really big goals.

04:12But now what I'm going to say is think twice before you act, because whatever you do has

04:19a really big impact on our planet.

04:21It's your choice.

04:22You can start from today.

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