Post by account_disabled on Feb 19, 2024 21:37:29 GMT -8
Dedicating a large part of your efforts to benefit the environment is one of the most required activities today, and there are those who do it with great enthusiasm and pride. One such person is Lucie Pinson, who began her career as an environmental activist in South Africa, where almost 90% of energy comes from coal-fired power plants. We tell you her story and that of 5 other people who have been involved in the issue in a significant way! 1. Lucie Pinson According to Fast Company , Lucie Pinson is originally from France, she worked with the NGO Friends of the Earth , fighting against new coal projects being built in South Africa. But those coal projects were being carried out thanks to financing from major banks around the world, including French financial institutions. Between 2005 and 2014, French banks, including BNP Paribas and Credit Agricole, supported the coal industry with more than €30 billion, making France the fourth-largest coal financier at the time. So Pinson turned his attention to France's banks, pressuring them to divest from coal projects. That work has made her the winner of the 2020 Goldman Environmental Prize, an annual award that recognizes environmental activists from each of the world's six geographic regions: Africa, Asia, Europe, Islands and Island Nations, North America, and South America.
South and Central Finance is an incredible tool for change, because behind every project, you will find a bank and an insurance company. Lucie Pinson. In 2013, he launched a media campaign, pressuring banks to stop financing Europe Cell Phone Number List coal projects, and protested at bank offices, handing out information to both employees and customers. And then she went straight to the source of those coal decisions: Friends of the Earth bought shares in French banks, as did Pinson herself, so she could attend shareholder meetings and talk face to face with the people who decided. finance the climate disaster. It is the way to bring the reality of the impacts within the banks. It's almost like an eruption in your world. Lucie Pinson. She showed the impact that these coal projects had on residents, and invited people from different countries who were fighting against coal projects to talk about their lived experiences. People who live near coal plants are at increased risk of respiratory illnesses, lung cancer, cardiovascular disease, and other health impacts. Coal plants and mines take land from communities, threaten their food sources, limit their access to water, and pollute the air.
Coal-related air pollution alone causes more than 800,000 premature deaths annually. When the bank talks about profitability, this speaker may talk about his mother or son having asthma. However, not everything always went well in those meetings. Pinson was verbally threatened and insulted " many times, and sometimes very, very violently ." But she doesn't blame the shareholders. " I think it's really about being hit, and they're hit because they don't understand climate change ," she says. « I am bringing them a reality that they ignore .» Pinson kept up the pressure on decision-makers, writing letters to bank executives laying out climate expectations for the coming year and publicly ranking banks based on their coal policies and projects. And banks and insurers felt that pressure. In 2017, SCOR, the world's fourth-largest reinsurance company, announced that it would not insure new coal plants and would stop investing in companies if 30% or more of their revenue came from coal. AXA, the third-largest insurance company, said it would divest about $3.5 billion that had been earmarked for coal-fired power plants, mines and tar sands.