Danish Youth Conference on the Nature Crisis

Biodiversity Ambassadors - in the process of becoming the Nordic Youth Biodiversity Network

Denmark

On January 9th, 2020 the Danish youth organization on biodiversity, named the Biodiversity Ambassadors, held a national Youth Conference on the Nature Crisis in the Danish Government Hall.

Here, 100 young participants heard about the state of biodiversity from leading Danish scientists, and afterwards discussed how different sectors should mitigate biodiversity loss with parliamentary politicians. The 100 participants signed up to work with one of the following sectors: finance, climate and energy, agriculture, children and teaching, education and research, or environment. Each group discussed challenges in their sector and solutions to strengthen the state of biodiversity, resulting in a broad societal approach across the groups. After these discussions, a politician from the Danish parliament joined the discussion group for the sector they represent.

The youth participants presented the main challenges and solutions they had found for their sector, and discussed their findings with the politician. Following this, the main challenges and solutions were presented by the groups to the entire conference, followed by a Q&A with the Danish Minister of Environment. Finally, all participants were provided with a flower they could give to one of the politicians, with a note highlighting the importance of biodiversity, and asking that the politician make halting biodiversity loss their priority.