UCT alumna handpicked to present at global climate summit

Tyler Booth, an advocate for the prevention of climate change and a University of Cape Town (UCT) alumna, has been handpicked to deliver an address during the second annual FP Virtual Climate Summit this week.

Hosted by Foreign Policy magazine, the summit is dedicated to advancing scalable and inclusive strategies to impact climate change. The two-day summit kicked off on Wednesday, 27 April, and discussions will explore a range of topics including clean energy supply chains and finance for clean technology deployment.

With a stellar line-up of speakers – including New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern and former United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon – Booth will be in good company at the virtual podium.

“I am very honoured to have been chosen as a speaker in a line of heads of state, senior climate negotiators and other world leaders,” Booth said.

Topic of discussion

Booth is a Chevening Scholar and is currently pursuing an MSc in climate change and environmental policy at the University of Leeds in the United Kingdom. She said the invitation to participate in the FP Virtual Climate Summit came after her presentation at the Intergenerational Roundtable on Climate Change, hosted by U7+ Alliance of World Universities in 2021. At the time she was in the process of completing her BMedSci (Honour’s) at UCT and represented the university at the event.

She said she is excited to address the audience on “The just transition”. This topic is particularly important as the world strives towards achieving decarbonised economies and net zero, she said. Her talk will focus on the importance of including the youth, marginalised sectors of society and those most affected by climate change in climate decision-making processes. 

“This topic is important [because] not only do young people face the compounding effects of the COVID-19 crisis … we also face the challenges of adapting to and correcting the systems that caused climate change.”

“My work as a climate advocate has focused on youth policy-making spaces and ensuring that we can drive and effect policies that have the biggest impact on us,” Booth said. “This topic is important [because] not only do young people face the compounding effects of the COVID-19 crisis, with an incredibly high rate of unemployment, we also face the challenges of adapting to and correcting the systems that have caused climate change.”

According to Booth, these crises are not independent of each other and therefore should not be dealt with independently. After all, she added, the solutions for combating climate change can and will boost youth unemployment and economic growth.

“But this cannot happen if there is no representation, awareness and capacity of the needs of young people, and the extensive role they can play. I am looking forward to joining a cohort of world leaders and researchers and advocating for greater and more effective participation of youth in climate decision-making,” she said.