By Moira
O’Brien-Malone*
07 Sep 2006 - Perhaps it was
the long bike rides or the hours spent playing
in the woods behind her childhood home in New
Jersey that sparked Jennifer Morgan’s interest
in the world around her. Whatever it was, the
departing director of WWF’s Global Climate Change
Programme has a lasting love of the outdoors.
But it wasn’t until 1989, while
still a graduate student in the United States,
that she read “Fighting For Hope” by Petra Kelly,
founder of the German Green party. Suddenly, her
course became clear.
“It changed my way of thinking,”
says Jennifer Morgan.
“Although I was studying international
affairs, I started researching and writing about
this new paradigm in foreign affairs – environmentalism.
I got attracted to working on environmental issues
because of a feeling that someone needed to represent
the creatures of the Earth that have no voice.
It was partially a feeling of justice.”
“Once I learned about climate
change and its impact on everything I care about,
I could not work on any other issue," she
adds. "It is truly the issue of our time
in my view.”
And now Morgan, 40, is taking
the next step in her climate work. She recently
announced that she is leaving WWF, the global
conservation organization, at the end of September.
She has been seconded from WWF to take up a two-year
Berlin-based position at E3G, Third Generation
Environmentalism, as head of that group’s work
on climate change.
The decision to go was a tough
one.
“It was probably the hardest
decision of my life,” Morgan says. “WWF is a wonderful
organization full of amazing committed individuals
and has enormous potential to make a difference
in the world. I have been there for eight years
and my team is like my family. It will be hard
not to be heading up that team, and I will miss
people a lot, but I know I will be working with
many of them in the future.”
But, she says, her job at E3G,
a relatively new organization known for its “entrepreneurial
diplomacy”, will allow her to return to her foreign
policy roots.
“The focus is on empowering
Europe to play a bigger role in the world, especially
in relation to countries like China and India,
to bring about climate stability. E3G wants to
change the narrative on climate change, to integrate
it into the energy security and foreign policy
agendas, where it really belongs.”
As with any new job, there are
pros and cons.
“I’ll be working for a very
small organization, which will bring the benefit
of flexibility and creativity, but of course I
will be losing the wonderful global network of
WWF.”
Morgan is full of praise for
WWF’s climate change work, but acknowledges the
challenges ahead. Asked to nominate the programme’s
key achievement, she does not hesitate.
“Entry into force of the Kyoto
Protocol,” she says. “Without WWF, I don’t think
we would have concluded the rules of the protocol,
despite the US walking out, or have secured its
ratification in places like Russia and Japan."
The Kyoto Protocol sets a legally
binding limit on greenhouse gas emissions for
industrialised countries and creates an emissions
trading system. Although it is just a first step,
it is a multilateral approach to a global problem.
Morgan is justifiably proud of the achievement,
having led WWF’s delegation to the protocol’s
climate negotiations, but prefers to credit the
team.
“WWF over the years has been
at the forefront of documenting the science on
climate change, especially in regards to biodiversity
impacts," she says. "Nowadays there
is a story every day from scientists, but back
in the early 90s that was not the case and WWF
provided credible research on things like polar
bears, coral reefs, ecoregions and the Arctic."
When pushed, she reluctantly
nominates what she feels is her greatest personal
success.
“I think it was building a north-south
coalition to complete the Kyoto Protocol, despite
the Bush administration’s rejection. We had just
a few months to test the political will of the
world. I think I flew around the world twice in
that time, meeting with ministers, talking to
crowds, and trying to ensure that the world moved
forward, and thank goodness it did."
“It was a great day for multilateralism when the
world decided Kyoto was the hit, even without
the biggest polluter," Morgan adds. "I
worked hard to make that happen.”
Challenges remain, but Morgan
describes them as “daunting but doable”.
“In order to keep the global average temperature
rise to below 2°C above pre-industrial levels,
which scientists agree is crucial, we have to
ensure that there is a decline in global emissions
in the next 10 to 15 years. This means changing
the way the world uses energy and creating new
opportunities for innovation and creativity."
The good news is that the technologies
exist, through energy efficiency and renewables.
The bad news is that there is not enough political
will in the world right now to bring about emission
reductions fast enough.
"We need leadership from
heads of state and CEOs around the world to forge
a pathway forward that meets the challenge of
climate change head-on," Morgan stresses.
"We need the key countries
of the world to come to a common understanding
of this threat and decide to act jointly, to trust
each other, in tackling it. We need the people
of the world to be ready to accept change to avoid
the worst impacts, or we will not only lose the
treasures of nature, but we will create an unstable
world where famine and disaster are common occurrences."
"We need China to develop
differently to the OECD, and Europe to realize
the important role it plays in the world to forge
coalitions and achieve big goals. And we need
the United States to understand that it needs
to work together with China and Europe on the
solutions."
* Moira O’Brien-Malone is head
of press at WWF International, based in Gland,
Switzerland.
