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Celebrating World Wildlife & Forest Days

The 2021 World Wildlife Day to be held on March 3, 2021 and World Forest Day on March 21, 2021 celebrates and raises awareness of the “Forests and livelihoods: sustaining people and planet” which underpins a green recovery from the COVID-19 pandemic.

"It is increasingly evident that environmental crises are part of the journey ahead. Wildfires, hurricanes, high temperature records, unprecedented winter chills, plagues of locusts, floods and droughts, have become so common place that they do not always make the headlines," Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta said in remarks to the Fifth United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA-5) where the overall theme was “Strengthening Actions for Nature to Achieve the Sustainable Development Goals.” He added that "These increasing adverse weather and climatic occurrences sound a warning bell that calls on us to attend to the three planetary crises that threaten our collective future: the climate crisis, the biodiversity and nature crisis, and the pollution and waste crisis."

The United Nation's 17 Sustainable Development Goals (SDG) are a call for action by all countries to promote prosperity while protecting the planet. More important than ever, these goals provide a critical framework for COVID-19 recovery. The UN Secretary-General António Guterres said “We need to turn the recovery into a real opportunity to do things right for the future.” More than ever that human health and wellbeing are dependent upon nature and the solutions it provides necessitating urgent action to solve planetary emergencies:

•   The climate crisis - SDG 3 & 13;
•   The biodiversity and nature crisis - SDG 14, 15; and
•   The pollution and waste crisis - SDG 6, 7, 11, 12.

"We shall work together to identify actions which can help us address climate change, protect biodiversity, and reduce pollution, at the same time,” Sveinung Rotevatn, President of UNEA-5 and Norway's Minister for Climate and Environment concurred. "We can no longer wait to make peace with nature" added UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen, otherwise we shall face recurring risks of future pandemics if we maintain our current unsustainable patterns in our interactions with nature.

The 3 art shows I curated -- that will be exhibited at various conferences through-out this year-- reflect these themes. These art shows contain paintings that were acknowledged in numerous United Nations art competitions. And have been published by the UN, the World's first climate change museum The Jockey Club Museum of Climate Change - Hong Kong, as well as other museums.

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