Prince Charles has declared the “urgent need to take decisive, bold action on behalf of future generations” as he witnessed the destruction caused to a vital Canadian ice road by warmer weather due to climate change.
The Prince of Wales said “we need to listen at least as much as we speak” to help communities around the world in danger of being cut off as a result of the climate emergency.
On a visit to Canada this week, Charles met with indigenous communities and heard how they are facing unprecedented hardships, from having their livelihoods stripped away to being forced to flee their homelands.
Some groups who have lived and thrived for centuries in some of the harshest environments across the country are now finding themselves on the front line of increasing environmental disasters.
Melting ice across the remote Northwest Territories is frequently causing flash flooding and the desecration of sacred lands with annual rising temperatures.
Lifelong environmentalist Charles, 73, discussed with his hosts the immediate need to be conscious of the risk to future generations.
Borrowing a phrase from indigenous elders he told how both local and global communities should be conscious of “the seventh unborn generation” when thinking about solutions to deal with the climate crisis.
The Dettah Ice Road which connects the remote community of Dettah with the city of Yellowknife is experiencing unprecedented levels of warming, forcing the road to open later and close earlier with each passing year.
While the road has historically opened in December, recent years have seen the opening delayed several weeks later and closing up to a month early.
The Ice Road was open for the longest period in 1995 and 1996, at 140 days; while it was open for the shortest period in 2017 and 2019 at only 91 days.
It acts as a lifeline for communities that would otherwise face being cut off or huge delays in getting across the area.
In a speech on the final day of his three day tour of the nation in honour of the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee, Charles said: “Canada is determined to shape solutions to the challenges it sees in the world.
“The same is true of the existential risks of climate change.
“I have laboured for so many years to bring this issue to the forefront of international consciousness – not just with words, but with practical action.
“As I said at the G20 Summit last Autumn, this means we need to listen at least as much as we speak.
“And what I have heard and witnessed at first hand of the devastating impact of climate change here, in the North, merely convinces me of the supremely urgent need to take decisive, bold action on behalf of future generations, and of Nature herself.”
The heir to the throne had long believed and indeed championed the need to combine the worlds of sustainability, government decision making and financial institutions to make collective decisions on tackling the crisis.
In Yellowknife, communities are attempting to combine these worlds as well as learning from indigenous tribes and their experiences of the changing environment.
Climate change in the area with longer ice-free seasons in the Arctic Ocean are leading to significant and rapid coastal erosion.
Numerous buildings have been moved in the community of Tuktoyaktuk, on the Northern Coast of the Northwest Territories along the Artic Ocean, and the entire community is in in danger of needing to be relocated in the coming decades.
Coastal erosion is also exposing and washing away cultural and archaeological sites faster than they can be preserved, while warmer winters are shortening the season for winter ice roads that are lifelines for goods and people who live in communities that are only accessible by air.
Charles added: “I am afraid that climate change and biodiversity loss know no borders; global markets and supply chains are deeply inter-connected and time is rapidly running out.
“To succeed, we will need to restore our relationship with Nature, challenge the status quo, innovate new business and financial models, work across borders at scale and ensure a just and sustainable transition for all.
“In this effort, our children and young people have a vital role to play and we must listen to them too because, as it was put to me yesterday, our generation has borrowed the land from them.
“I can only say how strongly I would encourage the leadership of the Northwest Territories to address this challenge by working alongside indigenous knowledge-keepers to restore harmony with Nature, while also looking at vital community scale renewable energy solutions to reduce greenhouse gas emissions such as biofuels, hydropower, solar and wind.
“We simply must learn practical lessons from traditional knowledge, through deep connections to land and water, about how we should treat our planet and, above all, recognise the vital importance of taking into account the seventh unborn generation."
