The Race Equality Foundation and charity think tank NPC are collaborating on a project to raise awareness on the impact of the climate and nature crises on the lives of people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic groups. This is part of a wider programme of work NPC is leading to accelerate action on the climate and nature crises in the social sector – the Everyone’s Environment programme.
Our partners are central to ensuring that the voice of a wide range of people is heard on this issue and that the environmental and social sectors are empowered to collaborate to ensure the least privileged communities are not the hardest hit by the environmental crises and related policy.
An initial roundtable discussion took place in September 2022 with organisations such as Caribbean and African Health Network, Friends Families and Travellers as well as Wai Yin Chinese Women’s Society in attendance, with contributions from Sheffield Environmental Movement, the Race Equality Foundation and NPC opening the discussions. Roundtable participants shared a clear desire to carry on meeting to drive forward learning and action.
Following this successful roundtable, together with NPC, the Foundation held a follow-up roundtable in January 2023 as an opportunity to build on the findings from the first workshop and design the next steps for how we collaborate. From these discussions, there was an overwhelming desire for something bigger that gets more people together that is both about sharing knowledge and laying groupwork for collective action.
The group agreed that the cost of inaction in this area is only growing. The sector needs to both do the small things that work, and the upstream things that lead to structural and systemic impact, and funders need to support both of these strands of work that are part of the Everyone’s Environment programme.
Views were also raised that the sector needs to keep an open mind about what the climate crisis and environmental action is – the scope is enormous and is seen differently by different ethnic groups.
We hope that everyone who participated in these events will continue to build on these discussions and we look forward to continuing this vital work in addressing the impact of environmental crises on Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities in the UK.
Take a look at:
- Our briefings on how the environment impacts people from Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities, and
- how people from ethnic minority communities want charities and government to respond to the climate and nature crises.
- Listen to Race Equality Foundation Chief Executive Jabeer Butt on the Third Sector podcast, discussing the impact of the Climate Crisis on Black, Asian and minority ethnic communities.
