Global Alliance of Universities on Climate (GAUC), the first cross-national initiative of this kind in the field of climate change, was established in 2019 missioned to provide collective leadership of global higher education efforts addressing climate change. With shared value, 15 world-leading universities from 9 countries across 6 continents commit to providing leadership of global higher education efforts in advancing climate solutions and collaborating with industry, non-profit and government organizations to accelerate the carbon neutral transition from the local to global scales.

The ‘Climate x’ Campaign is initiated by GAUC with the purpose of raising public awareness of synergy between climate change and other Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs), and calling for innovative solutions towards the net-zero future. The Campaign spans the national, regional, and international levels, including Climate x Youth Leadership Training Pilot, Africa Regional Forum on Climate Change, Climate Week NYC GAUC Event, ‘Climate x’ Global Youth Summit on Net-zero Future towards the COP 27 GAUC DAY. Inspired from the Climate Week NYC, GAUC is leading to co-initiate the Global Youth Climate Week, a week prior each COP with global partners to mobilize global youth to take the lead in addressing climate change. During the COP 27 ‘Climate x’ High-Level Event, we will review the outcome of the ‘Climate x’ Campaign, and look to the pathway of the net-zero future including youth’s role in accelerating the transformation.

Agenda

11:00-11:05
Warm-up video

11:05-11:25
Opening Remarks (3-5 mins for each, in total 20 mins)

  • XIE Zhenhua, China’s Special Envoy on Climate Change
  • Senior representative from France
  • Senior representative from South Africa
  • Elizabeth Yee, Executive Vice President, the Rockefeller Foundation
  • Li Zheng, Secretary General of GAUC (moderator)

11:25-11:45
GAUC Climate x Campaign Award Ceremony

GAUC Global Youth Ambassadors

Award presenters:

  • Guy Midgley, Acting Director of School of Climate, Stellenbosch University
  • Li Zheng, Secretary General of GAUC
  • Alice Ho, Chief Youth Officer of GAUC (moderator) 

11:45-11:55
Youth Open Letter to Global Leaders

GAUC Global Youth Ambassadors

Alice Ho, Chief Youth Officer of GAUC (moderator) 

11: 55-12:25
Multi-stakeholders Dialogue – Cooperative Pathway to Net-zero

  • Anthony Leserwizs, Director of the Yale Program of Climate Change Communication, Yale University (public perspective)
  • Alyssa Gilbert, Director of Policy and Translation at the Grantham Institute for Climate Change and the Environment, Imperial College London (Network perspective)
  • Gwenaelle AVICE-HUET, Chief Strategy & Sustainability Officer, Schneider Electric (Business perspective)
  • Suzana Kahn Ribeiro, Deputy Director of COPPE, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro (Academic perspective)
  • Danae Kyriakopoulou, Senior Policy Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, LSE (Policy perspective)
  • GAUC’s Global Youth Ambassador (Youth and South Perspective)
  • Bob Ward, Policy and Communications Director Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, LSE (moderator)

12:25-12:30
Step into COP28 Ceremony

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