Global Youth Video Competition 2019: Showcasing the power of youth in leading climate action

At COP25, we need the voice of Youth to be heard and we need them to be engaged in all important and international discussions about climate change. For the 2019 edition of the Global Youth Video Competition, three talented young filmmakers from Portugal, Brazil and the United States were recognized during the Young and Future Generations Day in Madrid at COP25 as winners of the competition. The ceremony, attended by UN and Spanish government representatives, showcased the three winning films and the individual actions of their creators to tackle climate change, protect biodiversity and promote better land use.

The 2019 edition of the Global Youth Video Competition was organized jointly by the three Rio Conventions (the Convention on Biological Diversity, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the United Nations Convention to Combat Desertification), in partnership with the Global Environment Facility-United Nations Development Programme Small Grants Programme and the BNP Paribas Foundation. The competition was implemented through the Television for Environment (tve) platform. 

This year, the 5th Global Youth Video Competition received entries from 114 countries, with 404 short videos submitted by young people aged 18-30. The judges shortlisted 20 films for each category which have been posted on YouTube for public voting, with the final 60 films being viewed over 500,000 times. Further information on the competition including a promo film featuring clips from many of the best film entries is available online on the tvebiomovies website. The awards ceremony, organized by UN Climate Change, took place Thursday 5 December at 18.00 as part of the Young and Future Generations Day, Rapa Nui Action Hub, at COP 25 in Madrid, in presence of Ms. Teresa Ribera, Minister for the Ecological Transition of Spain, and Mr. Ovais Sarmad, Deputy Executive Secretary, UN Climate Change.  

The BNP Paribas Foundation is committed much like the BNP Paribas Group towards youth and wishes to demonstrate this commitment by highlighting such initiatives through the competition. Various awareness-raising activities related to climate change and biodiversity are organized by the Foundation and the Global Youth Video Competition is one of the great initiatives led to engage Youth.

Young people from Portugal, Brazil and the United States are being celebrated as the winners of the 2019 Global Youth Video Competition for telling inspiring stories of local climate action that can be scaled up and replicated around the world. The three winners of the 2019 Global Youth Video Competition are:

• Raquel Gaião Silva from Portugal who won the ’Cities and local action to combat climate change’ category with her film ‘Ocean alive’ - www.ocean-alive.org
  The video by Raquel Gaião Silva presents the efforts made by the Portuguese NGO “Ocean Alive” to protect the seagrass meadows in Setúbal. “Ocean Alive” works to educate students and the local fishing community, to promote behavior change, reduce destructive fishing and protect the seagrass meadows.
• Callie Broaddus from the USA who won the ’Balancing use of land for people and ecosystems’ category with her film ‘Reserva: The Youth Land Trust’ - www.reservaylt.org
  This video by Callie Broaddus describes what inspired her to set up “Reserva: The Youth Land Trust”, an organization designed to empower youth to fight climate change and biodiversity loss through land conservation. Reserva is working to create the world’s first entirely youth-funded reserve in Ecuador’s Chocó Rainforest.
• Rafael Forsetto and Kiane Assis from Brazil who won in the category ’Nature-based solutions for food and human health’ with the film ‘What is Agroecology’.
  In their three-minute entry, Rafael Forsetto and Kiane Assis define agroecology and show how it has become part of the culture for farmers in Paraná, Brazil. These farmers avoid pesticides and seek to increase biodiversity and reduce the ecological impact of their agricultural practices.

Each of the three winners of the 2019 competition, which is run through tve’s biomovies platform, are attending COP25 in Madrid and have been awarded the opportunity to report on the international climate meeting to youth audiences worldwide.