Manitoba’s Road to Resilience

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Given the current global political reality, there is serious doubt that the world will take the dramatic action required to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and remove carbon from the atmosphere at the scale and timeframe required by the IPCC 1.5°C Report.

Many Manitobans recognize the primary consequences of climate change (severe weather, floods, droughts, fires). Those same Manitobans see that those consequences have costs that are rising. What many people may not realize is that our ability to function and survive as a society is at risk.

Other disturbances (food shortages, climate migration, global conflicts) are exacerbated by climate change. The consequences of these disturbances may first be felt elsewhere, but we will feel them here due to their impacts on the global economy, supply chain, and availability and cost of obtaining financial credit. As long as we are dependent upon imported food and global supply chains for energy and essential goods, we are at risk. We are best off if we can provide for our essential needs ourselves.

Most governments are mainly concerned with being re-elected. Under the pretext of being “practical”, they have chosen not to publicly discuss the urgency and scale of work required to adequately address the climate crisis. It is up to civil society (the community) to think at this level and to show the way (or at least a way). We can “think the unthinkable.”

The objective of this document is to provide a decarbonization in Manitoba – zero greenhouse gas emissions by 2050.

As we build that pathway we will be building our local resilience. Resilience means providing for our essential needs ourselves without fossil fuel.