Vision for Nature

The same day as I saw ‘A Focus for Nature’ doing blogs on ‘What I want the Natural world to look like in 2050’, in the run up to the General Election next week, I saw an advert for a photographic competition asking for photographs to ‘depict the natural beauty of our home planet’.

I started to think about what nature means to me and what photos I have taken that I could use. 

Could I use a photo of a Killer Whale in USA that I recently took or a photo of one of my local badgers? 

Then I thought what about something more accessible to everybody, something that everyone walks passed every day but may not even notice, like a Daisy or a Dandelion.

As I am only 11 years old I can’t vote in the General Election, but through Core Programme lessons at school and our 6^th form having a mock election I have been looking at the main parties views on the environment.

I have been writing a blog on wildlife in my local patch for nearly two years now and hopefully it shows people how breath-taking our natural world is.  

I am lucky enough to have a beautiful local patch full of wildlife such as badgers, hares, deers and plenty of birds, but if you look close enough there is wildlife everywhere.

I recently went to a talk by marine biologist and speaker Monty Halls, during the talk he said that he had heard someone say that our generation is the generation that will see the most wildlife, more than previous generations and definitely more than generations to come. This struck me as quite amazing but sad.

I believe that education about nature is the future.

Some schools don’t educate children about wildlife because it might not seem very important, but it is.

When I say something to friends at school about wildlife, some of them say ‘Wow, that’s interesting’, but some say ‘why don’t you like football or gaming?’ I say I do, but wildlife is more important to me.

Social media is a great way of informing people about wildlife issues and the beauty of nature through photos and blogs. 

Programmes such as Springwatch and CBBC programmes like ‘Deadly 60’ and ‘Wild’ inspire people to appreciate nature and get involved.

When Monty Halls said that quote he had heard that from somebody else and then repeated it to over 100 people in the room that night, hopefully those people, including me, will think about the importance of that message and the importance of nature and pass it on to more people.

To politicians one persons thoughts may not make a difference, or maybe 20 peoples thoughts, but if those 20 people educate 20 more people and so on. 20 people can soon become 20,000 people and then politicians would have to take notice about how important the natural world is to future generations like me.

In 2050 I want our planet to look beautiful, full of life for everyone, not some miserable place as depicted in “The Hunger Games’, ‘Divergent’ or ‘Interstellar’.

I want a peaceful planet where humans and the animals aren’t dying and our planet isn’t ruined.

As long as people fight for protection of our natural world and that message carries on to the children and my generations children and beyond then we might be in with an arms reach of grabbing a secure future for 2050.