31/10/2019

Damian Carrington On 10 Years As The Guardian's Environment Editor

The Guardian - , as told to

One of our leading environment journalists reflects on how awareness of the climate crisis has shifted in the last decade and offers advice for those who want to do more
Damian Carrington: ‘I’ve seen so much of the earth’s beauty. The flip-side to that is being confronted with its destruction.’ Photograph: Jill Mead/The Guardian
What did you do before you joined the Guardian?
I did a PhD and post-doc research in geology at Edinburgh University, including an expedition to Antarctica, which was amazing: beautiful, pristine with bursts of life along the coast. But I think my attention span was a bit short for academic life, so I started writing science stories for newspapers. My first staff job was at BBC Tomorrow’s World magazine, then BBC News Online. I went to New Scientist next and then the Financial Times. In 2008, I was delighted to be hired by the Guardian, which was – and is! – my favourite paper.
Damian Carrington on the Snorkel Safari in Kimmeridge, Dorset – a marine conservation zone. Photograph: Peter Willows/BNPS.co.uk
How has awareness of the climate crisis changed in the last decade? What do you think the big milestones have been? 
When I joined the Guardian, concern about the climate crisis was running high, following a landmark report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and Al Gore’s film, An Inconvenient Truth – the IPCC and Gore went on to win the Nobel peace prize. But it was seen as a future problem. The transformative moment was meant to come at the 2009 UN climate change conference in Copenhagen. But it didn’t happen and after that the impacts of the global financial crisis grabbed all the attention. It wasn’t until 2015, by which time the role of human activities in driving climate change was undeniable, that a big step forward was taken with the Paris deal.

How has your role in covering the environment changed in that time?
The Guardian has always taken the environment very seriously. In the decade I have been here, the team has expanded. But the basic approach has largely stayed the same – environmental issues affect everything, so should feature across all our coverage: reporting, exposing and holding to account. Today, the climate crisis is here, evident in more frequent and more severe extreme weather and climate change deniers have been relegated to the far fringes. With the global youth climate strikes inspired by Greta Thunberg and the Extinction Rebellion protests, 2019 feels like a new chapter. Those who have campaigned for decades are feeling hopeful.

What would you say are the most important environmental issues?
The climate emergency is the best known, and it will take systemic change to beat it. But the annihilation of wildlife and the destruction of nature is just as crucial in my view – we depend on the natural world for almost everything. The huge scale of the losses – from forests to insects to marine life – has only really become widely reported in the last few years. Pollution is the third issue, particularly the toxic air that causes millions of early deaths every year. Air is actually getting cleaner in some rich nations, but the understanding of how damaging it is – on everything from intelligence to miscarriages – is only really emerging now. Chemical pollution is also a serious global problem, from fertiliser to pesticides to PCBs

What frustrates you about how these issues are sometimes be covered?
One thing is the charge of hypocrisy that is often levelled at environment campaigners because they have a TV or something. Just because you have to live in the world as it is today doesn’t mean you can’t campaign to make it a better place tomorrow. But I think hypocrisy is the attack made by people who know they’ve lost the real argument.

 Has your work influenced/informed the way you live your life?
Yes. It’s impossible to write about it every day and not act. I am vegan at home and whenever I can elsewhere. My home is fully insulated and my energy supplier is renewable. I rarely fly for holidays – one short haul flight in the last couple of years – and usually go to Ireland by ferry to surf. I’ve also cycled to work for about 13 years now – it’s cheap, fast and healthy. Being green is often worthwhile for many reasons.

 What would you say to readers who want to tackle the environmental crisis?
The big shifts will be driven by the governments we elect (in democracies) and the companies to which we give our custom. Demanding urgent action from those leaders is vital. But personal action is also important, in itself and as an encouragement to others. The biggest action, according to scientists, is having fewer children, but that of course is a deeply personal and complex choice. Flying less and eating less meat and dairy also make big cuts in your impact, as does driving fewer petrol-powered miles and insulating your home.

How can we build on the urgency we’ve seen from many campaigners in 2019 and keep the spotlight fixed firmly on the big changes we need?
We are in a race against time and it’s not at all certain that we are going to win. We understand the problems and what we have to do, more or less, but the pace of action is far too slow. Putting pressure on politicians and business leaders is key – giving them a strong reason to move faster. The good news is that many solutions gain their own momentum once started. In many places, solar and wind power is now the cheapest electricity, and electric cars are the cheapest to own. But there are still big problems to solve, including agriculture and aviation. The young people involved in the climate strikes will be running the world in the not-too-distant future. But we have to make sure we are still in the race by then.

What have been the highlights of your reporting at the Guardian so far? What has made you most proud?
I have written nearly 2,000 stories for the Guardian, and I’d hope most of them have played a part in building awareness of environmental issues. It’s usually hard to know how much impact stories have behind the scenes, but the restoration of slashed flood defence funding in England followed a lot of reporting by me, as did the EU ban on neonicotinoid pesticides, which harm bees. The recent resignation of the executive director of the UN environment programme also followed a string of my stories, which was a good example of the Guardian holding power to account. The environment team get a lot of positive feedback from readers, scientists and policymakers, which is very heartening. One prominent scientist recently told me: “Thank God for the Guardian!”

What is the area within your work and reporting expertise that you feel most passionately about?
Usually the story I’m working on right now. But in recent years I’ve done a lot on pesticides, insects, the impact of livestock, microplastics and harmful subsidies. And badgers. I’ve written a lot about the cull in England. One of my editors here said I had “made the Guardian the paper of choice for small mammals”, which may or may not have been a compliment.

What about the highs and lows of doing the job?
Often, this is the best job in the world. I’ve been fortunate to see a lot of the Earth’s natural beauty. I’ve tracked forest elephants in Gabon, been swimming with giant mantas in the Maldives and walked through extraordinary landscapes high in the Andes. On the other hand, almost every day I have to report more destruction and degradation of the environment. The most heartbreaking story I have covered is the poisoning of children with lead in a former mining town in Zambia. But I was glad to be able to expose it at least.

 What’s next for you and the team?
The next 12 months are going to be absolutely pivotal for the world. There’s a major UN biodiversity conference in China next year – the targets set a decade ago have been woefully missed. The UN climate summit in Glasgow, UK, in 2020 will also be vital – nations are going to have to make big increases in the carbon cuts they pledge if we are to get anywhere near the 1.5C temperature rise seen as a safety limit. And we’ll be reporting day in, day out, across the world holding nations and companies to account for the environment and for social justice.

What makes the Guardian unique?
John Vidal, my brilliant predecessor as environment editor, says: “Environment is the world and everything in it”, and I think the issue now permeates all the newspaper’s coverage. That is because the Guardian has always taken the issue seriously, with full support from the top and the resources to match. Our readers really care too, and they tell us. I’d guess there aren’t many places where all that is the case.

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