Yesterday we left the meeting rooms of the climate negotiations behind and took it to the streets, marching alongside 15,000 others to demand climate justice. As the traffic backed up in the already hectic streets of Lima, people from around the world came together in a colourful parade of costumes, national dress, banners and giant corn.

The march reflected the widespread rejection of the business oriented marketsolutions being discussed

within the United Nations process, with many banners calling to ‘change the system, not the climate.’ There is a growing dissatisfaction with the current approach to tackling the climate crisis, and significant opposition to the UN’s REDD+ program, as evidenced by an array of banners and stickers throughout the crowd.

Indigenous groups from the Amazon region marched to save the rainforest, ‘Salva el selva’. Despite the importance of protecting the Amazon for its ability to store carbon from our atmosphere, many of the people who call it home feel shut out from the COP process. These same communities are frequently on the frontlines of resource extraction, and fight a constant battle to see their rights respected.

The New Zealand cohort carried a clear message to Tim Groser and the New Zealand government: Cut The Gap. We are deeply disappointed in the growing gap between New Zealand’s growing carbon pollution and our government’s commitments to reduce it, and want to see real action to back up the rhetoric being used here in Lima around doing our “fair share.”

The fact that 15,000 people had gathered from far and wide gave us hope in the future of our people. We are more climate-conscious now than ever before and all age groups are beginning to get involved. As negotiators enter the final two days in COP20, the message from the people has been stated loud and clear: we want to see strong action to tackle climate change. Action must be fair and the time is now.