kyu House Takes New York
For its third iteration, kyu House set up in its hometown during Climate Week NYC.
All photos by David Dini for kyu House
Having previously represented in Dubai for COP28 and London at Climate Action Week, kyu House put down stakes in its hometown for Climate Week NYC. Climate Week NYC is the largest annual climate gathering of its kind, encompassing a schedule of over 600 events and activities around New York City.
Over three days, more than a thousand guests braved diplomatic and presidential gridlock to check out kyu House’s dialogues, workshops and debates. BEworks, C2, Gehl, IDEO, IDEO.org, Kepler, and SYPartners were in the planning stages for months, with help from a few external partners.
Here are some highlights from kyu House’s New York run:
Monday, September 23
IDEO.org played host to a packed house for its presentation and panel discussion on taking “A Gender Transformative Approach to Climate Resilience.” While many organizations are struggling with the gender dimensions of the climate crisis, there are already women and girls leading the way toward climate justice, observed Soraya Hassanali, deputy director of Global Affairs Canada.
In his remarks opening the evening, Michael Birkin, kyu Collective CEO, noted that the world’s biggest problem has been relegated lower on the global agenda — but it’s something we have the power to change. “When we manage to energize human beings is when we actually make some progress,” he said.
In a lively debate as to whether climate action needs American political leadership, the Against side prevailed with arguments including this one from Eurasia Group vice chairman Gerald Butts: “The United States decided not to stay in the Paris Accord. And guess what happened? Nothing of consequence.”
Tuesday September 24
When it comes to sustainable lifestyle decisions, people are extremely motivated at the outset, but there is a significant drop-off when it comes to actually making the change said BEworks’ David Thomson and Angela Cooper in their session, “Low Carbon Lifestyles: Blueprinting Behavioral Change.” Their advice to galvanize change: Make it easier. Make it relevant. Make it social.
At “The Space Between Climate & AI,” IDEO executive director Sergio Fregoni pointed out that good design needs to be at the start. To ensure this, he begins by asking clients why they are looking for technical solutions.
Wednesday, September 25
Gehl highlighted the importance of cities in our global climate fight. “We need a kind of language to talk about the kind of life a climate-aligned city offers,” said Gehl head of climate action Blaine Merker. Partners like Rocky Mountain Institute, World Resources Institute, Second Nature Ecology + Design, and Creative Denmark joined Gehl’s two urban-focused sessions to share insights and examples of urbanism done right in New York, Denmark, Shanghai, Sydney, and beyond.
The attendees of SYP’s “Shaping Organizations of the Future Through Next-Generation Leaders” posited: If the current economic frameworks built on the exploitation of the Global South are failing, climate action must look to the Global South for leadership.
Climate’s impact on the Global South was also top of mind at that evening’s LinkedIn-presented debate, “Is Climate Action Job Creation?” Frontier Markets Founder & CEO Ajaita Shah made the case that those most affected needed to be included in our solutions. “We do that through entrepreneurship. We do that through livelihoods,” she said. “We do that through a very different lens of looking at the masses, who frankly speaking, are at the center of climate justice.”
“We are not just creating jobs, but also need to create wealth,” said Maryanne Ochola, managing director of Endeavor Kenya, building on the above in the post-debate conversation, “The Ultimate Investment Story,” on African entrepreneurship. “The challenge that I want to pose to all of us today is to see entrepreneurs all the way through,” she said. “They’re not just a ‘feel good’ story, they’re a scale-up story.”
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