“Hello, I’m Severn Suzuki speaking for E.C.O. – The Environmental Children’s Organization. We are a group of twelve and thirteen-year-olds trying to make a difference: Vanessa Suttie, Morgan Geisler, Michelle Quigg and me. We’ve raised all the money to come here ourselves, to come five thousand miles to tell you adults you must change your ways. Coming up here today, I have no hidden agenda. I am fighting for my future. Losing my future is not like losing an election or a few points on the stock market. I am here to speak for all generations to come. I am here to speak on behalf of the starving children around the world whose cries go unheard. I am here to speak for the countless animals dying across this planet because they have nowhere left to go. I am afraid to go out in the sun now because of the holes in our ozone. I am afraid to breathe the air because I don’t know what chemicals are in it. I used to go fishing in Vancouver, my home, with my dad until just a few years ago we found the fish full of cancers. And now we hear of animals and plants going extinct every day – vanishing forever.”
“I’m only a child yet I know we are all part of a family, five billion strong, in fact, 30 million species strong, and borders and governments will never change that. I’m only a child yet I know we are all in this together and should act as one single world towards one single goal. In my anger, I am not blind, and in my fear, I am not afraid of telling the world how I feel.”
“I’m only a child yet I know if all the money spent on war was spent on finding environmental answers, ending poverty and finding treatises, what a wonderful place this earth would be!”
“You are deciding what kind of world we are growing up in. Parents should be able to comfort their children by saying “everything’s going to be alright”, “it’s not the end of the world” and “we’re doing the best we can”. But I don’t think you can say that to us anymore. Are we even on your list of priorities? My dad always says, “You are what you do, not what you say.” Well, what you do makes me cry at night. You grownups say you love us, but I challenge you, please make your actions reflect your words. Thank you.”
U.N. Earth Summit in Rio De Janeiro, 1992 – Severn Cullis-Suzuki