For her environmental leadership and contributions to the fight against climate change, Costa Rican Christiana Figueres received the honorary title of “Dame of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire” from Queen Elizabeth II of the United Kingdom, according to the newspaper La República de Costa Rica.
The Queen has bestowed the Dame’s appointment on Christiana Figueres for her outstanding work on climate change. “Christiana works tirelessly to protect the planet,” said British Ambassador Ben Lyster-Binns, UK Ambassador to Costa Rica and Nicaragua, on social media.
The environmental fight continues.
Christiana Figueres, a Costa Rican leader in the global climate fight, has for the past year been frankly optimistic about the events of the last few years surrounding this phenomenon, such as the return of the US to the Paris agreement last year.
Figueres, a former executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, highlighted the thousands of commitments made around the world to reduce carbon emissions and meet the Paris Agreement’s goal of no more than a 1.5°C rise in global temperature.
“Even with their varying degrees of strength, the collective message of these commitments is clear: we have crossed a new threshold, there is no going back to a high emissions trajectory,” he has said in various media.
A year ago, Figueres proposed: “I urge world leaders who attended Biden’s virtual climate summit last year to turn around just for a moment and feel the full force of the winds of change behind us: seize it, move forward, accelerate! The time for gymnastics is over: let’s set our feet firmly into the future and show what is possible when we set our minds to it,” she concluded.
Environmental writer
Figueres has written a book entitled “The Future to be Decided. How to Survive the Climate Crisis” in a discussion style, together with British businessman Tom Rivett-Carnac. Both were the coordinators of the important negotiating effort and promoter of the signing of the Paris agreements in 2015.
In their book they state that “One hundred and ninety-five nations had just unanimously signed up to an agreement to guide their respective economies for the next four decades. A new global path had been charted”. Showing that it is possible to change the logic of signing global agreements and that it is possible to make the agreements and produce the necessary changes to overcome the Climate Crisis that has befallen all of humanity at this time.
From Pressenza Costa Rica, we join the British recognition and many others around the world that are given to Christiana Figueres, knowing of her long history in environmental struggles, but above all we recognise her ethics and morals, which allow her that important personal coherence in environmental action in the face of climate change and the climate crisis.
