Amanda McKenzie is the CEO of the Climate Council and is one of the best-known public commentators on the climate crisis in Australia. In 2006, she founded the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, which then became one of Australia’s largest advocacy groups, with over 100,000 members. In 2011 Amanda joined the Climate Commission as a Senior Communications Advisor.
When the Climate Commission was abolished by the newly elected LNP government led by Prime Minister Tony Abbott in September 2013, Amanda then co-ordinated and led one of the largest crowd-funding campaigns in Australia. Within 10 days the campaign raised $1.3 million, which allowed the commission to re-launch as the Climate Council, a not-for-profit organisation.
Amanda has received numerous awards and recognition for her work and dedication to fuelling the change for climate action, including Young Environmentalist of the Year, Australian Financial Review ‘Woman of Influence’, Westpac’s 100 Women of Influence and a finalist in Telstra Young Business Woman of the Year Awards. These questions were put to Amanda this week.
You’re the CEO of the Climate Council, how did you get to your level of success given the sectors gender gap, especially among leadership?
It was through taking initiative. I wasn’t moving up the ranks, so I created new things myself. The Australian Youth Climate Coalition was the first organisation I created, and I later founded the Climate Council when I was 29. I did so with a bunch of prominent people who are much further along in their career. So, I think it was the starting of new things, a bit of a leap frogging to work up the ranks.
How did you come about creating the Australian Youth Climate Council at just 20 years of age?
I was at University and got really passionate about climate change and thought ‘I need to do something’. I’d volunteered at many organisations and hadn’t felt like the work I had been doing was particularly meaningful. I wanted to do something where I felt like I was going to make a difference. I thought that young people had a really important role to play in tackling climate change because the younger you are the more affected you’ll be by the impacts of climate change. So, I started that while I was at university and it turned out a whole lot of other young people had the same concerns and wanted to join.
That experience of having volunteered and not felt like my work was particularly meaningful came into how I designed the volunteer program, to make sure all of the roles had a purpose.
What else fuelled your desire to create change for climate action?
As soon as I learnt about climate change, I could see the implications over a long period of time and particularly the human suffering that would be caused. I could see how the droughts, extreme fires and floods would displace people and would make already vulnerable people more vulnerable which would exacerbate inequality. They’d also make water or food more scarce in lots of parts of the world.
I realised that climate change intersected with every other issue that I cared about and I thought I had to work on the issue and had to try and make it better.
What’s the biggest factor that has helped you to your success?
I think it’s persistence. I believe you come to life with some natural talents and then there’s things that you can learn. The more that I’ve watched successful people and people who have made a difference, I think a lot of it is just persistence.
Secondary to that is being strategic and being willing to question the decisions you’ve made, the direction you’ve been going and the status quo by asking what is actually going to make a difference. That’s what I’ve done with the Climate Council. The Council is only seven years old, but we’ve evolved very significantly in terms of the work we’ve done, to be constantly reacting to what we think is required to make a difference on climate change in Australia. That involves the type of staff we have, the type of projects we do and the type of stories that we’re telling. It’s a constant re-evaluation of how we can make a difference, what’s working, what’s not working and trying to think differently about what could work next.
What motivates you?
I get really motivated by the people I work with. I work with a great team of people and they really inspire me. They work really hard. They’re strategic, they’re determined and they’re persistent.
I’m also motivated by my young daughter, she’s only two. The thing that hangs over me is knowing that by the time she’s an adult she will have no opportunity to work on this issue as she’ll already be living with the consequences. So, I feel a real sense of obligation to do something to protect her future.
It’s also just a general love for humanity and a love for the world. We live on this beautiful, majestic planet and I think humanities amazing in what we’ve been able to create. We’re just these little mammals in the world and we’ve built these huge cities and we know so much, so to destroy all of that almost inadvertently by making some poor decisions seems like a terrible tragedy. So it’s a combination of things that gets me going.
Can you tell me about some of the things the climate council has achieved?
We see our first role as providing accurate information to the public that’s accessible to anybody. We’ve published over 125 reports ranging from the problems to the solutions and we try to be really inspiring in the content that we offer.
The second thing we do is try change the national debate on climate change by bringing in lots of different voices that we think have a powerful role to play such as firefighters, farmers, doctors, local mayors. We bring it away from the policy wonks and politicians to create something that’s real and tangible for people.
And the third thing we do is creative initiatives that we think can actually get emissions down or fundamentally change the debate. So, we started a group for instance called the city’s power partnership, which engages now over 120 local governments which covers more than half of the Australian population. It’s a project that’s actually getting emissions down in local communities, getting new pilot projects up that can then be replicated in other places. So we have a few of those sorts of projects that are more tangible about engaging different communities specifically.
What would you say is your biggest achievement?
I’d say establishing the climate council is my biggest achievement. I think as an organisation it’s done a lot of really important things and has the potential to continue to do that. I feel really proud of the work that we’ve done together.
Who inspires you and why?
The people that inspire me are those who relentlessly pursue change for their whole lives. Wangari Maathai is a Kenyan environmentalist who against all the odds campaigned for her whole life for better social justice outcomes and better outcomes for women. She also found solutions for the environment and social justice at the same time and did so in an environment that was really challenging. She was the first woman to get a PhD in her country. She’s just a really inspiring and was the type of person who wasn’t there to take credit for the work and was just there for the outcomes.
What are your current goals?
Our current goal is around the coronavirus economic recovery. This is a huge opportunity to ensure that we rebuild the economy, get people back into jobs and also prepare for the future and ensure we tackle climate change at the same time. We’ve just done economic modelling that shows we can create 76,000 jobs now in renewable energy and ecosystem restoration among other things. It’s all about a win-win solution. We’ve got this huge issue coming at us called climate change, but we’ve also got this contemporary issue of coronavirus and the economic downturn, so let’s see if we can create these win-win solutions with the limited government stimulus and policy work that can be done.
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