Local Governments and Climate Change

Local governments are in a unique position to tackle the cause and effects of climate change. Being closest to the action local governments can provide effective leadership for their citizens because they have the opportunity to catalyse and sustain the behavioural change at individual and community levels necessary for building a more resilient community.

Climate change refers to changes in average climatic conditions. It is caused by natural processes — including solar activity, volcanic eruptions, and cyclic changes of the Earth’s orbit — and human activities, most notably those that release greenhouse gases (e.g. burning fossil fuel) and those that change the land cover (e.g. destroying ecosystems like forests and wetlands that have the capacity to remove greenhouse gases from the atmosphere).