Take climate action with 15 leading environmental nonprofits and 100 celebrities to win prizes and experiences.
GENZERO: Climate Action Together
The GENZERO campaign, founded by ValuesCo, TIME, and Celo, unites over 100 partners including nonprofits, brands, and activists and creators to celebrate and encourage collective action amidst TIME’s 100th anniversary. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s 2023 report critically calls attention to the need for 45% emissions reduction actions by 2030 to keep temperature rise within 1.5° C to avoid the collapse of many ecosystems, disruption of global food systems, and increased natural disaster. This is the critical moment to address the climate crisis.
“If we want to change the world we need to change mindsets and that is going to require a wide array of diverse actors and sectors to mobilize and come together around this,” explains youth activist and co-founder of Green Jobs Board, Kristy Drutman.
For the inaugural campaign, which launched surrounding the UN’s Climate Change Conference in Dubai (COP28) in November, GENZERO’s nonprofit partners, such as EarthDay.org, NRDC, Zero Hour and Amazon Sacred Headwaters identified high impact actions across five pillars of solutioning: Energy, Zero Waste, Rewilding & Conservation, Justice, and Food.
Influencers, such as actor & activist Mark Ruffalo, youngest ever UN advisor Sophia Kianna, Black Girl Environmentalist founder Wawa Gatheru and Grammy-nominated musician Vic Mensa, present these actions to mobilize action amongst their audiences, encouraging them to share the action they’ve taken to achieve a compounding effect.
GENZERO’s brand partners amplify and reward action takers to accelerate impactful behavior like composting, standing against new fossil fuel projects and taking public transit. Prizes range from planting up to 50,000 trees, a piece by artist Spencer Mar Guilburt whose credits and collectors include The Whitney and Swizz Beatz & Alicia Keys, and products like electric motorcycles and sustainable clothing.
In a time where 59% of youth and young adults said they were either very or extremely worried about climate change and more than 45% said their feelings about climate change negatively affected their daily life and functioning, according to The Lancet Planetary Health, hope is needed. In the words of Greta Thunberg, “Hope is not something that is given to you. It is something you have to earn, to create. It is taking action.”
GENZERO has reached over 9 million people with over 25,000 actions taken. Action takers have shared the message over 20,000 times, not only spurring more action through storytelling, but helping to reshape the climate narrative from resignation to hope. “We are excited to partner with ValuesCo and the GENZERO consortium of NGOs, influencers, and brands also committed to building a better future for our planet,” says Maya Draisin, Chief Brand Officer at TIME. “Our journalism drives the most important conversations forward, and this campaign provides an opportunity to move our readers from awareness to positive climate action.”
Ebony Twilley Martin, Executive Director of Greenpeace USA, says that “through this campaign, we amplify the voices of those demanding that polluters are held accountable for choosing profits over people. Together, we fight for a healthier democracy and a healthier planet.”
Culture As A Change Agent
UN Environment Programme's 2023 research reveals a stark reality: Investments that harm nature are 35x more prevalent than nature-based solutions, at $7 trillion to $200 billion.
To move against this tremendous economic force, the environmental movement has found success in cultural engagement. According to Dr. Marcus Collins, who has shaped iconic brands like Apple and Beyoncé, cultural engagement is the most powerful vehicle for influencing behavior.
GENZERO’s success underscores the effectiveness of this approach, creating a 354% increase in the amount of people reached versus the campaign’s media spend. The campaign includes cultural partners such as Impact Media, Ecotok Collective, Obey Giant, Environmental Media Association and FEMINIST.
Shepard Fairey, the artistic mastermind behind Obey Giant, responsible for seminal works including the Barack Obama “Hope” poster and the We The People campaign, tells us, “Art has always responded to culture, politics, ideas, and media that confronts people. If big corporations and the government can use advertisements to influence the spending behaviors of consumers, then why can't art and culture stir different emotions and spark counter conversations? The ethos of my Obey Giant art campaign started in the streets in 1989 to examine this practice and use subversive techniques to ask the viewer to question blind obedience. The biggest issue we face today is climate change, and I hope that through art and culture, we, as a coalition of citizens, can override narrow corporate interests in favor of collective health.”
“Tear Flame” (Credits: Obey Giant)
Fairey’s 2024 work “Tear Flame” speaks to how we are “wounding our collective Mother Earth”.
Coming off its star-studded 33rd annual awards, the Environmental Media Association, which focuses on driving and celebrating environmental messaging and production, has just launched GENZERO’s final campaign action – watch a TV show or movie with an EMA Green Seal for Sustainable Production.
If community engagement must be widespread for solutioning, participatory media is a tool to unlock and sustain action.
“Together, our collective efforts add up and can wield significant impact,” declares Gloria Walton, CEO & President at The Solutions Project and Mark Ruffalo, Actor & Co-Founder of The Solutions Project. “We must all contribute what and when we can to create a more equitable and sustainable world.”