PRESS RELEASE: CEEW-SEI release video in the run-up to Stockholm+50 and World Environment Day
New Delhi, May 30, 2022: The Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) and the Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) today released ‘Portrait of a Silver Lining’ – a performance poetry music video featuring a young Indian poet, Simar Singh. In the video, Simar urges nations and citizens across the global north and south to join hands and take bold climate actions to heal our planet, our home. The video has been released in the run-up to World Environment Day and Stockholm+50, a global environmental meeting organised to commemorate the first-ever conference of the United Nations on Human Environment in 1972.
‘Portrait of a Silver Lining’ is an artistic interpretation of a CEEW-SEI report ‘Stockholm+50: Unlocking a Better Future’ that was released earlier this month. The report synthesises up-to-date scientific evidence and analyses interlinked human and environmental crises. It also makes bold recommendations to improve the conditions for change through better policy coherence, strengthened accountability, and renewed multilateralism.
Simar Singh, said, “To be asked to interpret a critical CEEW-SEI report, at a watershed moment in our history, in my own way, was many things. An honour. A challenge. And an opportunity to be part of a truly global effort to heal the planet. Seeing how well the video has been received by people across the world has been humbling. I hope that this video truly serves as a wake-up call to redefine our relationship with nature and invest in a better future for all beings in the world.”
Mihir Shah, Strategic Communications Lead, CEEW, said, “Stockholm+50 is an opportunity for us to collectively reflect on the environmental actions and inactions taken over the last fifty years and reiterate the urgency to act now to avert a planetary crisis. This video, conceptualised and produced by CEEW, provides a message of hope and urges viewers to help heal nature and build a world where all get prosperity.”
Portrait of a Silver Lining (Lyrics)
Ralph Emerson once said,
a house is made with walls and beams,
A home is built with love and dreams.
The Earth, is not just a house,
built with walls and beams and skyscrapers,
and malls and roads.
The Earth is our home.
Full of breathtaking forests and waterfalls,
vast blue oceans and yes, also malls.
But with people, and all kinds of different beings.
The Earth is filled with love and dreams.
But our home is crumbling,
our dreams are breaking.
We’ve changed ecosystems,
made our home sick,
then we ignored the symptoms,
waited for it to get tragic.
In a world where nature is worshipped,
Actions don't match the words of the leadership.
Rising emissions is a call for urgency,
And now is the time for us to take agency.
Families of our own, swept away in floods,
Yet we don’t see pain till we see blood.
While our forests shrink in front of our eyes,
We renovate our home, to where we can’t recognise.
But 50 years ago, at Stockholm,
an effort was made to save our home.
50 years later, there is no accountability,
and it is time for us take responsibility,
Let’s craft a key to unlock a better future,
and redefine our relationship with nature.
Our home isn’t perfect, but it doesn’t need renovating,
It needs compassion, our home needs healing.
It is already 2022, but there is hope,
I see hope in the eyes of our generation,
As we are learning how to cope,
Young voices are becoming an inspiration.
Our home doesn't need heroes in capes,
or superheroes who change shapes.
Our home needs people like you and me,
people who act and people who make policies.
We need to invest in a better future.
Reform finance and technology,
We need to heal nature,
Build a world where all get prosperity.
As this may be our last chance,
This decade; our last window,
Despite the clouds and the storm,
there still can be a rainbow.
About Simar Singh
Simar Singh is a 21-year-old spoken word artist and is known for his poems that question the status quo on issues that are usually brushed under the carpet. He is passionate about voicing his thoughts and opinions on issues such as sustainability and children's education in India. Simar is also the founder of UnErase Poetry, a community based out of Mumbai for promoting and producing spoken word poetry in Hindi and English.
About CEEW
The Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) is one of Asia’s leading not-for-profit policy research institutions. The Council uses data, integrated analysis, and strategic outreach to explain – and change – the use, reuse, and misuse of resources. It prides itself on the independence of its high-quality research, develops partnerships with public and private institutions, and engages with wider public. In 2021, CEEW once again featured extensively across ten categories in the 2020 Global Go To Think Tank Index Report. The Council has also been consistently ranked among the world’s top climate change think tanks. Follow us on Twitter @CEEWIndia for the latest updates.