U.N. Seeks Climate Policy Advice from Video Game Players
by Simon KentThe United Nations (U.N.) launched a push Thursday to engage mobile video game players around the world and ask their input and advice to guide its ongoing “climate change” policies.
Mission 1.5 is the title of the campaign that aims to, “bridge the gap between people and governments on ambitious climate action.” It is being developed by the U.N. Development Programme (UNDP).
Players will take on the role of climate policymakers who make decisions to meet the 1.5 degree goal.
Afterwards, they will vote on key climate actions that they would like to see adopted. The data will be analyzed and delivered to governments by the U.N. with a request for action.
Put simply, the U.N. wants up to 20 million young game players to engage it with their opinions. The launch document outlined the plan:
The campaign is built around an internet and mobile-based video game, developed by UNDP alongside experts in game development, climate science and public polling, in which players take on the role of climate policymakers and make decisions to try to keep global warming below 1.5 degrees Celsius. After the game, players are asked to vote on key climate actions they want to see adopted. This data will be analyzed and delivered to governments, who often lack access to reliable information on public opinion on climate action.
The previous biggest international survey of public opinion on climate matters canvassed some 10,000 people across 76 countries, and was conducted ahead of the 2015 Paris climate talks.
The Mission 1.5 game is available at mission1point5.org and can be played by people in every country in the world.
It will launch initially in Arabic, Chinese, English, French, Russian and Spanish, with further roll-out internationally throughout the year up to the U.N. climate talks to be held in the United Kingdom in November.
Mission 1.5 takes its name from the collective effort to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius, as outlined at the climate meeting in Paris in 2015.
The UNDP draws almost $5 billion in annualized funding through the U.N.’s member states.