Celebrating Pacific climate youth leadership - in conversation with AnneMary Raduva

Climate activism requires ingenuity, creativity, persistence, resilience — and a degree of bravery. Last month, we were fortunate to meet and welcome one such individual into the Climate Reality Leadership network. AnneMary Raduva is a student, climate advocate, writer, and founder of the Young Eco-Champs Fiji and Stop Releasing Balloons campaigns.

​We recently had the opportunity to speak with her to find out more about her incredible initiatives and experiences, what inspires her and the challenges she has encountered. Please read on for more. 

Climate Reality: What first sparked your interest in activism, and how did that journey lead you to initiatives like Say No to Balloon Releasing and Lagilagi Drive?

AnneMary Raduva: After watching Clearwater Marine Aquarium’s YouTube video back in 2018, it sparked my desire to raise awareness about how deadly balloons can be. We focus so much on plastics, straws and styrofoam that we forget that balloons are also deadly to our marine and land animals. At 15 years old, my family knew me as the quiet and shy little kid, but after watching that video it made me want to do something about it. I asked my parents to pray with me about the idea of raising awareness of the effects of balloons.
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I started writing letters to editors of local papers with the help of my parents. I asked the government to relook at the Fiji Litter Act 2008 because it was outdated and I wanted them to classify balloon releasing as a form of littering. I started my own little clean-up campaign with my two younger sisters Faith and Eunice. 

After months of getting people’s attention on balloons, I wanted to find an activity for people that was more eco-friendly than releasing a balloon. On 1 December 2018, I organised our first mangrove planting and clean-up campaign. Between 2018 and 2025, we planted over 180,000 mangroves along the Suva foreshore — and we will continue planting until we can’t plant anymore.
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In 2019, I founded the eco-champs league. It is a safe space for kids under the age of 18, where we discuss various topics or issues that concern our community and our nation. 

We do have an amazing line-up of teen advocates who are passionate about their work, and I do applaud their courage and determination over the years. 

The Lagilagi Relief Drive is a campaign that was founded by my sister Faith Raduva. She founded this campaign in 2020, when she was 13 years old. She found out that women and young girls lacked proper sanitary products in Fiji. We both started creating 'dignity kits’. We both set up the Lagilagi Relief Drive with the help of our parents and we named the initiative after Faith’s middle name which is Lagilagi. Lagilagi means victory in the local Fijian iTaukei language. Individuals and companies donated money and sanitary products to the drive, so that we could deliver these kits to women and girls in need.

The kits are filled with pads, soap, toothbrush and toothpaste and were given to families that were impacted by the COVID-19 pandemic and victims of the category five Cyclone Harold which hit the country in 2020.We have delivered more than 3000 kits to women and girls around Fiji. In some cases, women and young girls often use alternatives like socks, newspapers and old rags because they can't afford sanitary products.
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My motivation and inspiration comes from my daily conversations with God. My campaign and events started with the prayer and it will always end with a prayer.  I also have an amazing support system. My family, friends and my mentors have played a huge role in my life and I do thank them for giving me hope and the courage to be who I am today. 

Climate Reality: What has it been like for you to do this kind of work as a young woman in Fiji? Have there been moments that shaped how you approach advocacy in your community?

AnneMary Raduva: In our small corner in the Pacific, we may not get the respect we deserve as youth activists, but we have and continue to mobilise my generation to protect our planet because we have lost hope in our adults. In the Pacific, we are still governed by our customs, culture and tradition, which is not a bad thing. ​

 We, as Pacific Islanders identify ourselves based on our culture, customs and traditions but when it comes to the decision-making spaces and platforms, we are overlooked, ridiculed and pushed aside. From personal experience, being a young brown woman, it is hard. The challenges come in many forms. When I started advocating for a total ban on balloons, my parents feared the public and their opinions. As parents, they wanted to protect me but I was determined to raise my voice. When we, the young people, choose to talk about an issue that is important and dear to us, we expose ourselves to all sorts of criticism. We need to understand that there will be people that will appreciate the work and effort you make and there will be people that will always want to knock you down.

I have been told by adults to leave campaign work to boys and men and that I should focus on school, get a good job and start a family. That’s the purpose of being a woman according to some adults. I have also been in spaces where our so-called leaders are either on their phones and gadgets or walk away when they see and hear young people my age talk about climate change, sustainable development and environmental issues. I have also been to events that fuels my motivation to empower more youths to participate in these spaces.
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Climate activism has taught me one thing, with a little government pressure, enough willpower and a mobilised and organised team of youth and activists, big swings in behavioural change can happen in a surprisingly short amount of time. We can be part of this change and be part of this answer. Let us work together to solve our global climate crisis together.

Climate Reality: You've engaged with global platforms and audiences—how has that experience been for you? Have there been challenges or lessons in bringing Pacific perspectives to international spaces?

AnneMary Raduva: I was very fortunate to attend a high-level panel discussion on ‘nature-based solutions for climate change’ that was organised by the IUCN, WCS and the French Government in New York and I met Her Majesty, Queen Noor Al-Hussein of Jordan. Her Majesty, Queen Noor was very encouraging and spoke very passionately about working together to raise ambitions to reach climate agreements and commitments.

I admire Her Majesty for her outspoken advocacy on conservation, sustainable development and climate change, among many other charitable foundations she has pioneered and initiated around the world. The high-level panelist included the former French Prime Minister, Mr. Laurent Fabius, the Prime Minister that led COP 25 in Paris!

I was also privileged to be mentored by legal professionals from the best environmental law school; the Elisabeth Haub School of Law at Pace University (New York) and Mrs. Mary Robinson, the former President of Ireland and President of the Mary Robinson Foundation for Climate Justice. I was introduced to climate justice and legal processes that helped me, as I tried to understand the legal processes and having access to legal advice at the same time. 

I pleasantly enjoyed the company of Attorney Antonio (Tony) Oposa Jnr and his team of legal practitioners and academics too. On home soil, I have been blessed to be mentored by conservationist and climate change warriors from 350.org Pacific, PICAN’s climate champs and the Alliance for Future Generations Fiji. They have set the bar for us younger activists – not just in Fiji but in the region and international spaces.
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At recent events, I was told by an adult that it is the norm – that to be a youth activist, I had to be ‘loud and aggressively rude’ and I corrected her. 

We are who we are today because we cannot rely on anyone to WALK our TALK and out of our anguish and disappointment,​ we are telling the world that decisions on climate change are too important to be left to adults who we cannot rely on and trust anymore. Climate change is something that will without doubt, unfairly impact my generation and the generations after. We are feeling the burden of it – so it makes sense that I would care the most.

​Climate change is something that will without doubt, unfairly impact my generation and the generations after. We are feeling the burden of it – so it makes sense that I would care the most. Everyday around the world, young people are creating, rallying, marching and talking about change – because we believe. We have this resilient ability to get back up on our feet every time we are pushed aside, overlooked, ignored and knocked down.

​Climate Reality: We’ve seen that a lot of your work is rooted in local action. What kind of community or environmental efforts have felt especially meaningful to you?

AnneMary Raduva: When I joined the global movement on global warming and related global greenhouse gas emission pathways in 2019, I was very fortunate to have met one of the region’s very modest and leading academics in the climate change space, Dr Morgan Wairiu who was teaching at The University of the South Pacific’s Pacific Centre for Sustainable Development in Suva.

Dr Morgan was the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) lead author in the 1.5 Special Report and coordinating lead author of Chapter 15 – Small Islands in Working Group 2 and I was hooked at how simple Dr Morgan explained the works behind the 1.5-degree SOS and how climate change has outpaced our efforts to address it. That was in 2019, and I was 15 years old.

The report said we only had 12 years to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees, beyond which we face irreversible climate disruption. Irreversible - a stark warning and to our generation it is a last warning. 12 years from 2018 is only five years from now – how many of us is doing the math and are panicking? I’m beginning to plan my future with ‘ifs’. My future is not as promising as I hoped after learning about this United Nations IPCC findings and report.

I hope to carry on talking about policies, implementation, resilience, adaptation and mitigation and to find a workable solution to a bigger problem that my generation and I did not create, and I am still hopeful – even if some countries refuse to endorse the IPCC findings - that common sense will prevail.
With the release of the 2018 IPCC report, focus has been on the mentioned 12-year climate change ultimatum. IPCC warns that within 12 years, global warming should be kept to a maximum of 1.5 degrees and it also suggests that this is affordable and feasible, however, the onus lies at the most ambitious end of the agreement pledge that was signed at COP 21 in Paris back in 2015.

Just a one or two-degree rise can lead to heat waves, a decrease in wildlife population and an increase in the risk of death and heat stroke in humans. Climate change is not a problem that will simply go away — it is vital to humanity that we fix this as much as possible before it’s too late. When we look beyond our fringing reefs and our region, unfortunately, under the current Trump administration, global warming is likely to accelerate with the withdrawal from the Paris Climate Agreement and payment reversals to the Green Climate Fund— a system that worked to help developing countries deal with climate change.
As the next few years are incredibly crucial to regulating the climate, the effects will be devastating, since greenhouse gas emissions are expected to rise under Trump’s policies. There is no time for procrastination!

We must become proactive in how we maneuver our campaigns around this global crisis.

Climate Reality: If someone asked you what Pacific youth most want the world to understand about climate change, what would you say based on your own experience?

AnneMary Raduva: Even though we may be side-lined and not taken seriously, our voices are strong enough to make ripples from the local to the international space. We have the willpower and enthusiasm of a growing network of young leaders to speak up for our shared future. It’s time to use this collective power to influence the decisions of today because we are running out of time.

Youth commonly have the smallest voice when it comes to engagement. Yet, young people need to actively start driving change because the world we will all inherit is shaped by the actions and decisions of today. We are part of the generation who may be the best hope for the cause of slowing the impacts of climate change and preserving what is left for our own survival!

Let’s not wait for our governments to decide for us. Climate change is about people – it is about you and me. 

My campaigns and experiences made me realise how much power and influence young people have. In Fiji and the Pacific, our domineering patriarchal culture and custom dictates who speaks, when and where to speak, how to address issues, what issues to discuss and why we need to discuss the issue. We are too often subjected to our culture of silence - but this is slowly changing. There is so much power in what is happening within our generation! We may not have the respect we deserve – yet – but I know it is coming.

Climate Reality: Are there any last thoughts you would like to add, AnneMary?

AnneMary Raduva: We may be side-lined in many decision-making processes, but this only builds the momentum for us to be protagonists in the fight for our rights and wellbeing. We, the younger activists, are more than prepared to engage and take the lead. Let’s take our own seats to the climate change space and create that avalanche of change we all want for our future! Let’s WALK THE TALK!
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