Mitzi Jonelle Tan, a staunch advocate for climate voices from the developing world, has made her call for climate justice at the COP27 summit in Egypt.

It’s the same struggle she takes up daily in her native Philippines, where such activism can be dangerous work.

The 25-year-old sees the effects of climate change on her home first hand.

Tan’s hometown of Marikina is regularly hit by typhoons and Manila, the capital, is threatened by rising sea levels. Ocean acidification could ruin the livelihoods of millions of fishermen across the archipelago.

But she has also witnessed the repression of those campaigning for environmental enforcement, and said she was “illegally detained” while protesting Philippine mining interests in 2018.

“The Philippines is one of the most dangerous countries in the world for environmentalists and activists,” Tan told AFP, peering through her signature round glasses.

“At least 270 defenders have been killed in the last 10 years,” she added.

British human rights organization Global Witness estimates that of 200 environmentalists killed worldwide in 2021, 19 were in the Philippines.

“That’s what happens when you threaten normal operations,” Tan said, listing on her ringed fingers the interests of “multinationals, mining companies and the military” who accuse activists like her of “terrorism.”

Tan began her activism in 2017 after meeting an Indigenous leader who drew on her community’s experiences of harassment, displacement and violence.

“That’s why we have to fight back,” she said.

Since then she has been at the forefront of the fight for climate justice in her home country and beyond.

During her time at COP27 in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh, in addition to moderating discussions and press interviews, Tan has led protests urging world negotiators and leaders seated in the conference halls to take a more urgent stand on climate justice.

According to UNICEF’s Thomas Sayers, “It’s young people like Mitzi who give us hope for the future of this planet”.

After founding Youth Advocates for Climate Action Philippines in 2019, Tan joined Greta Thunberg’s international Fridays for Future (FFF) movement in 2020.

At that point, the Swedish activist had been leading student climate strikes for two years since she was 15.

The marches grew, bringing together hundreds of thousands of young people, mostly in wealthy nations – Australia, Belgium, Canada, Germany and the United States – rather than in developing countries.

Thunberg, a notable absence from COP27 over concerns about greenwashing and restrictions on civil liberties in Egypt, said she was “passing the megaphone” to those “most affected by the climate crisis”.

Within FFF, Tan helped establish the Most Affected People and Areas subgroup.

Members are committed to linking the climate crisis to global “systemic injustices,” according to an open letter to world leaders.

“We need to change the paradigm, move from a system that favors profit to a system that prioritizes the planet and its inhabitants,” she said, rejecting the current credit system used to fund climate action.

According to the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, 71 percent of all public climate finance came from loans in 2020.

“There’s an analogy where you hit my car and I have to borrow money from you to fix it — that doesn’t make sense,” she said, arguing that the wealthy countries of the Global North “have to pay debt.” have for climate change.

A natural with a megaphone, succinct arguments punctuated by passionate gestures with her tattooed arms, Tan has won over her own generations as well as older ones.

“Mitzi brings with her the uniqueness of her generation,” said compatriot and experienced environmental activist Ana Gabriela Celestial.

“She’s a digital native, she’s more creative, she’s an influencer and an effective youth climate activist,” she added.

“More and more young people are realizing their power,” Tan said, stressing that they “do not accept a world that is burning, sinking and drowning.”