Save the Children launches the global campaign ‘Generation Hope’ in Bangladesh, for and with the children, calling for urgent action on climate inequality. In partnership with Breaking the Silence (BTS), this child and youth-led event which marked the launch of the Generation Hope Campaign was held at Lakeshore Hotel in Dhaka on Thursday. The chief guest for this event was also a child, echoing the design and execution of this campaign which is centered around bringing forth child and youth voices on climate change. 

Dr. Ian Fry, United Nation’s Special Rapporteur on the promotion and protection of Human Rights in the context of Climate Change joined virtually at the event as a special guest. He said, “we must invest in children we must invest in their health."

Generation Hope is a global flagship campaign of Save the Children which envisions a world that cares for children and their planet by fixing the broken system and accelerating action to address the connected crises of economic inequality and the climate emergency. The campaign aims to tackle economic inequality by ensuring fair funding to prioritize children’s rights and well-being, limiting catastrophic climate change & ensure children’s rights are at the heart of the world’s response. “Generation Hope” is a child and youth-led campaign which will be implemented nationwide for the next 5 years. In the world's biggest listening exercise of its kind, Save the Children International spoke to more than 54,500 children from 41 countries to learn more about their experiences of climate change and economic inequality, their hopes for the future, and what they think needs to be done to solve these crises. 

In Bangladesh, before the official launch of the campaign, Save the Children spoke to 5233 children aged between 12-18 from various districts across the country. 

All the countries running this campaign followed the format of putting forward a set of questions to the children and summarizing the answers in a report. In Bangladesh, Save the Children followed the same process. This countrywide session with children is called ‘Child Hearing ‘and some key statements and learnings that came through are -

“We believe economic inequality disproportionately affects women and girls and need more support to overcome this effect, and less wealthy people are more affected.” 

“We believe adults either don’t care about climate change or aren’t doing enough about it.” 

“We want adults to listen to and act on scientists’ advice about climate change.”

“We are sharing information with our peers and helping them understand the climate crisis.”

“We want to be taken seriously by adults and to have access to specialists and other activists to increase our power.”

Save the Children aims to tackle the discussed crises by giving children and youth a platform and voice. Save the Children believes ‘Generation Hope' can be the best way to do so. Save the Children Bangladesh’s Country Director Onno van Manen, Deputy Country Director Dry. Shamim Jahan, Tasmima Hossain- Chairperson, Executive Committee; Breaking the Silence and Iftekhar Mamud- Special Correspondent; Prothom Alo were also present at the event.