Study: Some people are willing to change their lifestyle for the climate

That is the conclusion International study The Guardian writes in ten countries, including the Netherlands.

In addition to the Dutch, the scientists studied more than 1,000 residents from the United States, Great Britain, Spain, France, Germany, Sweden, Poland, Singapore and New Zealand.

Major environmental challenge

62 percent of people see climate change as the most important environmental challenge facing the world today, followed by air pollution (39 percent), waste (38 percent) and new diseases (36 percent).

“Governments have two lessons to learn from this study,” scientist Emmanuel Rivier told the British newspaper. First, governments need to better meet the expectations of citizens.

Bringing solutions

In addition, governments no longer need to convince people of the seriousness of the climate crisis – it has already happened – but solutions need to be proposed. And responsibilities for those solutions should be shared equally.

desire

Fifty-one percent of those polled said they would take action to save the climate, 14 percent said they certainly did not want to, and 35 percent said they did not yet know.

It is noteworthy that of all the residents surveyed, the Dutch were the least willing (37 per cent) to take action. Residents of Poland and Singapore (56 percent) are the most interested.

Dynamic lifestyle

Why do people not want to change their lifestyle? The main reason for this is that people are ‘satisfied with what they are doing now’ (74 per cent), experts disagree about the right solution (72 per cent) and the government should come up with the right tools (69 per cent).

Only in Sweden, residents realized that others were doing more than themselves for the climate. Only residents of Singapore and New Zealand appreciate the government’s efforts to tackle the climate problem.