Tauranga Extinction Rebellion co-ordinator Leo Murray said the dance was planned to create a good vibe and attract more people to get involved. Photo / Caroline Fleming
Tauranga Extinction Rebellion co-ordinator Leo Murray said the dance was planned to create a good vibe and attract more people to get involved. Photo / Caroline Fleming
Climate change activists took a creative approach to spread their message through interpretative dance at Saturday's Jazz Festival.
The performance, led by advocate group Extinction Rebellion, followed the release of the Government's environmental stocktake on Thursday.
The report "Environment Aotearoa", put together by Statistics NZ and the Ministry for theEnvironment, detailed widespread biodiversity loss, the risk of further species extinction and the threat of climate breakdown in New Zealand.
Instead of chanting and shouting, the protesters, all dressed in blue, danced theatrically like a roving band around the Jazz Festival from midday onwards.
One of the dancers, Ali Thompson, said the protesters danced with a long blue cloth that represented the ocean and she dressed up in high-vis representing the economy drowning in it.
She said the dance was to represent how with the way many big businesses are going, how sea levels will continue to rise and climate change will take over in the end.
The protesters with their placards and long blue cloth used in the performance. Photo / Caroline Fleming
A call to action and a need for change was so necessary, she said.
The protesters were singing the phrase "the oceans are rising and so are we" as they danced.
Tauranga Extinction Rebellion co-ordinator Leo Murray said the protest had aimed to create a "feel-good vibe" that would hopefully attract people to support the cause and "awaken their curiosity" on what they could do.
He said with the festival going on and the sun shining, they had chosen to not take a "disruptive approach" and come from it from a positive point of view.
The Bay of Plenty Regional Council said it will look deeper into the priority issues addressed in the report, specifically the ones most likely to affect the region.
These include native animals, plants and ecosystems under threat and changes to vegetation that is degrading soil and water quality.
The council's integrated catchments general manager Chris Ingle said these issues were already being recognised by the council and were in the current work plan.
He said the council was currently consulting on their 2019/20 annual plan that included questions on what the community wanted focused on in terms of climate change.
Protests by Extinction Rebellion took place in Auckland, Thames, Tauranga, Wellington, Nelson, Christchurch and Dunedin on Saturday.
