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TALIA: There's a storm outside. The rain is lashing against the windows and they rattle in the cold February wind. A huge VAT of vegetable soup warms the room.鈥�听

I'm in the 19th century grade two listed building in the southwest of England. I'm here on a funded poetry residency 鈥� fancy - literally five days, where I get to write poetry.鈥�听

I'm talking with the other artists who will also here on residencies. Musicians, theatre makers, writers from all different parts of England. In the day we all get on with our own thing. But at mealtimes, a bell rings, and we come together for sturdy, delicious, organic food.鈥�听

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We chat about the weird things we do in the rehearsal room like me grabbing random books from the library to find poem inspiration, or then pretending to be a statue whilst rehearsing for a play.鈥�听

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The venue we're in sits on a large estate surrounded by rolling grassland. There is a big focus on sustainability here. There are polytunnels where tomatoes grow in the summer, apple orchards and kale patches. I'm not used to being in such an environment and I am loving it. I've even brought two鈥痯airs of Dungarees and my wellies to get me in the mood.鈥�听

Because of the nature of the venue, the conversation around the dinner table unsurprisingly leads on to climate change. This is early 2018, so it's before Extinction Rebellion arguably got more people talking about climate change, even if some of those conversations have been fraught.鈥�听

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In between slurps of soup we chat about how to get more people taking climate change seriously. It's something I care about a lot. But I'm trying to say that some people might not be seen as active on climate change, not because they don't care about the planet, but because they don't connect to environmental movements or organisations.鈥�听

They might feel excluded from more mainstream conversations.鈥�听

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Environmental awareness was generally something that was part of the conversation in my house, mostly because my dad happened to think it was important, and by extension it's something I became interested in. But to some others around us, it seemed a bit less important. Obviously I can't say why for certain, but I think it had something to do with that feeling of being patronised by people and organisations whose lives were very different to theirs. 鈥�听

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The feeling of being told what to do or of being blamed for not making enough effort like whatever you're doing is wrong. Because there's no denying that acting on climate change does take effort, even the seemingly small things it takes time.鈥�听

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If you're a single parent or have money struggles, you might be more focused on survival more than anything else. Thinking or acting on climate change can occupy a lot of headspace, especially if the messaging that's out there is a little bit smug.鈥�听

We're sitting in this historic building and talking about how insurmountable the issue seems. And I think I start to explain what I have just now. Why some people perhaps don't feel so connected and this man sitting across the table from me just goes off on one banging his fist on the table.鈥�听

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He seems to be saying that it doesn't matter who you are or where you come from, you need to just get over yourself and take climate change more seriously.鈥�听

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Make the effort step up. He seems to be ignoring the point I'm trying to make about not talking down to people by sort of talking down to me. And it's sort of delicious because he's basically proving my point, but still, there are no winners to this argument.鈥�听

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I wasn't angry at this man for his passion. He was right. We all do need to do something. I just felt that in that moment we missed an opportunity to understand each other and find a common path through this massive thing that affects us all.鈥�听

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I hope that this episode is all about how to do that.鈥疘'm Talia Randall and you're listening to Blossom Trees and Burnt out Cars, the podcast where I dig beneath the surface and chat with the people who are opening up nature to everyone.鈥�听

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Episode 5: The drowned out voices of climate change.鈥�听

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How do we make conversations and action around climate change more inclusive?鈥�听

To help me answer this question is Zarina Ahmad. Zarina's work is rooted in environmental issues. For years she worked for the Council for Ethnic minority voluntary organisations in Scotland.鈥�听

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A lot of Zarina鈥檚 programmes have involved bridging the gap between mainstream organisations, government bodies and underserved communities. Sometimes her work has been showing people that there is a gap in the first place.鈥�听

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We met at Kelvingrove Park in Glasgow on a bench by a sweet little duck pond. I'll be honest, I was expecting rain, but the sun was beaming, some of my freckles even made an appearance, in Scotland you know!鈥�听

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As we chatted on a Friday afternoon, the park got busier, with people sneaking out of work early to catch a bit of that Scottish Sun.鈥�听

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I asked Zarina - how do we make climate change action more inclusive?鈥�听

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ZARINA: The environmental sector was very exclusive and there wasn't very many people like myself that I met to have conversations with. and I remember at one point, there was a racist incident that happened.鈥�听

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I was speaking to somebody from the Green Party who I had gone up to see thinking that this person was on the same wavelength as me, had the same morals, the same ethos and wants the same out of life. And this gentleman turned around and said to me in a room full of people - your kind don't grow. Do they? 鈥�听

Now at that moment, it took me a while to actually to understand what he actually meant. First and foremost I thought, does he mean I'm a woman and because I'm a woman I don't grow and I think, well, that can't be true right 鈥�听

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Is it, I'm from East Ayrshire. Well, East Ayrshire is full of farmland so it can't be that. Then think maybe third, the way I speak and I'm not Scottish, I'm from the North East of England. But Newcastle is a small city surrounded by farms, so it can't be that.鈥�听

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And it was only when the rest of the room had gone into this deadly silence that I realised he was actually referring to the colour of my skin.鈥�听

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And to make matters worse, he actually repeated it again, he said, and slowly 'cause he thought maybe I hadn't understood English. He went your kind don't grow, do they.鈥�听

And and it was at that point I just thought, Oh my God, there's so much work to be still done in terms of like race equality within, the environmental sector. Looking at green policies, looking at the green agenda and I was like OK. So that was how my work started to engage BME communities.鈥�听

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So that's Black, Minority, Ethnic communities, and I don't like using that term, so I'll probably use that term more diverse communities and more ethnically diverse communities. But that's a term that NGOs and Scottish Government use and so I might drop in and out of that terminology right? And so yeah, so that was how I started working, and that was really important.鈥�听

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TALIA: Absolutely yeah.鈥�听

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ZARINA: And again, it was like looking to see. Well, what does climate change mean to different communities and to different people? And how do I translate like policy jargon or like mainstream narratives into everyday language?鈥�听

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TALIA: That sounds like a really full on experience and something that I'm sorry that you had to endure.鈥�听

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It feels like because. In my experience, the climate change environmental sector is overwhelmingly white and middle class that there are so many things that are left out of the conversation around climate change, and I think that a lot of people from diverse communities, lower status communities, communities of colour, working class, communities, whatever terminology we want to use, feel left out and feel patronised.鈥�听

So I'm curious to know what you think is missing from the conversation around climate change that will make people feel more included and like they're part of it.鈥�听

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ZARINA: I think you hit the nail on the head. I think its like having less patronising conversations. So I think for me one of the biggest things like that came out of the work I was doing with this terminology, that's used again and again, is behaviour change right? And I hate that too and I'm very vocal about hating that term because the starting premise of behaviour change is saying that what you've been doing all this time is wrong. And now we, whoever the we might be, is going to come along and tell you how to do things better. So I think that at the beginning it irates people or get people backs up because it's like, well, why do you have to tell me what to do?鈥�听

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So I think the starting point on looking at behaviour change, and I can understand, like policymakers looking at like nudge theories and trying to make changes, mass changes within society, but I don't think it's the right place to start.鈥�听

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I think what we need to do is start having the conversations of asking what is important to everyday people and connecting that to the impacts of climate change and climate issues. So it's like looking at different social justice issues and connecting that to climate justice, which is what I think that is missing in鈥痶he conversations. 鈥�听

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Because it's mostly about the climate science and about carbon footprints and or carbon emissions and how tech is going to save us. But yet every day people are supposed to act on something that they don't have an under ful understanding of. It's very abstract. I mean how, do you know what one tonne of carbon looks like? I have no idea and I've been working in the sector for like 12 years. But if someone said to me a tonne of carbon I could not even imagine what a tonne of carbon looks like.鈥�听

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TALIA: Yeah, these things are really abstract, aren't they? And like, one thing that I've heard you talk about before is there's a lack of awareness of cultural differences and how cultural practises and backgrounds impact our relationship to the environment and to nature, and those things also get overlooked.鈥�听

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ZARINA: Right, yeah, there's different elements to that. Again, looking at some of the work that I was doing with different organisations, it was very much like you said, the patronising approach was 鈥榳e will tell you how to do things better鈥�.鈥�听

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Now, for instance, an example that I use again and again is that I was working with at Zero Waste Scotland and they tell people what portion sizes you should use so that it reduces their food waste. OK.鈥�听

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Now working with like a community like the Bangladeshi community and if I was to say to them, this is the recommended rice portion size that zero waste have said that you need to use, they'd be horrified. They've been looking at my face and then tell me to get out the door. Because a rice portion size for a Bangladeshi community is different for like a鈥痺hite Scottish family because the way they eat their food and their Curry's is totally different. The rice isn't a side portion. It's like the main and then the then curry is put on top of the rice. So they would just laugh at me 鈥�听

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The鈥痗ultural nuances and knowing what is important in a culture and how they function and how they approach everyday鈥痚veryday practises is really important, so that's one example. 鈥�听

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Another example is connexion to land and nature right. And I suppose 'cause I work with lots of different communities that 鈥痬ight be first generation ornew migrants or even might be established communities. But when I talk to them about their home countries and they talk about their homeland, they actually talk about the physical land. They miss it and they have pride in it. But yet when they talk about Scotland or England, that isn't there. 鈥�听

And I always found that was like sad for me because I'm thinking, how can we expect different diverse communities who are new or relatively new and may not be native but yet they're not connected to the land, how can we expect them to be then become responsible citizens.鈥�听

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And so a lot of the work I do is again taking people outside into the environment into the natural environment into the countryside so that people feel that they have pride in their homeland here, their adopted homelands. So that they can have that feeling of belonging and have their identity wherever they are.鈥�听

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And then having that connexion to nature so that they know why. Why they've been asked to do certain things, or why they have to adopt different practises, because that's really important.鈥�听

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TALIA: Totally, and I think, it's thinking a bit more laterally. Asking questions and not assuming that your way is always the right way. A鈥痓it of like with the right portion size, which is something that I've never thought about, but its so important鈥�听

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ZARINA:鈥痠t's so important because food is so important. People attached so much to their food. You know food is like their identity, their culture, their health, their wellbeing, they're nurturing their nourishment, their comfort, you know. So and then when you're talking about food and then you're talking about something that's so emotionally sensitive.鈥�听

People don't really, realise how emotionally sensitive food can be. And then you're criticising the way the east. Then again, it's just like you know. You know walls are going to come up. Barriers are going to come up straight away鈥�听

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TALIA: Totally and I think it emphasises that sense of dislocation. So when you were talking about how people who have other homelands have a strong sense of connexion to the landscape there and not to the landscape where they now live in Scotland, food is like a portal that takes you back to your homeland and that helps you feel rooted.鈥�听

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And so then, when you're told that, well, actually what you're doing is wrong, you're creating food waste. You're part of the problem. You better fix up is it's more than just a slight insult on the surface, it's actually something quite deep, you know鈥�听

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ZARINA: It is, it is, yes, you're right, it's deep. And then when you think about the bigger picture, the amount of food waste in individual household has. Yes it can add up but you look at the sector, the food sector, and what the food sector is doing as a whole, you know towards climate change and the degradation of the planet, and that's another fault.鈥�听

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You know, that's another conversation, but yet, as individuals, we're not supposed to talk about that when we supposed to talk about our individual actions and our individual responsibility. And I think that's also quite patronising. Whereas like, you know all the responsibilities are now with an individual, but yet corporates and corporations and sectors can do whatever they want to do. 鈥�听

And yeah, and I think the two have to be connected. I think individuals need to know what's going on in the bigger picture and vice versa. And you know, work together is really important.鈥�听

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TALIA: I want to talk a little bit about this phrase Climate Justice, which might be new to some people. Can you describe what it?鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yes, so climate justice is basically - Those that are most impacted by climate change are the ones that are least contributing to the negative impacts of climate change, but also have the least voice and the least ability to do anything about it. And usually climate justice is referred to the global South, so places like, let's say for example I use Bangladesh where there's people that live along the coastline and their sea levels rise. And again, they're not contributing . Their carbon footprint is negligent compared to somebody from America who has a very high carbon footprint and yet they're the ones that are being impacted by climate change. Their lives have been destroyed. Their homes have been destroyed, but yet they're not the ones contributing to it. So that's climate justice. In like the bigger global south. 鈥�听

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But we can also bring it back home, right? So again, when we look at things at home, we can look at things like gender justice. Thinking about who the climate impacts and thinking about who are most affected by that. Who's most vulnerable to the climate impact, even in the UK and then thinking well who has the power to do anything about it? And also who's at the front line? Who's most resilient? Who has the most resources and is looking at that inequality across the playing?鈥�听

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TALIA: I think when we're thinking about examples that are quite local to us in the UK, I'm thinking about areas in the city that have high levels of pollution tend to be where working class communities or communities of colour or BME communities -again, whatever phrases we want to use -鈥痩ive and therefore are more affected by the negative impact of climate change. Breathing in lots of pollution etc. 鈥�听

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And also I'm thinking about - I don't know if this is linked to climate justice - but who gets to enjoy and be in nature? I think maybe it's part of that discussion?鈥�听

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ZARINA Yeah, and we saw that during the pandemic, right? Who has who has their houses with the bigger gardens? You know, whos is living in in the high rise flats? And I remember speaking to a community group that was working within a mother,鈥痵he had like 3 little children. She lived in a high rise flat. They had like a very small communal garden鈥�听

But the whole time for six months during the pandemic, they had not left their flat at all because some of the narratives that were coming out were like, that the BME community were to blame for spreading the virus. And then she didn't want her children to go out even into the garden. The communal garden, which was a very small, partly because they were going to get abused or get blamed in some way.鈥�听

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And then the whole fear around not being able to access green spaces or being comfortable to go to the like a local park and or even to like nature reserves. Again, a lot of people of colour find it really difficult to feel as if they belong there. 鈥�听

And a lot of the programmes and the messaging is usually鈥痶argeted at wealthy middle class people, so you know. We've been working really hard over the last few years with big environmental and nature reserves organisations to encourage them to put programmes together where they are looking at different diverse programmes and bringing in people and being more inclusive.鈥疉nd it is happening. It is happening.鈥�听

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TALIA: Yeah, do you feel like it's changing? Do you feel like it's improving?鈥�听

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ZARINA: I think over the last few years I do feel that there has been a huge change compared to the last 10 years. And I don't know if it's because of the Black Lives movement, but that seemed to be something that's quite significant as a changing point for people to think鈥�听

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And both from both the BME sector, where people say we've had enough.鈥痀ou know there's too many inequalities we need to do something about it, and then also from the other environmental sectors where people saying hold on, we need to do something we're not doing enough.鈥�听

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I think one of the biggest things that I've noticed when working with communities and taking them out to nature reserves and hikes is that it doesn't feel safe, right? They feel more vulnerable when they're outside, like even in an urban city park. They do feel as if they are vulnerable and so safety is a huge thing.鈥�听

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And then it's also groups go out in bigger families. Their family units are bigger, right? And then because they're speaking in their own home languages, it seems as if they're louder. They're not necessarily louder, there's just more people, more voices. And then because it's speaking another language, they're more visible. And then also the clothing that they might . It might be wearing more of their cultural clothing or their religious clothing, so that makes them stand out more. So what happens is that they get more stares.鈥�听

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And those stares make them feel uncomfortable and going into different places, and I think a lot of my work is about saying to people, no, but this is your place. You know you do have place to belong here and I want them to be to feel proud of being part of Scotland. This is their adopted homeland.鈥�听

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And if they can't connect to their natural environment, then how do we expect people to be responsible citizens, how do we expect them to then take action? And what saddens me is when they talk about their stories about their homeland and their home country and they have this passion and this love that comes out when they're talking about.听

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And they're not talking about the house or they're talking about like the city they're actually talking about the soil. The smells, the flowers, the trees you know, and then they describe it to me. And I'm just thinking - but we have it here in Scotland. Come on, let me take you, let me show you Scotlands beautiful.鈥�听

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TALIA: It's so powerful hearing you talk about sensory memory, and I think that so much of being in nature is about feeling safe enough to just be in your senses and be in the present moment. And if you do feel like all eyes are on me as I walk through this park with my family, you're not going to have that very like physical connexion to a patch of grass or a landscape. And even if we might not be consciously aware of it or might not verbalise it, or might not even think about it until someone asks us, I think it runs quite deep, you know.鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah, that's such a good point and I've never even thought about it from that perspective that is so true. And yeah, that even in the moment something that's really difficult and being somebody of colour, sometimes you do have to work twice as hard and that emotional labour of twice as hard just to say, I'm here. I'm allowed to be here. And it's OK for me to be here. Nobody is looking, so it's all right.鈥�听

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TALIA: Telling yourself that you're allowed in green spaces in the face of being othered. This experience has come up in basically every episode of this series.鈥�听

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Zarina said that one of the consequences of feeling unwelcome in nature space is the possibility that you feel less inclined to be a custodian of nature or to act on climate change.鈥�听

That's why I'm excited by Zarina鈥檚 trips. Taking people out into the Scottish countryside to say, look at how beautiful this is. To help foster connexion to their local landscape. But also a feeling of belonging around issues of climate change.鈥�听

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There was a phrase Zarina explained in our chat - climate justice. The idea that those who are more negatively affected by environmental degradation are often excluded from making decisions on environmental policy.鈥�听

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For example, earlier in the series I met with Traveller community members. ONS data shows that Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities have the poorest health outcomes of any ethnic groups. Not only in the UK but internationally.鈥�听

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There are much higher levels of chronic coughs, bronchitis, and asthma in these communities too, and many people think that this is because a lot of traveller sites have been placed so close to roads and other pollutants.鈥�听

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Do you remember Josie O Driscoll and Joseph from episode 2? We talked about some of these issues and here's a brief response from them.鈥�听

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TALIA: Do you feel like travellers have a seat at the table when it comes to talking about environmental policy or climate change?Or like, do you feel like welcome in those spaces that are to do with like the environmental movement?鈥�听

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JOSEPH: No, not from my perspective, no.鈥�听

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JOSIE: Definitely enough, no, I don't think that Gypsies and Travellers are even thought about it. when it comes to environmental climate change, and we'd probably have a whole lot to say on that. 鈥�听

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Travellers have a very low environmental impact. A lot of us collect scrap metal. We recycle and upcycle. We've been doing that for many years and using what we have around us. I think we were upcycling before recycling became fashionable.鈥�听

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TALIA: It's interesting to hear how some communities are doing some of the environmental action that is generally being asked of the individual, are facing serious consequences of environmental degradation, yet still don't feel included.鈥�听

This makes me think about another term that I want to explore - hard to reach communities. You've probably heard this phrase used in lots of different contexts. But I wonder if this phrase is contentious in itself. I asked Zarina what she thought.鈥�听

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TALIA: This term hard to reach communities.. you can't see, but there's like a little eye roll that I can see, coming from Zarina...鈥�听

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ZARINA: So, hard to reach communities, right? Or classified hard to reach right because? I don't know why they are classified as hard to reach because to me they're not.鈥�听

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TALIA: Yeah, and who is in a hard鈥痟ard to reach community? 鈥�听

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ZARINA: So the so the reason why they would probably be classified as hard to reach. It's because, like let's say if a programme is put out there in the open right or funding streams, these are the communities that don't come forward. Because they don't have the resources, they're not鈥痚quipped.鈥�听

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That annoys me is because no one willing to do the outreach work to these communities and so they鈥檙e straightaway classified is hard to reach because they haven't come forward themselves.鈥�听

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But sometimes you have to go out there and do the outreach work. Do the ground work, do the engagement and these communities are not hard to reach. They're definitely not. But yet, when an issue happens or arises, right, a negative issue arises. Then all of a sudden that these communities are there to blame, you know, and they're very visible there.鈥�听

And that's what really鈥痝ets on my nerves because it's like - one time they're hard to reach, but other times they're very visible and very in your face.鈥�听

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TALIA: I wonder if hard to reach is like,another way of saying I haven't reached them.鈥�听

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ZARINA Yeah, exactly, that is exactly what it is. It's like we haven't reached them. We don't have the resources, or we don't want to do that extra legwork. Do you know I mean?鈥�听

We don't want to put in extra money into this community and a lot of the time. What annoys me as well is that these communities aren't given the adequate resources to do the work that is expected from them.鈥�听

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But yet you're willing to pay a consultant 拢500 a day, but you're not even willing to give a community 拢500 to hold a community event. You know, it's like that. There's total inequality there, it's like. Well, who's valued?鈥�听

TALIA: I've been thinking a bit about the issues within the environmental movement quite generally. Because every single one of us exists under these big structures like race, inequality, gender, inequality, you name it. Class inequality.鈥�听

I feel like historically, climate change movements haven't acknowledged that, and maybe think that oh, 鈥榳e exist inside this silo where we're not impacted by all these other layers鈥�. Has that been your experience?鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah, totally.鈥疉nd it's been something that's been really difficult. It's taking a long time to try to break that down to get like climate movements or environmental movements to actually try to understand that we have to connect up to other social justice issues and social inequalities that will more likely to be impacted by climate change.鈥�听

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And it has been very much like silo work. That it's not just that we're not impacted, but we don't impact them. So it's like the work we're doing isn't going to affect somebody in terms of race or gender that we're quite neutral.鈥�听

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'cause we're working on the environment but without actually realising that well, no, because you're not including like a whole sector of society. And you're not taking into consideration how they might be feeling or how they might be impacted. So yes, I think there is this huge blind spot.鈥�听

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TALIA: It's really interesting that you use the word neutrality there, and I think that thinking that this thing is neutral can actually be quite damaging because is anything is anything neutral? You know, who knows?鈥�听

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But yeah, it's that thing of yeah, we exist outside of these issues. And actually there's a real power even at a bare minimum, in acknowledging that there is this hierarchy within it. And once you start to acknowledge the thing, you can start work exactly and dismantling it and changing it 鈥�听

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I wanna ask you a little bit about something you said earlier, which was this moment when someone said, 鈥榶ou don't grow, do you?鈥� I'm thinking a little bit about the cultural practises and different relationships we have to say, for example, growing. It feels like for some communities growing food was something that they did historically, for subsistence and it's a big part of cultural practises. And then it maybe became something that they didn't want to do because they wanted to move away from poverty, I guess. Whereas in white middle class culture, growing is very on trend. Do you know what I mean?鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah, no, totally. I can use my own family history about this. My family came from a farming background. So like my great grandparents were farmers, right? In Punjab and that's what they did. But I remember my dad telling me stories about farming, well its not commercialised forming they grew their own food to feed their families and their community, their village. There was no cash crops and any surplus was then sold, but that primarily that was not the whole point of growing. 鈥�听

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Now I remember my dad, when my family then moved from India to Pakistan during the partition and and at that point and again because of colonialism, farming was not looked at as a civilised job.鈥�听

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Farming wasn't a job, it wasn't a career, so my dad's generation were then we were taught to be educated and get good jobs and become like doctors and lawyers and engineers and moved to the West so that they can have proper jobs and proper careers and move away from the land. 'cause being on the land was not in any way progressive. Or profitable or efficient, or you know all these terminologies that are used.鈥�听

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So my dad came into this country and I remember when we were younger my mum wanted to grow.鈥疢y dad was like why would you want to grow? Why? Why would why do we need to go? We don't need to grow here, right?鈥�听

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And I remember as a child going up and down the streets in Newcastle, we used to play this game with my friends looking at the gardens and we knew which one were Asian gardens because they would have things like coriander and spinach and potatoes in their front garden and we would be horrified鈥�听

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So I'm going back like 40, 50 years ago and my me and my friends were horrified because we were like we don't want these gardens. These are the messy gardens and these are the gardens where the Asians are. You know, we can tell these are Asian. At that time there was like a smelliness, I don't know how you how garden can be smelly but yeah there was like this thing about like Asians being smelly as well. This is just like the prejudice and discrimination that we faced. But then, as a child you take it on board 'cause you think I don't want to be smelly. I don't want to have those gardens. I want to have the Rose gardens, the proper ones with the manicured gardens with the lovely you know, pruned hedges.鈥�听

And I know that a lot of people my generation have grown up to have these lovely gardens and have moved away from growing in any way whatsoever. But yet now that you said, if you want to be affluent and you know high society, you know you can go and put your name down for an allotment and you pay lots of money just to grow your own food.鈥�听

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TALIA: I find this so interesting. So much about culture, race, class status can be explored just by talking about which plants you prefer to grow. its fascinating.鈥�听

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Zarina鈥檚 points about including all of this in climate change movements so that they feel more inclusive, feels really vital at this point in time. And even though you've heard a lot about what's wrong with, well, everything, the work that Zarina and others are doing is solution based.鈥�听

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So on our park bench in Glasgow, I asked Zarina what she wanted to celebrate.鈥�听

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ZARINA: Well, I love doing the job I do. I think for me it's celebrating people. I think people are wonderful and I love talking and learning from people and listening to their passion. And once you give somebody space and give them the resources you hear what's important. 鈥�听

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It's like the climate sisters that I'm working with at the moment.鈥� The 12 women, absolutely amazing because they've come up with like these creative ideas to discuss a climate issue that they're passionate about that they're concerned about. And they're bringing that to a platform where they would not normally be so it's things like that that I really want to celebrate. I just think if you give a person that space just to have a normal conversation you actually you can get to such a鈥痙eep place.鈥�听

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TALIA: That's lovely and you're right people are wonderful鈥�听

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ZARINA: People are. I mean look at all the wonderful work you're doing Talia. Who would do a podcast about the environment?鈥�听

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TALIA: Well, I mean, I don't think that I would especially, like this journey for me has been really interesting. 'cause you know, like I was saying to you before I grew up on a Council estate in Inner London. You know in good old Cricklewood, which we would affectionately call the armpit of North West London. Look, I loved it, I'm not being down in Cricklewood 鈥�听

Looking back and reflecting on my childhood on this estate, I was out in nature all the time. We were really lucky that we had gardens and also there were like patches of green and there was this nature reserve at the edge of it that we weren't supposed to go into 'cause it was locked. But we still kind of broke in and entered.鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah, as you do.鈥�听

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TALIA: As you do and actually like, I had a lot of opportunity to engage with nature, like when I was a teenager, I got this scholarship to go with other teenagers to South Africa for a month for the Climate Conference, a Sustainable development conference, which was an incredible opportunity.鈥�听

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It was a scholarship, but it was a huge privilege to go and do that and yet, even though I've had all these big moments with nature, I still wouldn't consider myself to be in inverted commas and nature person because I'm from a council estate.鈥�听

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Even now I would say I'm probably closer to middle class and working class like I don't even know where I stand on that class spectrum. It's a very interesting and complex thing, but I still feel these sorts of barriers. And almost like it's not legitimate for me to talk about nature or climate change or environmentalism, and that is so weird, because actually, I'm really probably quite well placed to talk about those things, do you know what I mean?鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah. I remember once being in a group and somebody said the term activism. They said you're an activist and I was horrified. I was like who me? I'm not activist, you know. And I'm like no, no, no, no no.鈥�听

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I know I only came to just listen to learn something here. I didn't come to do any activism and how dare you?鈥�听

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TALIA: why do you feel that you don't call yourself an activist, then is it because that label is attached to like a stereotypical image in your mind?鈥�听

ZARINA: I think it was like these people that were disruptive and that were tree huggers. And like I said before, like as a child, I would say that was a tree hugger, you know, but as an adult I was far from being a tree hugger.鈥�听

You know, and it was just like Oh well, no, I'm not an activist. You know, I'm not somebody who's going to disrupt something or cause problems, you know, and then also again, talking about activism and being somebody's BME community. It's like something that you don't really want to do and get involved in. 'cause like getting arrested would just be like...鈥�听

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TALIA: a bid deal鈥�听

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ZARINA: Yeah, big deal. Big deal, big big big deal. A nig no no no, you know.鈥�听

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TALIA: I'm thinking about how calling yourself an activist is almost like an act of reclamation. I don't know. Maybe I'm thinking too deeply about this. Maybe the鈥疭cottish Sun has got to me, but a big theme of all the people that I've been speaking to is that their walk through the countryside or their garden projects is sort of like reclaiming something because they felt like they haven't belonged.鈥�听

Do you feel like that's the same relationship you have to being an activist?鈥�听

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ZARINA: I don't really know. I mean, now I embrace it and and I don't mind and I actually like. I said, I've like, learned to go with the flow more now. So if somebody wants to label me as an activist, they can do. Somebody wants to label me as an educator they can do, you know, I'm now I'm just like thinking labels don't really matter. I'm just me and I just want people to be then. you know.鈥�听

I just think there's so much goodness in people and I just want to celebrate that without having these labels without having borders without having attachments. It's like why can't we just be? Let's just be a part of nature鈥�听

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TALIA: You know that sounds amazing. It also sounds like that inner tree hugger. Embrace it!鈥�听

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ZARINA:鈥疶he thing is, a part of me is so not that person as well.鈥�听

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TALIA: Yeah, yeah, I hear that.鈥�听

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ZARINA: You know, I'm this personal who sits in front of a computer all day long in my wee room I'm calling from calling office. It's just like a鈥痺ee junk room that I sit in with my spreadsheets and my books. But yeah, I'd like to be this lovely Zen person. You know, sitting in parks all day long.鈥�听

I mean when I die, I have to tell you this, I'm making this very public and very vocal about this. When I die, I do want to be buried under a fruit tree, so I want to be in one of these pods on and then the tree has to be a fruit tree so that anybody can come along, pick the fruit off that tree and that's how I would like to be buried when I die. So I am probably a proper tree hugger though.鈥�听

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TALIA: I love that.鈥�听

Never deny your inner tree hugger.鈥�听

My chat with Zarina brought up the idea of belonging and this theme has basically come up in every chat I've had in the series.鈥�听

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If we leave each other out from nature spaces from conversations and action around climate change, we all lose.鈥�听

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The point of my conversation was not to tear down environmental action or belittle the work that people are doing. Not at all. I read an article last year that I think put it really well.鈥�听

In Gal Dem Diyora Shadijanova wrote about this tension between critiquing climate change groups versus the fact that we might be running out of time.鈥�听

She said that 鈥渃onstructively calling out climate groups for their lack of diversity and western centric narratives shouldn't deter us from fighting for the same political policies that would structurally benefit us all鈥�.鈥�听

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I think this is such an interesting point.鈥�听

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Being part of something isn't always about getting along or even being right all the time. It's about having the grace to accept your blind spots and the courage to speak up about the problems.鈥�听

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If we want to include everyone we have to connect all of this up. Be sensitive and be brave. And not just because it's a nice thing to do, or because it feels fluffy to give ourselves a pat on the back.鈥疊ut simply because, we have to.鈥�听

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In the next and final episode of 鈥楤lossom Trees and Burnt out cars鈥�, I'll be finding out how plants can be a gateway to another homeland that you may have lost contact with.鈥�听

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鈥淔or me, it wasn't just the fact that it had Mexican origins, it was the fact that it had Mexican origins, but it was growing in Devon soil鈥�.鈥�听

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Join me, Talia Randall, as I dig beneath the surface and chat with the people who are opening up nature to everyone.鈥�听

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鈥楤lossom Trees and Burnt out cars鈥�,鈥痺as written and produced by Talia Randall.鈥�听

The researcher was Erica McCoy.鈥�听

The technical producer was GaylGordon and the production mentor was Anna Buckley.鈥�听

Executive producers were Leanne Alie and Khaliq Meer.鈥�听

This podcast was commissioned by Khaliq Meer at 大象传媒 Sounds Audio Lab.鈥�听

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