Hey y'all, it's Penn Badgley. I'm guest hosting today. I'm crouching underneath a blanket like I'm six years old, hiding from myself. It's a metaphor for how much of the world is dealing with climate change, right? No, I'm just up here for quiet sound. If you want to learn how to take real lasting climate action, like I do, I want to

invite you to join Countdown, TED's new global initiative to accelerate solutions to the climate

crisis. Now, here's a talk from the Countdown Global launch event given by Mayor of Freetown, Sierra Leone,

Yvonne Aki Sawyer. To hear more of these ideas and get involved, check out countdown. ted.com

and subscribe to the countdown podcast wherever you are listening to this.

It was December 2015, a month since the end of the Ebola outbreak in Sierra Leone, and I was

driving along the Grafton Road on the outskirts

of our capital city, Freetown. I'd driven along that road so many times over the past 18 months,

but honestly, I'd been so preoccupied, I didn't notice my surroundings. But that afternoon,

I wasn't distracted, and I took it all in. I was shocked.

So much of the once lush green forest cover had simply disappeared. I felt physically sick

as I parked my car and looked at the Barron Hills around me.

I wasn't just witnessing and mourning the loss of beauty,

crushing though that was.

I was witnessing and mourning the very real impact of climate change,

which is felt in ways both large and small, in my city, my country,

and on my continent. Cerilion now regularly experiences extreme weather patterns, particularly

abnormally heavy rainfall or delayed rains, both of which can lead to

crop failures and in turn fuel the migration of people from rural areas to cities. In Freetown, a city

of 1.2 million people, the pressure for housing and the absence of development control

has led to the establishment of over 70 informal settlements in the past 20 years.

This combined with the sailor forested land to house builders, has resulted in the deforestation

...