"We Children Will Do it Ourselves": A 13-Year-Old Calls for Climate Action

Adults: It's time to stop talking and start planting. Or at least start listening. Because 13-year-old Felix Finkbeiner and thousands of other kids around the world aren't accepting any more excuses about the climate crisis.

Finkbeiner, the founder of Plant-for-the-Planet, was invited from his native Germany to speak at the opening of the U.N.'s International Year of the Forests in New York on Wednesday. He told the crowd that children understand that adults know exactly what climate challenges we face and know the solutions to these challenges.

"But we children don't understand why there is so little action," he said. The young activist, who at age 9 stood in front of his fourth-grade class and said, "Let's plant 1 million trees in each country of the world," urged adults to consider the futures of children, and quit hiding behind skeptics.

"We children think we can plant a trillion trees in 10 years," he said, calling for a "Trillion-Tree Campaign." And they'll do it with or without the support of their elders. "I don't have much hope that adults will do something," Finkbeiner said. "So we children will do it ourselves."

Since they started four years ago, members of Plant-for-the-Planet have planted 3.5 million trees. Finkbeiner hopes that many more children worldwide will listen to his speech and realize that they, too, can become active. "Never forget," he said, "one mosquito cannot do anything against a rhino, but a thousand mosquitoes can make a rhino change its direction."

--Molly Oleson