COP23 UN Climate Change Conference in Bonn – Children’s Protest Song against Water Pollution

The 23rd UN Climate Change Conference or COP23 (23rd Conference of the Parties) took place from 6th to 17th of November 2017 in Bonn. Fiji presided over the conference with the support of the German government. The Conference of the Parties is an annual meeting of the countries who participate in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), where they assess the progress in the implementation of the convention. The first COP was held in 1995 in Berlin.

Each year the conference is accompanied by numerous protests and demonstrations. This recording was made during a children’s protest march against water pollution. It was organised by the Frauenmuseum Bonn and three local day nurseries. The children and their mothers and carers carried large banners and self made plaster fish while singing their protest song. To make more noise they carried bells with them, which you can hear in the recording, too. They walked from Münsterplatz in the city centre of Bonn to Heerstraße in the old town.

The protest song translates as follows:

We want food (repetition of the word food), we want food without garbage!

We want water (repetition of the word water), we want water without dirt!

Recordist: Kathinka Engels
Photographer: Kathinka Engels