International College of Innovation x Taipei Fine Arts Museum: Taipei Biennial 2020 Special Event “You and I and Our Climate Footprint: Let’s Negotiate !”
Date :
2020-11-30
Department :
International College of Innovation
【Article by the International College of Innovation】
On November 28, the second event of Taipei Biennial 2020 Theater of Negotiations “You and I and Our Climate Footprint” has taken place in Gallery D at Taipei Fine Arts Museum, hosted by ICI students in 2020 Fall Semester “Anthropocene and Geopolitics” course as well as students from four other universities together with professors together with researchers from the Taiwan STS Association (Taiwan Science, Technology, and Society Association). This event has drawn large attention from visitors of Taipei Fine Arts Museum with the aim to raise people's awareness about natural resources and environmental issues.
Since the resources of the Earth are finite but humans are consuming resources at an alarmingly rapid speed, have you ever wondered “How many planets do we need if everybody lives like you ?” This idea was researched and introduced by Global Footprint Network (GFN), an international non-profitable organization envisions a future where all can thrive within the means of our one planet. Research done by GFN has shown that the rate of human consumption of the earth’s resources is about 1.6 times the rate of resource regeneration. In other words, every year humankind is spending more ecological resources than the Earth can provide. GFN has thus introduced the idea of the Earth Overshoot Day (EOD), marking the day when humans exhaust their global resource budget for each year. And for 2020, the Earth Overshoot Day is August 22. It is high time human beings took steps to protect the environment and save ourselves, “There is no planet B!”
Through GFN online questionnaire, visitors coming to the special event could measure their Ecological Footprints, how many Earths they would consume and when their personal Overshoot Day would be. Only within 10 minutes, visitors could have a clearer view into how the way they lived, consumed products and services can directly affect the Earth. People will be asked a total of 13 questions about their everyday routine, from how they consume food daily, means and frequency of transportation, to their accommodation life-style. Questions like: “How often do you eat animal-based products ?” or “How much of the food that you eat is unprocessed, unpacked or locally grown ?” was presented. Most people take those for granted, but actually every little thing we do in our daily life will contribute to our ecological footprint. After visitors had a self-evaluation, there would be a result calculated by GFN showing on the screen. Most people were very surprised by how many Earths they would consume and the highest number of Earths recorded was 5.9, nearly 6 times the resources that we currently have. “I was really shocked when I knew my result, even our existence alone has already consumed more than 1 Earth!” - a visitor said. Then, the students would help them to figure out which part of their consumption category affects their ecological footprint the most, whether it was food, shelter, mobility, goods or services. The answer for which part affects the visitors’ ecological footprint the most was usually food, as reported. It would take another 5 to 10 minutes to identify what can be modified in your life to reduce your footprint at personal, family and national level (focusing on the case of Taiwan).
The activity did not stop after calling for people’s awareness, but also provided suggestions and solutions for the visitors to change their habits and lifestyle to be more environmentally friendly. “We do have a convenient, cheap and healthy way of purchasing at the same time and it is our choice to choose it or not” - a student of ICI Anthropocene and Geopolitics course stated and suggested visitors to go shopping in non-packaging and environmentally friendly stores around Taipei and nearby areas. For instance, shops that are recommended by the students include the “Unpackaged.U” shop in New Taipei City. Professor Paul Jobin, an organizer of the event also shared his own way of living green at home: “I have tried to reduce the amount of household waste and make biofertilizers from food waste. I am also planting various types of vegetables in my own house, including some of Taiwanese delicious indigenous vegetables. I really hope that through this special event, people can take a little step to change their lifestyle and live more green because little progress is still progress”.
This special event is the sequel event to the first event of the Taipei Biennial 2020 “New Diplomatic Encounters” Symposium. While the symposium last week was held in the form of a formal meeting and negotiation, this week's event was much more open and fun to join. Besides doing a small test on their ecological footprint, visitors also had the chance to visit an exhibition called “Planet with Alternative Gravity” with very interesting artworks, movies and information on our planet. Being asked why the “Theater of Negotiations” are held in Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the organizers answered that they want to hold the event in a public space, where everyone can come and the knowledge acquired by the students can be spread. The idea of combining Anthropocene and Geopolitics with arts also helps the students get a clearer and deeper acquisition of academic knowledge. At the end of the event, the hosts and the curators together with the professors had a small meeting to share their thoughts on the event, hoping to improve other events in the future.
This event was a collaboration between International College of Innovation Anthropocene and Geopolitics course (opened by Professors Paul Jobin and Chih-Yuan Yang) and Taipei Fine Arts Museum for the 2020 Fall Semester. Taipei Biennial 2020 “You and I Don’t Live on the Same Planet” will last from 2020.11.21 to 2021.03.14 with weekly events engaging the role-playing while addressing several social controversies that exist in Taiwan today. These range from climate emergency to nuclear waste, food safety, renewable energy, and assisted conception. The role-playing takes the form of debates about these controversies, with participants representing the various stakeholders (lobbyists, judges, NGOs, local politicians, residents, and non-human actors etc.), engaging in realistic exercises in negotiation and public governance of the issue in question.
Let’s look forward to future events and don’t forget to pay a visit to Taipei Fine Arts Museum to meet our students from ICI Anthropocene and Geopolitics course! You will be dragged into a fantastic art place inside the exhibition and have a wonderful experience here!
On November 28, the second event of Taipei Biennial 2020 Theater of Negotiations “You and I and Our Climate Footprint” has taken place in Gallery D at Taipei Fine Arts Museum, hosted by ICI students in 2020 Fall Semester “Anthropocene and Geopolitics” course as well as students from four other universities together with professors together with researchers from the Taiwan STS Association (Taiwan Science, Technology, and Society Association). This event has drawn large attention from visitors of Taipei Fine Arts Museum with the aim to raise people's awareness about natural resources and environmental issues.
Since the resources of the Earth are finite but humans are consuming resources at an alarmingly rapid speed, have you ever wondered “How many planets do we need if everybody lives like you ?” This idea was researched and introduced by Global Footprint Network (GFN), an international non-profitable organization envisions a future where all can thrive within the means of our one planet. Research done by GFN has shown that the rate of human consumption of the earth’s resources is about 1.6 times the rate of resource regeneration. In other words, every year humankind is spending more ecological resources than the Earth can provide. GFN has thus introduced the idea of the Earth Overshoot Day (EOD), marking the day when humans exhaust their global resource budget for each year. And for 2020, the Earth Overshoot Day is August 22. It is high time human beings took steps to protect the environment and save ourselves, “There is no planet B!”
Through GFN online questionnaire, visitors coming to the special event could measure their Ecological Footprints, how many Earths they would consume and when their personal Overshoot Day would be. Only within 10 minutes, visitors could have a clearer view into how the way they lived, consumed products and services can directly affect the Earth. People will be asked a total of 13 questions about their everyday routine, from how they consume food daily, means and frequency of transportation, to their accommodation life-style. Questions like: “How often do you eat animal-based products ?” or “How much of the food that you eat is unprocessed, unpacked or locally grown ?” was presented. Most people take those for granted, but actually every little thing we do in our daily life will contribute to our ecological footprint. After visitors had a self-evaluation, there would be a result calculated by GFN showing on the screen. Most people were very surprised by how many Earths they would consume and the highest number of Earths recorded was 5.9, nearly 6 times the resources that we currently have. “I was really shocked when I knew my result, even our existence alone has already consumed more than 1 Earth!” - a visitor said. Then, the students would help them to figure out which part of their consumption category affects their ecological footprint the most, whether it was food, shelter, mobility, goods or services. The answer for which part affects the visitors’ ecological footprint the most was usually food, as reported. It would take another 5 to 10 minutes to identify what can be modified in your life to reduce your footprint at personal, family and national level (focusing on the case of Taiwan).
The activity did not stop after calling for people’s awareness, but also provided suggestions and solutions for the visitors to change their habits and lifestyle to be more environmentally friendly. “We do have a convenient, cheap and healthy way of purchasing at the same time and it is our choice to choose it or not” - a student of ICI Anthropocene and Geopolitics course stated and suggested visitors to go shopping in non-packaging and environmentally friendly stores around Taipei and nearby areas. For instance, shops that are recommended by the students include the “Unpackaged.U” shop in New Taipei City. Professor Paul Jobin, an organizer of the event also shared his own way of living green at home: “I have tried to reduce the amount of household waste and make biofertilizers from food waste. I am also planting various types of vegetables in my own house, including some of Taiwanese delicious indigenous vegetables. I really hope that through this special event, people can take a little step to change their lifestyle and live more green because little progress is still progress”.
This special event is the sequel event to the first event of the Taipei Biennial 2020 “New Diplomatic Encounters” Symposium. While the symposium last week was held in the form of a formal meeting and negotiation, this week's event was much more open and fun to join. Besides doing a small test on their ecological footprint, visitors also had the chance to visit an exhibition called “Planet with Alternative Gravity” with very interesting artworks, movies and information on our planet. Being asked why the “Theater of Negotiations” are held in Taipei Fine Arts Museum, the organizers answered that they want to hold the event in a public space, where everyone can come and the knowledge acquired by the students can be spread. The idea of combining Anthropocene and Geopolitics with arts also helps the students get a clearer and deeper acquisition of academic knowledge. At the end of the event, the hosts and the curators together with the professors had a small meeting to share their thoughts on the event, hoping to improve other events in the future.
This event was a collaboration between International College of Innovation Anthropocene and Geopolitics course (opened by Professors Paul Jobin and Chih-Yuan Yang) and Taipei Fine Arts Museum for the 2020 Fall Semester. Taipei Biennial 2020 “You and I Don’t Live on the Same Planet” will last from 2020.11.21 to 2021.03.14 with weekly events engaging the role-playing while addressing several social controversies that exist in Taiwan today. These range from climate emergency to nuclear waste, food safety, renewable energy, and assisted conception. The role-playing takes the form of debates about these controversies, with participants representing the various stakeholders (lobbyists, judges, NGOs, local politicians, residents, and non-human actors etc.), engaging in realistic exercises in negotiation and public governance of the issue in question.
Let’s look forward to future events and don’t forget to pay a visit to Taipei Fine Arts Museum to meet our students from ICI Anthropocene and Geopolitics course! You will be dragged into a fantastic art place inside the exhibition and have a wonderful experience here!
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