WWF is launching a new campaign for Euro 2024 with a twist on famous chant ‘Don’t take me home’. The environmental organisation is calling on football fans to get behind their Amazon Appeal throughout the tournament, helping to stop the destruction of the rainforest and prevent the impacts of climate change and extreme weather on football, people, and wildlife around the world.
With all eyes fixed on the green grass of the pitch for Euro 2024 this summer, nature remains in freefall as global leaders, businesses, and human activity fail the world’s forests on a catastrophic scale. While fans avidly watch the Euros, every 30 seconds an area of Amazon rainforest larger than a football pitch will be destroyed.
Under the combined pressures of climate change and deforestation, the Amazon rainforest is approaching an irreversible tipping point, meaning that if just 5% more tree cover is destroyed, the forest is likely to decay, dry out and die. This means we will lose the Amazon as we know it, and football could follow.
The Climate Coalition has found that extreme heat and rainfall cause an estimated 62,500 amateur matches to be delayed or cancelled each year [1]. And professional teams are not exempt, as by 2050, an estimated 39 of the 92 stadiums in the top four leagues of English football will be at high risk of multiple climate hazards, such as drought, flooding, and windstorms [2]. In a recent interview with the BBC, Cambridge United groundskeeper of 45 years, Ian Darler, described the weather over the last 12 months as “exceptional” and “scary” adding that “’heavy rain in recent months had made it difficult for him to get training pitches ready for next season”.
To turn the focus of football fans back towards nature loss, WWF’s new video ‘Don’t take my home’, draws attention to the destruction of the rainforest. From the iconic jaguars, sloths, and macaws in their last great stronghold to the 47 million people that live in the Amazon, its continued destruction will take their home.
The impact of the devastating changes to our climate can also be seen in our homes and around the world in increasingly destructive wildfires, floods and food crises. Less forest means a more unstable world, putting our food and water security at risk. It also means more climate change, less protection against extreme weather events, and less biodiversity.
Sports fans are already calling for action. In 2023, the British Association for Sustainable Sport found that 40% of football spectators experienced climate-related disruption [1]. In addition, 63% of fans called for a new independent football regulator to protect the sport from climate impacts and minimise its contribution to greenhouse emissions [1].
Players are speaking out too. A new report from Planet League, led by Tottenham Hotspur Women centre half Amy James-Turner highlights the opinions of players and managers on environmental and climate issues. Interviewing and surveying professional female players and managers, Amy found that 70% agree climate change has affected playing conditions, with one respondent describing playing during a wildfire stating they “could barely see, it was so smoky and foggy.”
But there is hope as 96% of respondents said football should actively reduce its carbon footprint and that “football clubs need to lead from the front” and 85% agree the football community working together can be effective in the fight against climate change.
Jamie Gordon, Senior Programme Advisor – Latin America, (and fan of Gillingham FC) at WWF said:
“The Amazon rainforest is at a tipping point and the decisions we make today will determine whether it’s still here for the next generation.
“The Amazon is also home to nearly 50 million people along with countless species. Worldwide, forests provide livelihoods for 1.6 billion people and climate regulation. Their loss globally is already having an impact on the football pitch, with tens of thousands of matches cancelled, and will only get worse.
“The time to act is now. There is no extra time. But we can bring our world back to life by ending deforestation and rebuilding our vital defence against climate disaster.”
Through its Amazon Appeal, WWF aims to reduce the impact of climate change across the world by stopping deforestation in the Amazon, protecting forests and rivers, and restoring habitats for people and wildlife.
WWF is therefore calling on football fans to unite and support their campaign to stop deforestation, while protecting the game they love and help bring our world back to life.
Protect the Amazon. Protect the Future – Donate to WWF’s Amazon Appeal | WWF UK
