McCauley Wycliff
Member
Facebook has expanded its Climate Science Information Centre countries in Sub Saharan Africa, starting with Nigeria and South Africa.
The social media network describes the centre as a “dedicated space on Facebook with factual resources from the world’s leading climate organizations and actionable steps people can take in their everyday lives to combat climate change.”
The centre was first launched in the UK, France, Germany and in the US. It features facts, figures and data from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the global network of climate science partners including UNEP.
Facebook launched the centre based on its Covid-19 model of collaborating with leading health organizations such as the World Health Organization (WHO) and locally the Ministry of Health (MOH), to provide factual information.
The tech giant says the centre is part of its “commitment to connecting people to accurate, expert advice and information about global developments that affect their lives.”
Apart from South Africa and Nigeria, Facebook has also expanded the centre to Brazil, Belgium, Canada, Ireland, Mexico, the Netherlands, India, Spain, Taiwan and Indonesia, bringing the total number of countries to 16.
The company has also rolled out a new test of alert prompts on posts about climate change with an aim to better educate users about the impacts and subsequent need for action. The company is testing adding information labels on selected posts about climate change.
“We added a section that features facts that debunk common climate myths – including too much carbon dioxide in the atmosphere harms the earth’s plant life and polar bear populations are declining because of global warming. To debunk the myths with current and specific facts, we’ve brought in climate communication experts from the George Mason University, the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication and the University of Cambridge.”
In countries where the Climate Science Information Centre is not available, Facebook will direct users to the UN Environment Programme for information