All language subtitles for Legacy.Our.Heritage.2021_Documentary_A.J

Subbed by A.J. (dedicated to A.F.)

A man's life is simultaneously brief and huge.

Places and events mark you for eternity,

drawing your path
and your relationship with the world.

This happened to me
40 years ago in Kenya.

I was a 33 year old Parisian,

my life nourished since childhood
by a love of animals

and the dream of absolute freedom.

I'd been constrained since I was little
by rules I tried to dodge.

I was a dunce at school and at home,

the dimensions of which were never
big enough for exploring the world.

I arrived here with my wife Anna
and our two children,

at the heart of this wild nature.

We'd bought a three-year return ticket.

We bought our house ourselves,
helped by our African friends.

We were writing a thesis on lions.

We'd spend days watching them.

The lions taught me photography.

Observing the lives of animals
changed me profoundly.

I was born of them,
born of these animals.

Thanks to them,
I learnt the freedom of just being.

Never had I felt so alive and happy.

The lions weren't afraid of us.

They'd never been hunted by humans.

It was an absolute dream, a discovery.

Living, as a family, with them.

Here, "wild animal" wasn't synonymous
with "fear of humans".

We were accepted
as part of that natural harmony.

The cycle of life
played out before our eyes.

Eat or be eaten.

Observing animals taught me
how to live in the world of humans.

We watched them love each other,
but also die.

Half of the lion cubs
died in their first year.

With them
I lived the essentials of life:

children, love,

sex,

death...

We were at the heart
of the cycle of life in the raw,

in all its insecurity,
always on the lookout.

Its harmony breaks free
of all our reference points.

To earn a living
I piloted hot-air balloons,

taking tourists to see animals

every morning.

This was a revelation
which changed my life.

From up there
I mapped out their routes,

the corridors taken by thousands
of wildebeest, buffalo and zebra,

heading to the south
of the Serengeti,

where they would find
abundant grazing.

But their greatest predator
was the River Mara.

Every year the mass annihilation
of wildebeest happened again,

making a deep impression on me.

Now as I rewatch this film,
40 years later,

I see us today beating a similar path
towards our own impasse.

And I wonder
what kind of animal we are.

The kind that can make it across

or the kind
that will all suffer the same death?

The development of Kenya between
when I first set foot there and today

perfectly illustrates
our shared history of the world.

Never would I have imagined
that all these animals

would be threatened with extinction
forty years later.

And that 75% of the land

would be cultivated

to help feed the 8 billion humans
that we now are.

And never would I have imagined
that wheat, corn and barley

would replace the antelopes' grasses,

or that the mechanic din
of combine harvesters

would echo
over this paradise of biodiversity,

as they do across the whole planet.

We have sought our power
in dominance and control.

The earth found it in freedom
and the links between all things.

I had there
all that a man might dream of,

a sort of adventure kit
like in a comic book.

I think now that I had the very essence
of what makes a human life,

and that my life
couldn't have been complete

without what we experienced there.

Kenya is also the land
of the first humans.

In the Rift Valley were found the first
traces of our Homo sapiens ancestors.

It became the land of the Masai.

Cattle are their capital
and their currency.

In 1980

we believed
in the promises of development.

What the West offered seemed to me
the natural progress of the world.

We were all going to be rational,
richer and happy.

I knew that the way of life
of the Masai would change.

I felt a little nostalgic,

but I saw that sadness
as the selfishness

of a privileged Westerner.

But today
the grazing land for their cattle

has been severely reduced
because of agriculture.

They often have to venture
into nature reserves

to find pasturage for their herds.

And to defend themselves
against lion attacks,

they've now swapped their spears
for poison.

They who showed such pride
in fighting lions with spears.

These vast expanses of greenhouses
edge the lakes of Kenya.

Like in Ethiopia or Chile,
green beans or flowers

are mass produced
for the tables of the whole world.

Delivered by plane every day,

they feed the spheres
of international finance,

but leave behind
the very real consequences

of pesticides and waste.

But they importantly provide employment
where there was none before.

Poverty is often better distributed
than wealth.

I never thought when I left Kenya

that the 60,000 inhabitants
of the Kibera slum

would have now increased
to a million,

and that one person in eight
would now be living in such conditions.

On the planet today how many people
are exiled, migrants and refugees?

Who'd have thought
that the huge camp of Dadaab,

set up in the desert to take in refugees
from the 1991 war in Somalia,

would still be there today?

It's become the biggest refugee camp
in the world.

500,000 people live there,

yet no one knows about it.

Is this the promise of our progress?

Since my birth, the wealth produced
and exchanged on Earth

has multiplied twenty times.

What a leap!

But to what end?

So that 1% of the world's population

owns as much as the other 99%?

Here too
the signs of climate change are clear.

Kilimanjaro of the eternal snow

is now almost without ice,
like wrinkled old skin.

It's not the earth we should be killing,
but our conception of progress.

Beauty is essential to my work.

I believe it is a balm for the soul,
as the Navajo say.

Salt crystals paint living pictures
in the black waters of Lake Magadi.

This beauty is dazzling.

I return to it ceaselessly.
It's like an obsession.

The optimistic young man I was in Kenya
is no more.

I'm a different man today.

What I've learnt through my work
over these 40 years

and what the scientists tell us

throws all my certainties into question.

11 years after my film Home,

I just want to relate my feelings
about the world

and our inability
to change our way of life,

even though we know the solutions.

The scientists have announced
the 6th extinction of life on Earth.

And with all my soul as a human being
I cannot accept it.

So let's have the courage
to face the truth

and look at ourselves with open eyes.

This is the story
of Legacy, Our Heritage.

LEGACY
OUR HERITAGE

Directed by Yann Arthus-Bertrand

This movie
is dedicated to my grandchildren.

I often ask myself this question.

When did humans become aware
they were different from other species?

When was that awakening?

It's hard to say,
but one thing is for sure:

35,000 years ago,
deep in Chauvet Cave in France,

they already knew.

They knew, of course, that
they stood upright but ran too slowly.

And mostly they knew
that they controlled their environment

better than other species.

They knew that, among the multitude
of emotions which bubbled inside them,

they felt love and friendship.

I feel a powerful connection
to these humans

who lived thousands of generations ago.

Like me, like you,

they seemed sensitive
to the beauty of nature.

They made an effort
to freeze it in time.

For whom? To what end?

What is clear is that they had no wish
to depict themselves or their species.

They chose to depict other species
in all their majesty

and all their splendour.

Humans have always stood apart
from other species

in a particular and unexpected way.

The story I'm about to tell you
is your own.

The story of each one of you.

The story of human beings,

a fantastic species
which has succeeded at everything.

You'll see how this puny little creature,

not naturally very well armed
against wild animals or bad weather,

all the same managed to control nature

and conquer the entire planet.

It's often said
that I have a photographer's eye,

that I'm able to capture something extra
in a landscape,

a force that's there,
but which not everyone necessarily sees.

I long thought that this force

was my perfectionism,

my doggedness
in seeking the perfect photograph,

the most harmonious lines,
the perfect angle, the ideal light...

But in the end

it's quite possible that this force
which emanates from some of my pictures

is nothing other than that force
which powers life itself:

energy!

For energy is not only that
which powers all living creatures,

linking them all together,

it is also their raison d'être.

And this energy
will be the central theme of my film.

In the beginning
on Earth there was no life.

There was only energy.

Energy caught in a loop,
a prisoner of the elements,

neither transformed nor channelled.

And there was an enormous amount
of energy, in all its forms.

Abundant, wild and dangerous.

The earth in the beginning
was just rock in fusion,

furious and raging.

This energy dissipated immediately
into space in the form of heat

because nothing held it back.

Then, gradually, water vapour
produced by the burning earth

formed a gaseous envelope
around the planet.

An atmosphere.

The atmosphere let in the sun's rays,
which warmed the earth,

then prevented the heat escaping.

Like a greenhouse.

This new heat provided the conditions
conducive to life.

Without this natural greenhouse effect,

the temperature on the planet
would be around minus 50 degrees.

And at that temperature
life as we know it is impossible.

Life on Earth, then, only exists
because of the greenhouse effect.

The accumulating clouds
then unleashed diluvian rainfall,

which ended up forming the oceans.

For billions of years,
this water went through all its stages:

cloud, rain, lakes, rivers and oceans,
ice sometimes,

then vapour again.

And this cycle of water still continues.

The water we drink today

is that which cradled the first algae,

and which was drunk by the dinosaurs.

Water
is an essential constituent of life.

In fact, it makes up
almost two thirds of the human body.

And it was in the oceans that life
would first appear, diversify,

and then pullulate in its myriad forms.

Our planet is called Earth.

But for the major part of its history

it could have been called
the planet Sea.

For a very long time

this life in the oceans was limited
to tiny, simple organisms.

The equivalent of today's plankton.

I like this comparison...

If the history of life on Earth
until today

is represented as a 24-hour period,
and it is now midnight,

then life first appeared
at about 6 a.m., in the oceans.

But what is astonishing

is that life would only emerge
from the oceans to colonise the land

at about 10 p.m.

That was when plants first appeared.

For plants
this conquest of the continents

would have been
unimaginably difficult.

They had to colonise an environment
so different from the sea,

where they'd been coddled
in obstacle-free weightlessness,

now confronting
naked, hard, sterile rock.

But this virgin territory
was worth the effort.

It was abundant
in that essential constituent of life:

energy.

This energy is what enables
living things to function,

to develop, to move around...

Since life first appeared,

its sole raison d'être
has been to seize this energy.

And living things

have become experts at exploiting it.

I have so much respect for living things

because each one
is an incredible creation,

so much more sophisticated
than the most refined machine,

and so much more fascinating too.

For plants,

these species which for many of us
are just a backdrop,

the energy problem was solved
in an unexpected way,

through their taming of solar energy.

They're the only living things

which, thanks to photosynthesis,
have access to unlimited energy,

which they transform into matter.

Vegetal matter.

It's extraordinary to think
that the vegetal matter they make

doesn't come out of the ground. No.

It comes out of the carbon in the air,
out of the sky,

transformed by photosynthesis.

Then began a race upwards,

in which the highest plants
gained an advantage,

having more energy at their disposal.

They could reproduce more easily,

transmitting to their descendants
the advantages that worked for them,

creating generation after generation
of ever taller plants.

Thus were trees born.

In their race upwards,

these magnificent representatives
of biological ingenuity

had to solve problems which to us
might seem insuperable.

For a tree, in fact,
is a trunk linking two crowns:

one aerial and visible,

made of branches and leaves
for capturing the sun's energy,

and the other, just as big, underground,

made of roots
for capturing water and minerals.

Trees, then, are not just magnificent
solar energy power stations,

they are also enormous water pumps,

able to lift
hundreds of litres of water a day

to heights of tens of metres.

These spectacular colossi,

giants in space and in time,

can thrive for centuries,
even millennia.

And all the while releasing oxygen,

which can then be used
by other living beings.

Over the years,
trees have increasingly fascinated me,

occupying an ever larger place
in my thoughts.

Think about it.

With the carbon
they take from the atmosphere

and the energy
they borrow from the sun,

they build matter:

branches, trunks, roots...

And when this matter dies
and falls to the ground,

it creates humus,

forming the soil in which other plants
and trees will grow.

Before plants,
there was no soil on Earth,

just naked and sterile rock.

It's the soil, the earth
after which our planet is named,

which is the foundation
of terrestrial plants.

The compost of our lives.

In fact, "humus" and Homo,
the name of our species,

have the same etymological root,
meaning "earth".

Fixed to the ground and immobile,

trees communicate

by means of their roots and the odours
they release from their leaves.

They've also solved, in an amazing way,
one of their biggest problems.

Being anchored in the soil
and unable to move,

they use animals, which can move,

to come into contact and reproduce,
by means of their flowers.

They developed fruit,

to attract animals, which eat them
and deposit their seeds elsewhere.

This is how they came
to colonise vast territories,

without moving a centimetre
throughout their lives.

Of course I could speak
just as enthusiastically

about other species besides trees.

For example, those which didn't
develop photosynthesis:

animals, our ancestors.

They came up
with a much more ingenious solution

for obtaining that energy:

eating the plants

or eating the plant eaters.

All these herbivores
and carnivores are doing

is salvaging the solar energy

stocked in the form of matter
in living beings.

All living species are driven

by a natural urge
more powerful than anything:

to survive so that they can reproduce.

All the energy they obtain
is channelled to this end,

all that energy
is dedicated to survival.

If any is left over
it will go towards reproduction,

then to surviving another year

in order to reproduce again
as soon as possible.

Hoard, eat, dominate, reproduce...

Such are the driving forces
of every living being on Earth.

My experience of life in Kenya

made me a humble and attentive spectator

of the beauty of this infinite cycle

of energy passing
from one species to another.

Energy is everywhere,

sometimes being economised
to a maximum degree,

sometimes explosive and impressive,

ceaselessly circulating
from one species to another

in the networks of our ecosystems.

Humans began their story
like every other species,

with the same imperative:

finding the energy to endure.

But unlike the oak or the bear,

they didn't start out with the assets
of robust, powerful species.

They had few weapons to fight nature,

no fangs, claws or horns.

They didn't run very fast,
swam slowly, couldn't fly...

But from the start
humans had two essential advantages

which would lift them
out of their animal condition:

their intelligence
and their cooperative spirit.

If one person
couldn't catch a prey alone,

they would cooperate
to hunt and to gather.

They also had coordinated strategies.

They invented traps, nets and weapons.

Cooperation and intelligence.

It's not by chance that humans live
in families, communities, tribes,

villages and megalopolises.

They seek the presence of others,

for this has been successful
through the ages.

To defend themselves against predators,

to build shelters
against the cold or the heat,

to fish while others made boats
or repaired nets...

They took care of their children,

their sick or their old,
who could in turn be helpful.

They learnt to observe nature
and copy it.

They discovered
the medicinal properties of plants,

and passed this knowledge down
through the generations.

If I had to sum up what is common to all
the peoples I've visited in my life,

from tribes in Sudan,
Mali or the Sahara,

to villages in Ethiopia
or communities in India,

or simply back home in France,

I'd unhesitatingly say

that it's their vision
and sense of community

which have enabled them to adapt
to tough, even hostile, conditions.

This is just as true
for our modern societies.

Returning to our representation
of life on earth as a 24-hour period,

the first humans appeared

at about58 p.m. and 43 seconds,

We've been around
for barely a few heartbeats of the day.

Yet, as insignificant
as our appearance might have seemed,

it completely changed everything.

And the life of human beings
underwent a radical change

when they learnt to control the energy

that's stored in trees
in a particularly effective way,

by making fire.

The energy of burning wood

helped them
to fight the cold and the damp,

to keep at bay darkness and predators,

and to kill the parasites in meat
which made them ill.

By taming this source of energy,
which only they learnt how to do,

human beings pushed back
the constraints of nature.

In nature all species are kept in check
by climatic conditions,

such as droughts and harsh winters,

and by other species,

by food becoming scarce
when populations grow too large,

or by their natural enemies,
predators and parasites.

The human beings' genius

lay in eradicating all of nature's
forms of control,

evading bad weather
and eliminating natural enemies,

and stretching the planet's
elastic resources to their limit.

For the first time
in the history of Earth,

there would eventually be no force

capable of restricting the growth
of a living species:

humans.

After taming fire,

humans would become masters in the art
of channelling other forms of energy.

They began
in a spectacularly innovative way,

by domesticating wild animals

and making use of their energy.

Taming these formidable creatures,
so strong and recalcitrant,

would make possible
what had hitherto been unthinkable,

in particular long-distance transport.

What seems quite ordinary to us today,
mounting a powerful animal,

was actually
an incredibly daring endeavour.

With these combined energies,

humans acquired a new freedom,

crossing every frontier,

beginning with that between the possible
and the impossible.

These animals would at first enable them
to go further,

to spread all over the planet.

The conquest of the world

could not have happened
without the strength of these animals,

and the destiny of humanity
would have been quite different.

Having domesticated animals,

they would now domesticate wild plants

and tame the earth,

learning through contact
how to make it give up its goodness,

with a combination of labour and love.

A tender tilling.

They replanted some of their food,

to harvest it later,
but in a greater quantity.

Humans went from a nomadic
to a sedentary existence.

By settling down
they could channel energy

in a more efficient and sustainable way.

They learnt the art
of managing the land,

and gradually inherited great experience
in the practice

of transforming landscapes
to feed their people.

I'm still fascinated

by the constant labour
of the women and men of every continent,

who paint gigantic frescoes
across the land,

creating works of art they cannot see,

but which reflect their hard work
and know-how.

This communion between the land,
humans and animals

has lasted for thousands of years.

But I notice

that the methods have changed little
in most countries around the world.

By inventing agriculture

almost 10,000 years ago,

humans could harvest great amounts
of the energy stored in plants,

and thereby better survive, grow,
and develop.

Side by side,
panting and sweating together,

women, men and oxen

painstakingly ploughed the land,
watered and nourished it,

took care of the fragile young shoots
which emerged,

and fought rodents,
caterpillars and disease,

frost and drought,

anything which could cast them
into hunger.

But far from destroying
what they subjugated,

they stimulated and encouraged,

inducing germination and growth,

eventually getting even fields of rock
to flower.

Life was still hard, brutal even,

but it lengthened,
enjoyed better support,

and was less unpredictable.

At the same time
as developing agriculture,

humans optimised their exploitation
of the energy stored in animals

by becoming breeders
rather than hunters.

Why go running after prey

when you can keep the creatures
close at hand?

These herds of domestic animals,

oxen, sheep, pigs and goats,

would soon come
to take on such importance

that they would often be
their owners' most precious possessions.

Their entire wealth.

Around the world I've seen this.

In a way they're the equivalent
of our bank accounts,

but with much more love and care
lavished on them,

and much more risk involved.

These animals
being their entire wealth,

humans learnt to live
on everything that came from them.

Their meat and milk, of course,

but also their skin, their tendons,
even their excrement,

which burnt well,
providing heat and cooking fires.

Again and again,
it all comes down to energy.

Every species

was exploited for its qualities,
for what it offered humans,

often its strength and endurance,
and resilience to climatic conditions.

What fascinates me
is not just that humans managed

to harness the energy
of plants and animals,

but that they managed to control
the entire energy transfer

from one living thing to another,

harnessing for their own benefit
everything they could take.

Humans have always applied
their social nature to sharing.

They have shared, pooled and gifted
possessions and knowledge.

They invented bartering.

Then an even cleverer version:

trading, which makes
all kinds of exchange easier.

Their intelligence helped them discover
even faster methods of transport,

like boats,

which slip across the water,
requiring little energy input.

Thus did they conquer distance,

discover other continents,
and access the inaccessible.

All over the planet humans survived,

adapted, thrived, and spread out.

And every time,

their inventiveness
took on a new aspect,

giving rise

to all kinds of different, rich,
picturesque and fascinating cultures.

Whether the land
was too dry or too damp,

humans always managed to tame it,

as they'd tamed oxen

and rice.

With fire, humans discovered metals,

and their tools became
increasingly powerful.

They dug the earth in search
of precious rocks, rare metals,

then sources of energy.

They always used
their two main assets:

their intelligence
and their cooperative spirit.

And their determination to succeed
at anything led to real achievements.

No matter how difficult,

no matter the time and the sacrifices,

humans eliminated all the obstacles
placed before them,

meeting every challenge.

And then, 150 years ago,

humans achieved a stroke of genius,

marking a total breakthrough
in their existence,

the wide-scale exploitation
of new forms of energy,

concentrated and excessively available:

coal, and then oil.

There then followed a radical change
in the scale of their success:

the Industrial Revolution.

They exploited this energy
on a huge scale,

in a more systematic, organised
and methodical way.

150 years, out of 4.5 billion.

In our 24-hour history of Earth,

this era began
at five microseconds before midnight.

Five microseconds.

Even a blink of the eye
lasts 100,000 times longer.

So, five microseconds ago,

human beings learnt how to master energy

as no other living being had ever done,

changing for ever the human condition.

They dug to get at coal, oil and gas.

This energy was almost limitless,
so great were the reserves.

And almost free.
You just had to help yourself.

They could dig anywhere, both on land

and underwater.

This fossil energy
results from the decomposition

of things that died
millions of years ago.

This is why it's called fossil fuel.

In a way,

humans moved on
from the energy of the living

to the energy of the dead,

that of billions
of decomposing animals and plants,

an underground store of millions of years
of the sun's energy.

Think about it.

Humans were no longer content

to control the energy passing
from one living being to another,

as in agriculture or livestock farming.

Now they were achieving the exploit

of harnessing the fossil energy
which had built up

but had never before been exploited.

Energy that was incredibly
more concentrated and powerful.

Thanks to oil,

humans could work with materials
like steel, concrete and plastic,

and were able to build

much more, in a much better way.

These constructions were now
on an unimaginable scale,

their size matching the ambitions.

They invented machines,

metal giants to dig and find

materials and more energy.

There was excess in every domain,

whether for exploitation,
habitation or travel.

Humans could now,
thanks to these iron giants,

move around on the land, the sea

and even in the air,

reducing the travel time to the ends
of the earth from weeks to hours.

A return trip
to the other side of the planet

takes less time than going
to the next town two centuries ago.

Humans' frail barks
had now become factory boats,

able to locate, track
and catch fish by the tonne,

without risking their lives
each time they went to sea.

Agriculture became mechanised.

Exchanging donkeys for tractors,

they could work ever greater surfaces
with ever greater ease.

Oil was the magic potion
which banished ever-present hunger,

the extreme insecurity
and the constant exhaustion

which were rewarded
with such modest harvests.

Oil enabled women and men
to make the transition

from simply surviving
to actually living.

Humans totally mastered irrigation,

digging hundreds of metres underground,

waking up water
that had slumbered for millennia,

to fight against drought,

even in the driest places.

With their mastery
of fertiliser and irrigation,

they turned deserts green.

Thanks to oil, they were able
to invent new pesticides,

much more effective
at fighting weeds and pests.

No more harvests almost totally lost,

ravaged by insects and rats.

Farewell, famine!

All the creatures that had been
stealing this energy for millennia

now had to go without.

Humans made sure
that all the plants they grew

in ever larger fields

would no longer be misappropriated
by any other living creature.

Manipulating oil,
thanks to their mastery of chemistry,

they invented new materials like plastic.

In agriculture,

plastic would let them
tame the sun's rays,

trapping their heat inside greenhouses.

The famous greenhouse effect.

By thus capturing solar energy
much more efficiently than ever before,

humans were able to go on growing crops
even when it was cold.

And, with artificial lighting,
even at night.

Efficiency and productivity
have been so prioritised by humans

that they have become second nature.

Almost an obsession.

Since plants don't sleep,

it makes sense to grow them constantly.

This was the Green Revolution,

which multiplied farming yields

while reducing

the amount of labour required,

thanks to mechanisation,

the use of very effective fertilisers,

high-performance irrigation,

and extremely powerful pesticides.

We went from 1,000 kilos of cereal
produced per farmer,

to 500,000 kilos.

Yes, you heard right.

500 times more in barely 150 years.

Livestock farmers too were able
to change the dimensions of their farms.

They could now efficiently manage
hundreds of animals,

optimising feeding and care,

giving many more people access
to cheaper meat.

Mechanisation also made it possible
to exploit raw materials, like wood,

on a much more massive scale
than had ever been possible before,

making it available
to everyone everywhere.

Entire forests
could be transported by ship.

Foodstuffs were transported
by the tonne,

gradually allowing hunger
to be pushed back around the world.

Each region specialised,
becoming more efficient,

exporting to neighbouring regions,
while importing their specialities.

Onto our tables
came steaks from Argentina,

tomatoes from Morocco,

avocados from Mexico,
prawns from Vietnam,

soy from Brazil, rice from Thailand...

Controlling energy like never before,
thanks to oil,

nothing could now be denied us.

We could now build an enormous city
in only two years,

and house millions of people there.

Concrete is the child of oil.

These technical feats
concentrate us so,

that it has become impossible to forget
that we're a very social species.

Populations grew,

and we built ever bigger,
ever higher, ever more organised cities.

We had the means and resources
to build cities anywhere,

even in the middle of the desert.

We simply had to desalinate the water
and import sand,

the world's second most consumed
resource after water, and make concrete.

The concrete used to construct
the world's tallest skyscraper, in Dubai,

was made with sand - listen carefully -
from Australia.

Yes, Australia.

Do you realise?

Nothing is denied us.

Like ants or termites,

we build energetically
for our ever-growing population.

But, unlike insects,

we're constantly improving
our level of comfort,

living longer,
and possessing more and more things.

It's been calculated
that a litre of oil

is the equivalent in energy
of the work

of 100 people for an entire day.

But we are now producing more
than 15 billion litres of oil a day.

The energy equivalent
of the physical labour

of 200 times
the population of the planet.

Since I was born in Paris,

the health of men and women
around the world has hugely improved.

Children die young less often,

many of us enjoy a richer,
more plentiful and diversified diet,

we live better and older,

we spend more time
in education, leisure,

and tourism...

Every year, France welcomes
more than 85 million tourists,

more than the actual
population of France.

We can now quickly nip
to another continent,

just to see elephants...

or cruise on distant seas
or the lagoons of Venice,

without abandoning our comforts.

And all these achievements
from the development of our society

seem normal to us.

We can go and visit the sacred temples
of Egypt, Cambodia or Burma,

to appreciate, as a family or en masse,

their serenity

and their calm.

You've got the picture.

This, sadly, is where this lovely story
of human success

starts to go off the rails.

And I can no longer speak
as if everything is fine.

I must have the courage of the truth,
and tell things how they are.

That is what I'm going to try to do now.

Having eliminated
practically all natural obstacles,

humans are pursuing
their blind, uncontrolled race ahead,

with no constraint to slow them down.

They are running now totally unbalanced.

Do these people on this beach in Rio

have any idea of the crisis
that the planet is facing?

Bolstered by their riches,

humans haven't shed their instinct
for accumulation,

reproduction and dissemination.

With the mortality rate
constantly in decline,

the world's population
is growing at breakneck speed.

When I was a child,

there were barely 2.5 billion of us.

In just my lifetime,

that number has increased threefold.

Every second,
there are five more of us on Earth.

Five more,

five more,

five more...

By the time you've watched this film,
there'll be 20,000 more of us.

In just four days,
there'll be a million more of us.

Next year, 100 million more.

We're becoming
an ever weightier burden on Earth,

our carbon footprint
ever more pronounced

as we clutter our lives with things.

Pushed on by the momentum of life
and the dynamics of our own success,

we thought
we could dominate the laws of nature.

But today they're reminding us
of their presence.

There cannot be an infinite population
in a limited territory.

We cannot extract infinite resources
from a finite planet.

We cannot have infinite growth
in a finite world.

Today the planet isn't facing
one major environmental crisis,

but two.

The climate crisis
and that of biodiversity.

The two crises are linked,
each exacerbating the other.

Both were created by human activity,

and both have an impact
on human societies.

There's a lot of talk
of the ice melting at the poles.

But we don't live at the poles,

so how does that actually concern us?

The answer is simple.

It's essential

because the ice is the best measure
of what's happening to the climate.

Its melting is easy to observe
and illustrates the problem.

It's a very clear warning signal
which is constantly screaming at us.

The planet is warming up
far too quickly.

And the reasons
are easy to understand.

For all the advantages oil has given us
we have had to pay a terrible price.

As it is burnt
it releases CO2 into the atmosphere,

the CO2 increases the greenhouse effect
and therefore the air temperature.

This greenhouse effect,
which is a natural process

that let Earth warm up sufficiently
for life to flourish,

is now too strong, much too strong.

The world's scientists are warning us

because on a planet-wide scale
the effects can be dramatic.

The more greenhouse gases we emit,

the more we risk
a massive melting of the poles.

But the poles play an essential role
in regulating the planet's climate.

Their disappearance would completely
destabilise the current climate.

And the melting of the ice
would raise the level of the oceans.

If Greenland melted,

the sea level would rise by six metres.

If the Antarctic melted, the scientists
say it would be more like 60 metres.

The amount of land flooded
would be incredible.

The oceans would advance tens,
even hundreds, of kilometres inland.

Our coastlines
would be entirely changed.

Luckily we haven't reached
that point yet.

But data show that the pack ice
is melting faster,

and icebergs are breaking off.

The world's glaciers,

on which more than 1 person in 5
depends for drinking water,

are gradually disappearing.

Since the Industrial Revolution
150 years ago,

we've increased the global temperature
by one degree.

And even by three degrees
at the North Pole and South Pole.

Each summer
brings a new high-temperature record.

The reason the scientists are so worried

is because these masses of ice
are a tipping point,

ready to topple into a chain reaction

which would precipitate melting
at a faster and faster rate.

Several phenomena
have recently been discovered

which could precipitate
this warming and melting.

One of these
is the warming of the permafrost.

From Canada to Siberia,

this is an immense expanse,
one fifth of the world's land surface.

This great wilderness

of earth permanently frozen
to a depth of several metres

has trapped incalculable quantities
of methane,

a gas with almost 30 times
the warming power of CO2.

In thawing and releasing this gas
into the atmosphere,

this permafrost is accelerating
its own thawing,

which is picking up speed,
quite slowly for now,

but getting faster and faster.

It's a climate bomb.

Some of you may think
that these extra two degrees

don't pose much of a threat.

After all, two degrees
is practically nothing!

It's easier to understand
the impact of a couple of degrees

when you see the effect of temperature
on your body.

Two extra degrees,
and you're bedridden with a fever.

Four extra degrees, and you're dead.

The climate crisis
isn't just global warming.

We ought really to call it
"climate malfunction",

with storms, hurricanes, cyclones,
heatwaves, floods, and fires,

ever stronger,

ever more frequent.

All this energy that we emit
in the form of CO2 into the atmosphere

comes back at us in the deadly force

of the storms and cyclones.

Nothing is lost,
it is all just transformed.

We see these catastrophes on TV
practically every day.

We're getting used to them.

And they're affecting
more and more people, everywhere.

Australians, Russians, Brazilians,

Americans, Indians, but also Europeans.

This concerns us all.

But there's another,
more insidious effect of global warming.

Its effect on agriculture.

Farmed species were selected
for a stable, temperate climate,

the same species farmed in each region
for millennia.

The plants in a field

are fine-tuned,

their fertiliser, pesticides
and water precisely dosed,

their genetics all identical,

the rhythm of their lives standardised.

These varieties of cereals,
vegetables and fruit

therefore perform particularly well
in the current climatic conditions.

On the other hand,

if the conditions change
they'll become completely ill-adapted.

But the climate upheavals are too swift
and brutal for these pampered plants,

which are starting to be affected.

The regions which farm produce
adapted to certain climates

may see their yields shrink
and have to change crops,

or even abandon their plantations.

We are, then, risking a malfunction
in the world's food supply.

This is worrying

because our daily lives
and very civilisation

depend entirely on the food
with which faming supplies us.

We all tend to forget this.

And it concerns all living species.

For while life is accustomed to change,

biodiversity isn't adapted
to such rapid modifications.

Biodiversity is the diversity,
the richness, of the living world.

Over two million known species,

but many millions of species
still to be discovered.

All these species are interlinked
and even depend on each other.

Trees, insects,

birds, mammals, humans...

The countless species
interacting with an ecosystem

depend on their connection to others.

Yes, you and I
are part of our biodiversity.

And, above all,
we need it in order to survive.

Absolutely everything we eat and drink

is this biodiversity.

Meat and fish,
fruit and vegetables, of course,

but also the microorganisms
which make cheese and yoghurt,

bread made with wheat,
beer, and wine.

Biodiversity also supplies us

with our materials,
like cotton, wool, or wood,

or most of our medicines,
traditional and modern.

Biodiversity

modulates our climate,

by absorbing the CO2 in the atmosphere,
for example.

It's biodiversity too
which purifies our air and our water,

fertilises our land,
and pollinates our crops.

It is what constitutes

the very bedrock of our existence
as living beings.

And even if we think
we're disconnected from nature,

even if we've lost the capacity
to marvel at it,

we are intrinsically connected.

We depend entirely on the good health
of the ecosystems around us

for the planet to work.

Living species,
whether farmed for our food or wild,

are the intravenous drips
which since the dawn of time

have kept the human race alive.

Yet we're killing off
a thousand species every year.

Every extinction is irreversible,

each one an irreplaceable loss.

It's a bit like wiping a hard disc

that's been working
for millions of years,

without knowing what was on it.

And as well as all the species
already gone,

a million more are currently
threatened with extinction.

A million!

I know that these figures
don't move everyone.

But some are so important

that I can't stop myself quoting them.

Here they are,
in four stages of my life,

and you'll see that they're not
as abstract as all that.

Since 1972, when I was 25,

the population of the world has doubled,

and we've eliminated almost two thirds
of animal populations.

Today, if we combine all mammals,

96% are humans and their livestock.

Only 4% are wild animals.

Since 1982, when I was 35,

we have doubled our extraction
of natural resources from the earth,

and we're now chucking 8 million tonnes
of plastic into the sea every year,

the equivalent
of a dustbin lorry's amount

tipped into the sea every minute.

This material can take centuries
to decompose,

and in the meantime
it fills the stomachs of rivers, fish,

and birds.

I find these images inconceivable,

impossible to look at...

They're an irrefutable symbol.

We live in a civilisation of rubbish.

In 1992 I was 45,

and I learnt,
at the first Earth Summit in Rio,

that we'd lost
half of the world's natural forests

and half of the ice caps.

Aware of the harm
we were doing to our environment,

I began a work
that would change my life:

Earth From Above.

Now I'm approaching my 75th birthday,

and 75% of the earth's surface
has been "severely altered".

Half of the inhabitable world

is used for farming,

and most of this farming
has gone insane.

It alone uses up 70%
of the world's fresh water.

And a third of this land
isn't used to feed us,

but to feed our livestock.

Every year,

we spread around five million tonnes
of pesticides and herbicides

to kill insects and weeds.

75% of flying insects have disappeared,
even in the protected areas

of Europe.

And in France we've lost 30%
of our passerine birds.

I could give you dozens of such figures.

It takes but a moment's thought
to realise that our animal nature,

which is still at the heart of humans,
drives us to consume ever more.

That our hyper high performance
has reached such a stage

that nothing can now resist it,

and that, without resistance,
the machine is out of control.

A powerful example of our excesses
is in California,

where the world's almond production
is concentrated.

The industrialisation of agriculture
is on a such a scale here

that to pollinate the trees

bees are brought in by truck.

As hundreds of billions of bees
are needed

to pollinate these gigantic fields,

and there aren't enough in California,

they are rented for the season,

and even sometimes imported
from Australia.

With all this manhandling,
the mortality rate is enormous.

But never mind,
you can always rent more next year.

Elsewhere, our domesticated animals,
which helped us out of poverty,

are raised and slaughtered in conditions
which show our lack of humanity.

In these meat factories,

taken at birth from their mothers
which then produce all our milk,

the calves are crammed together
in their thousands,

in fear and suffering,

without us giving a thought
to their sensibilities or intelligence.

Our greed and pursuit of profit

have made us totally lose sight
of the importance of life.

We treat animals like plants.
We have to make them grow quickly.

To mass-produce cheap meat,
the animals are crammed together

to be fattened and pumped full
of hormones and antibiotics.

This intensive livestock farming
uses water and grain

which could feed the world,

and contributes
to the greenhouse effect.

Despite health warnings,

consumers are urged by lobbies
to eat meat every day.

In 40 years the amount of meat
consumed in the world has tripled,

contributing to the very real
health crisis of obesity.

Yet it's a simple calculation.

While one farmed hectare
can provide food for two carnivores,

it could feed fifty vegetarians.

Over 100 billion animals are killed
every year for their meat,

a billion in France alone.

Yet nothing is curbing this zeal
to produce ever more cheap meat.

Here in China

these are not social-housing blocks.

They're the buildings
of a multi-storey pig farm.

From their birth to their slaughter,

these poor creatures never leave
these ultra-modern pigsties.

Not for a second
of their miserable lives

do they see the sky
or smell the earth.

Our pâté sandwich

is more often the unspeakable
and prolonged suffering

hidden behind these clean walls

than the consumption of an animal
that lived a healthy life on a farm.

As the poet Lamartine wrote:

"We don't have two hearts,
one for animals and one for humans.

"We have one heart or we have none."

Industrial fishing has also drifted
into troubled waters.

Using satellite and radar,

it's now possible to locate any shoal
of fish, however deep it might be,

and catch every last one.

Gigantic factory boats
contain all the facilities for gutting

and conditioning.

The fish are prepared and frozen
on the boat,

which can remain at sea for months,
emptying the ocean.

Unmarketable fish
are caught accidentally,

as are turtles and dolphins.

Hundreds of thousands
are killed every year.

The ocean beds are dredged
by trawling nets,

which destroy everything
over thousands of hectares,

a bit like harvesting strawberries
with a bulldozer.

At the same time we're killing
hundreds of millions of sharks a year.

More than 10,000 every hour.

It's not surprising that over 90%
of all marine predators

have been wiped out.

These industrial and intensives means
of farming and fishing

only enrich very few people.

Most humans still live in poverty,

without exhausting the land
or emptying the sea.

250 million farmers

have only animals
to help them work their land,

and a billion have nothing
but their own physical strength.

More than 90% of those who fish
do so on a small scale.

All over the world
I've filmed women and men

who haven't benefited
from the different energy revolutions,

and who work as hard
as people did centuries ago.

We know that a person in Bangladesh

emits 30 times less CO2
than an American.

But don't kid yourself.

In an era when the Internet makes images
of our paradise available everywhere,

the inhabitants of developing countries
want only one thing:

to be developed and live the dream
they see every day on their screens.

Children who know
of the opulent way we live,

yet have practically nothing,

are more numerous
in every country I travel to.

How can we consume less
and save more

while giving everyone the chance
of a better life?

For many humans it's not just
about fleeing poverty or war,

it's increasingly about fleeing
an environmental crisis.

But whether the cause is climate,
economics or politics,

they are all quite simply refugees.

They're increasingly numerous

and come from an ever growing number
of countries.

Only 20 million refugees in 2019.

I say "only"

because the UN predicts
250 million climate refugees in 2050.

In the poorest countries,

the climate crisis
and the biodiversity collapse

will cause famines, economic crises
and even wars.

And the rich countries
will be hit by the ricochets.

Whatever we might think,

the real migratory crisis
has not yet begun.

It will violently affect those fleeing,

but also those
in the receiving countries.

In my film Home, already 11 years ago,

I repeated several times that
it was far too late to be pessimistic.

And I proclaimed renewable energy

as the ultimate solution

for fighting climate change.

Around the world I've seen wind farms
sprout up like forests of hope.

But these efforts
haven't been accompanied

by a reduction in our consumption

of fossil fuels: coal, gas and oil.

They haven't replaced fossil fuels,

they've been supplementary,

added on.

I also said, let's look to the sky
and learn to harvest the sunshine.

Let's create our own photosynthesis.

Because the sun, in one hour,

gives us as much energy
as all of humanity consumes in a year.

Around the world

I've seen thousands of hectares
taken over by solar panels.

But all these wonderful initiatives

haven't replaced the 100 million
barrels of oil we consume every day.

100 million barrels.

And this figure increases every year.

Another mirage: the COPs,

these major international conferences

which bring together the countries
that signed the UN agreement

to fight climate change.

They've taken place every year
since the Kyoto Protocol in 1997.

I've often been present.

Behind the windows
in the UN building in New York

hundreds of diplomats study
the increasingly alarming reports

of the world's scientists,

and try to come up with solutions.

All of them symbolise
the hopes of humanity.

And I think they know it.

I don't for a second doubt
their good faith or sincere commitment.

These conferences at least
gather the world's leaders

to consider this vital subject.

Unfortunately,

they're more like meetings
of apartment co-owners who don't get on,

where the selfishness
of every nation comes to the fore,

and each country ends up doing
just what it wants.

An example, which to me
is the most striking and revelatory,

is in the famous Paris Agreement,
signed in 2015.

180 countries committed
to reduce the emissions

which contribute to climate change.

But, to make sure
the producing countries would sign,

the words "coal","oil",
"gas" and "fossil fuel"

did not even appear in the treaty.

As if they were afraid of naming
the enemy that's going to kill us.

Never has a COP succeeded
in reducing CO2 emissions.

This failure is the symbol
of our addiction to growth.

Coal, the most polluting fuel,
is still, despite everything,

the world's prime source
of electricity production.

They talked of the end of oil,
but they extract more and more,

like this shale gas
which is poisoning the soil of America.

With this new energy source,

the US is once more the world's
main producer of oil and gas,

driving down the price per barrel.

It's never been so cheap.

And that is in no way good news
for the environment.

With 40% of its people
not believing in climate change,

America, the world's richest
and most polluting country,

is, I think, the symbol

of our inconsistency.

Fossil fuels
are the lifeblood of our growth

and as such
are unconditionally protected

by international finance.

The banks lend with interest
over 650 billion dollars a year

to companies which explore new reserves
of fossil fuels.

The banks are therefore dependent
on their debtors,

and on the growth
of the fossil-fuel industry.

So it's hard to change the model

when it might cause
colossal financial losses

or even bankruptcies.

So what's to be done?

Curing finance of its addiction
to coal, oil and gas

is one of the challenges
to be taken up.

To be honest, I do see the banks making
encouraging moves to get out of coal,

but still too timidly
to reverse the trend.

They must go further

and invent a new model of finance
at the service of the planet,

whereas today it's our planet
which is at the service of finance.

In 2020 gigantic wildfires,
impossible to control,

ravaged Australia, Siberia,
and especially California,

where almost 300,000 people
had to be relocated.

San Francisco's millions of inhabitants,

who saw their city turn red
in the middle of the day

because of the burning forests,

no doubt really understood
what climate change means.

These Mad-Max-style,
end-of-the-world images

should make them think.

Should make us think.

This isn't fiction,

the movies...

It's reality.

How I hate telling you all this!

It breaks my heart.

It's so desperate.

These aren't the stories a grandfather
wants to tell his grandchildren.

But I don't want to lie to you.

I'm too old for that and I have no right.

I feel obliged to tell you the truth,

to have the courage to face that truth.

Could this be our legacy,

my legacy,

that I'll leave to my grandchildren?

Yet our children are often
a lot more clear-headed than us.

Thirty years ago, in 1992,

I was gripped
by the words of Severn Suzuki.

She was thirteen,

and she spoke at the United Nations
on behalf of all the world's children.

And almost 30 years later,

it was 15-year-old Greta Thunberg

who spoke at the United Nations.

She is so raw and awkward,

but is so touching and moving.

And above all else she is so right.

She endures the suffering
of those who understand.

And I think it's indecent
to make fun of her,

because it's not up to her
and our children

to bear the weight of the world.

It's up to me, to all of us.

How can a world
which ignores its children

hope to have a future?

How can we hear, 30 years apart,

the same warning message,
the same call for help,

and do nothing?

We haven't listened to our children,

and today we've been brought low

by something much smaller:

a virus.

As I'm finishing writing this film,

I'd never have imagined showing you
these sci-fi images

of these empty cities,
devoid of human beings.

Yet scientists had warned us
of the risks of a pandemic.

It's a bit like with climate change.

We don't want to believe it.

A pandemic every ten years.

That's where we're heading

if we don't radically change
our relationship to biodiversity.

Through deforestation and the capture
and sale of wild animals,

humans have created the perfect cocktail
for the outbreak of new pandemics.

HIV, Ebola, bird flu, and now Covid-19.

All these pandemics came from viruses
in wild animals,

which have adapted to humans.

Our industrial-scale livestock farming
and interconnected world

merely amplify the phenomenon.

This invisible danger
has become visible.

And, confronted with this new reality,

we have been able
to sacrifice our economy.

All around the world, at the same time,
we decided to stop everything.

And we all accepted these constraints

in order to save lives.

It is therefore vital

that we protect biodiversity

and rethink our relationship
with the natural world.

For the reality is that we're wiping out

everything that isn't human on earth.

Take heed.

According to the WWF,

in 50 years we've lost around 70%

of mammals, fish, birds,
amphibians, and reptiles.

70% of living creatures.

It's incredible.

And today,
faced with this unimaginable loss,

how is it possible not to think

of every living creature around me,
around us,

as something precious and sacred?

So,

what can we do to fight climate change?

It's actually quite simple.

It is imperative
that we decarbonise our lives

in every way we can.

This means reducing
our consumption of oil,

coal, and gas.

For this carbon-loaded energy
is hiding everywhere.

In our food, our clothes,
our travel, our homes...

Everything we consume every day
is full of oil, full of carbon.

There is no other solution,

even if this seems impossible.

For this energy which makes us
so powerful and rich

is now killing us.

Yes, it's killing us, as simple as that.

We have to confront this truth together.

And it's not my truth,

it's the truth
of thousands of scientists

that you have to believe.

Their solution?

We need to reduce the world's
consumption of fossil fuels

by 5% every year

to avoid exceeding the 2 degrees
fixed by the Paris Agreement.

And I'm mostly talking
about the rich nations,

because 70% of CO2 emissions

are produced by barely 10%
of the world's population.

And that includes me.

What an injustice!

If we do nothing,

by the year 2070

a third of humanity
may be living in regions

as hot and uninhabitable as the Sahara.

So, by 2070

a third of humanity,
which will mean over 3 billion people,

will be unable to live
in their own region.

Three billion, that's a lot of people!

We must, therefore, show great courage

in facing the enormity
of this overwhelming task,

and acknowledge
that there is no miracle solution.

There's no alternative.

Decarbonise our lives.

Not to commit to doing this

means being complicit.

And I'm in no position to lecture you,

because for 4/5 of my life
I ignored all that.

Take a good look at these faces
we filmed around the world.

I now know that my quest for beauty
was right there,

in these faces.

So present, so obvious.

We're going to have
to confront our destiny

all together,

with them.

We are all equal
in the face of suffering and death.

I think that we all share, deep down,
love for one another.

Remember what it is
that makes us strong:

intelligence and cooperation.

Can you feel that they are members
of our family?

Of your family?

Let us tell our children

that they're arriving on Earth
almost at the start of a story,

not at its disillusioned end.

They are

in the very first chapters

of a long and fabulous saga.

They must know they have a job to do,

with the children, their children,

and their children's children.

Do you see all the convictions
of the world in their faces?

Can you feel the love they're radiating?

So imagine what we could do,
all together.

For the only sustainable energy is love.

For my legacy

is quite simply the love of life.

There are SOLUTIONS,
it's up to you to CHOOSE.

For we are the CITIZENS,

we are the BUSINESSES,

we are the STATE

Let us listen to the SCIENTISTS
and learn about CLIMATE CHANGE

LET US ONLY VOTE for POLITICIANS

who put ECOLOGY
at the core of their PROGRAMMES

Let us VOLUNTEER

and MAKE COMMITMENTS
by joining ASSOCIATIONS

Let us STOP EATING INDUSTRIAL meat

Let us EAT food that is LOCAL,

in SEASON, ORGANIC, UNPROCESSED,

and NOT wrapped in PLASTIC

Let us SAVE with banks
that practise SUSTAINABLE FINANCE

Let us ISOLATE our HOMES

Let us buy SECOND-HAND

and REPAIR our things
to avoid OVERCONSUMPTION

Les us TRAVEL by TRAIN, BUS,

BIKE, CAR-SHARING,

or ELECTRIC VEHICLES

FLYING must ONLY BE
a means of transport

in EXCEPTIONAL CIRCUMSTANCES

When we BUILD,
instead of CEMENT

let us PREFER WOOD, EARTH,

STONE, and FIBRES.

Let us CALCULATE
our CARBON FOOTPRINT

to learn how to REDUCE it

Let us not SEE these as CONSTRAINTS

TAKING ACTION makes you HAPPY

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