The countdown to the Biggest Hour on Earth is set for March 25, Saturday, when millions of people across the world will converge around major world landmarks, cities, and communities to switch off their lights for 60 minutes — starting at 8:30 pm, as part of a global movement to save the planet.
In the Philippines, national landmarks, office buildings, government offices, and individual houses will all join in as a sign of a broader commitment towards addressing our planet’s sustainability.
The Earth Hour global celebration started as a symbolic event in Sydney, Australia in 2007 and has grown into one of the world’s largest grassroots environmental movements spanning over 7,000 cities and 193 countries and territories.
The Philippines joined in 2008, making this year’s Earth Hour the fifteenth time the celebration is observed.
Several community partners will also be participating in this year’s main Switch Off event in the Quezon City Memorial Circle: World Vision Philippines, Oxfam Pilipinas, Boy Scouts of the Philippines, Association of Young Environmental Journalists, and De La Salle University among others.
Their participation demonstrates solidarity among fellow environment and development groups in coming together for a common cause to tackle climate change, biodiversity loss, and environmental degradation.
As humanity’s unsustainable demands on the natural world are leading to climate breakdown, habitat loss, and decline of wildlife, Earth Hour is celebrated every year on the last Saturday of March as an opportunity to invite individuals and institutions to take substantive measures for the planet. The core message of this movement lies in going “Beyond the Hour” – essentially, the actions people can do after the lights go back on.
This year’s Earth Hour celebration in the Philippines will be the first in-person event since 2020 before lockdowns due to COVID-19 forced the celebration to go online.
For a decade since its inception back in 2007, Earth Hour focused on building awareness of climate change.
In 2018, the movement’s focus pivoted to include both climate and nature as their interconnectivity became more evident, with human activity causing direct negative impacts on nature and the environment, contributing to biodiversity loss and climate change.
While COVID-19 has prevented people from interacting in person, this has been an opportunity to connect to millions of people in digital spaces and engage with decision-making institutions to secure a new deal for nature with the aim of halting the loss of biodiversity by the end of the decade.
Quezon City has been a continuous partner of WWF-Philippines and Earth Hour for many years.
Earth Hour was last held in Quezon City Circle in 2015. Quezon City was also a finalist in the recent One Planet Cities Challenge (OPCC) 2021-2022. OPCC is a friendly global competition initiated by WWF to recognize cities for their climate actions and ambitions and assess whether they align with the goals set forth in the Paris Agreement in limiting climate change to 1.5 °C.
March 25 will also be the start of the annual Earth Hour Virtual Run, a self-paced virtual run that aims to promote a sustainable and healthy lifestyle, raise environmental awareness, and support conservation efforts of WWF-Philippines.
The run will last for a month up to April 22, wherein participants can choose their running distances from 10 km to 60 km. The registration started on February 3 and will end on April 9.
Earth Hour 2023 is co-presented by Quezon City Government, together with our Official Communications and PR Partner, COMCO Mundo League of Enterprises, and supported by the Department of Energy, Climate Change Commission, League of Cities of the Philippines, League of Provinces of the Philippines, Department of Agriculture, Court of Appeals, Department of Health, Armed Forces of the Philippines, Department of Information and Communications Technology, National Historical Commission of the Philippines, and the National Parks Development Committee.
