Speaker: Khanyi Mlambo-Chaba

Humanity has reached a point where it has to be humble and “sit down and listen to Mother Earth”, businesswoman and athlete Khanyi Mlambo-Chaba said.

Humility is one of the first lessons one learns when climbing big mountains, said Mlambo-Chaba, who has climbed some of the world’s highest mountains and run more than 200 marathons. Mlambo-Chaba has completed both the Comrades and Two Oceans marathons 10 times, and run marathons in Boston, New York, Tokyo, London, Berlin and Chicago.

Climate change has long been a concern for Mlambo-Chaba: she has adopted 13 children and her focus is on their future, and the futures of all children. She completes the athletic feats to raise funds for their education.

“Our children may never see the sparkle of ice on Kilimanjaro,” she said of Africa’s highest mountain, the glaciers of which have been receding for many years.

Leaders needed to be careful to include all people in the plans they make to stave off climate change, Mlambo-Chaba said. She recounted a recent incident in a supermarket, through which she realised that the teller she was dealing with had no real idea of why it is important to reduce plastic use.

“Although the shops and the government are doing their best, we have forgotten to take everyone along with us,” she said.

This brought Mlambo-Chaba to another lesson she has taken from mountaineering. At high altitude everyone suffers, no matter how fit, she said.

Humankind’s ultimate equality is a lesson that people have learned through the Covid-19 pandemic, she said. No matter how much money or resources anyone, or any nation, had, it was in many ways an equaliser.

Mlambo-Chaba said her experience climbing Mount Elbrus, the highest peak in Europe, taught her that people need the right gear to complete a tough task.

The Russian peak is the most technical mountain Mlambo-Chaba has summited, and the required gear is heavy and “your life depends on what you take with you”. It is also a mountain that has to be tackled slowly, so that climbers acclimatise properly, and it is only reached by hiking and climbing across other large mountains.

Tackling climate change is going to take courage, adaptation and the realisation that there are no easy wins, and the willingness to face uncomfortable situations and decisions, Mlambo-Chaba said.

“Climate change is not a competition. It’s about how we pull together in unison, as a team … We all have a choice, we can continue to talk, or we can prepare and understand that there will be hard work involved. We can be humble and know we don’t know the answers, but we do know that we need a new way.”

The South African business sector was not adopting climate-friendly practices quickly enough, or taking the challenges of climate change seriously enough, Mlambo-Chaba said.

Research by the Institute of Directors in South Africa, of which she is a member, showed that in general business put climate change at the bottom of a list of 10 challenges it faces. “There is a lot of progress, but as soon as there is a little cough in the economy, it falls off the list. The focus is still on profit first,” she said.

Business leaders needed to commit themselves to fighting climate change, they needed to measure their progress on this, and they needed to see themselves and their business as part of South African society, she said.

“I believe in the concept of shared value. It is good for business to make a profit, but on the back of doing good for society.”