Quote by Ban Ki-moon: “We are the first generation that can end poverty, and the last that can act on climate.”

This is a statement of both possibility and urgency. Humanity has the technological and economic means to eliminate extreme poverty — and the window to prevent catastrophic climate change is still open, but closing fast. It frames this moment in history as one that will never come again.

Ban Ki-moon said this near the end of his tenure as UN Secretary-General in 2016, the year the Paris Agreement on climate change was signed by 195 countries. Global inequality and environmental degradation were intensifying, and the Sustainable Development Goals had just been adopted as a framework for global action.

South Korean diplomat who served as the eighth Secretary-General of the United Nations from 2007 to 2016. His tenure prioritised climate change, sustainable development, and humanitarian intervention on a global scale.