COP30 In Belém, Brazil (2025)
IAHV’s COP30 engagement was driven by the youth engine of IAHV, with youth delegate Muskaan Banatwalla bringing her background in Conflict, Security and Development, and Sienna Bassi, an Engineering student from the University of Cambridge advocating for positive impact on people and planet, to bear on an integrative approach that combined mental health, youth leadership and climate action to deliver sustainable, proven, grassroots impact.
The conference’s location in the heart of the Amazon set a powerful tone. The conversations that followed with Commonwealth Secretariat representatives, delegates at the African Union Pavilion and governments across the Global South actively seeking scalable, community-led solutions, confirmed that IAHV’s integrated model is precisely what the international climate community is looking for.
Sienna represented IAHV as a youth panelist at a side event hosted by the Commonwealth Secretariat, speaking to the role of young people in driving community-led climate solutions, a moment that reflected both the strength of IAHV’s youth voice and the organisation’s growing standing within Commonwealth climate networks. FLY GREENER’s community-driven carbon offsetting model and YLTP’s youth leadership work both generated genuine interest, particularly among delegates working across nature-based solutions and climate-vulnerable contexts.
The clearest takeaway from Belém: the world is no longer looking for more promises. It is looking for proof.
And IAHV actively delivers that proof.
COP 29 In Baku, Azerbaijan (2024)
Pic above: L: Darshak Hathi (President, IAHV) R: Shailen Mittal (Board member, IAHV UK)
COP29 evolved more like a Finance COP. Focus in conversations shifted from a) Mitigation to Adaptation and b) Fossil Fuels to Climate Funds. Multilateralism was properly in play.
Our delegation engaged with Ministerial delegates from Kenya, Uganda and South Africa, while discovering funding pathways via Adaptation Acceleration funds of the AU, NEPAD and Africa Development Bank at the Africa Pavilion Panel talks.
Our delegation discussed IAHV’s mental health interventions with WHO officials and opened mental health intervention opportunities with a high level official for Azerbaijan’s Prisons, school teachers
and a University.
We were joined by Art of Living Azerbaijan’s Country Coordinator and Director Mr. Mammadov Kanan. Baku’s Volunteers and teachers offered vital hosting and networking support to our overseas delegates from the UK and India. IAHV delegates went
live explaining in plain-speak, the updates on Article 6.2 and 6.4 for rules of carbon trading that were discussed at high level negotiations.
COP28 In Dubai, UAE (2023)
The IAHV delegation put mental health in the centre-stage of Climate discussions, pitching for partnerships for its youth leadership programs in Europe and Africa.
IAHV’s delegation was kindly sponsored by its strategic partner Saving Our Planet’s founder and Director, Mr. Stephan Savarasse. Picture on the right shows IAHV Global President Mr.Darshak Hathi, and Global Program Coordinator Mrs. Sumathi Jayraman. IAHV UK Board member Shailen Mittal, shared on webinars the updates from ground in Dubai and the top highlights of high level negotiators, and a walk-through of some COP28 pavilions.
Delegates engaged with Commonwealth Secretariat at Reception hosted by Secretary General Patricia Scotland; and with youth-powered team of CCI and with leaders at Panel Talk at The Africa Union Pavilion
COP26 In Glasgow, Scotland (2021)
Having embarked upon the IAHV Climate Action Now reforestation initiatives in 2017, The COP in Glasgow was IAHV and Art of Living’s first delegation to the UNFCCC conference.
Shailen Mittal was joined by Pawan Udernani, core volunteer and long term supporter of IAHV. It is at this conference that Shailen experienced first hand, Climate Science gamified as Climate Fresk and 2Tons, and went on to become a qualified facilitator after a personal meeting with one of the founders – Frederick Ringenback. Shailen and Pawan were joined by local Art of Living faculty – Dr. Sujata Sriram, Ritu Bhargava and Greg Sandiland.
Three top takeaways were
a) It takes a massive lot for 192 nations to agree on negotiations that are agreed by absolute vote.
b) However monumental the goal seems, there are literally
thousands of solutions, innovators, organisations and movements diligently at work to limit the rise of global temperatures and
c) While public media coverage often focuses on sensationalized narratives that can heighten eco-anxiety, the core work of forums like the UNFCCC COP conferences centers on constructive dialogue, collaborative problem-solving, and genuine progress toward global climate solutions.