Stephen Leahy is an award-winning international environmental journalist with over 25 years of experience in the field. His work has been published in a wide range of prestigious publications around the world, including National Geographic, The Guardian, Vice, New Scientist, Maclean’s, Al Jazeera, and many others. Leahy's journalism focuses on critical environmental issues such as climate change, water scarcity, and biodiversity loss, aiming to bring global attention to these urgent matters.
1. Would you please start by telling us why you became an environmental journalist and maybe a bit about that mid life crisis?
5:07 For about 10 years I had a career in marketing. At one time I was the kind of the junk mail king of Canada sending out paper flyers by mail. I was at a direct mail conference and David Suzki was the guest speaker. It was kind of a downer because he was talking about climate change and environmental impact . And when he was asked "what can we do as an industry?" he replied "stop what you are doing and do something useful."
6:01 I took that to heart because I was feeling tired of the long commute to work, the direct mail industry, wanted to do something more meaningful, spend more time with my family and more time outside of highly air conditioned offices. I wanted to integrate my work with my family life.
Were you able to achieve what you set out to do?
7:14 Absolutely. I was there for my kids before and after school. Could go for walks and schedule my won time . It took a few years because I had a family, a mortgage, and there were financial pressures.
2. You wrote a book Your Water Footprint – please tell us a little about that and is there any good news here? What are the 3 things people can do day to day that will make a difference. person can do on a very small scale to help protect water.
8:11 The book came about when someone in Uxbridge where I lived at the time asked me to do a info graphic approach to show in a visual the impact of our use of water. An Ottawa school is using the book for a project called Blue Schools. I ask the school kids if there is anything that we can make that does not require water. There really isn't anything.
Is there anything we can do to protect water?
10:18 Any time you consume anything be aware of the water consumption. The idea is to respect water. For thousands of years water has been considered sacred because we cannot survive without it or do anything without it. I think having that mindset of awareness helps us and water.
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