Look up, and you’ll often see the skies populated with some of Aotearoa’s famous native – and sometimes rather unusual – nature birds. Many of us are unaware, however, that above those birds our skies are being increasingly populated by private jets, which contribute to the anthropogenic threats our communities, including our cherished bird taonga, are facing. In fact, over the past 10 years, private jet use has more than doubled in New Zealand, despite private jets emitting approximately 15 times more per passenger than commercial flights do.
The use of private jets is enabled by our current systems that fail to regulate the concentration of wealth and harmful ways of transport. In Aotearoa, this is made clear by the fact that private jets only pay a third of the government’s civil aviation fees that commercial flights do. This is a clear example of how climate change is a social justice issue. Further, while 80% of the world has never set foot on an airplane, the ultra-rich swan around in private jets – an overt display of what is going wrong with our world.
350 Aotearoa is calling on the airports across the motu to help us make private jets a thing of the past. Looking to other places across the globe can be a great source of inspiration. In the Netherlands, certain airports have banned private jets from landing on their runways, while in France a private jet supertax of 70% has been planned. Legislation must be introduced here to stop rolling out the red carpet for the ultra-rich and their private jets.
The climate crisis is not in transit, it’s arrived at the gate. It’s in our skies, our water, and our land – with record-shattering heat waves, increasingly severe wildfires and flooding from superstorms and rising seas. While the climate burns and New Zealanders struggle with the cost of living, the ultra-rich fly around in private jets, burning the climate while the rest of us suffer. There is no reason for the uber-rich to fly in energy-guzzling, climate-killing planes that pay lower fees while the rest of us struggle to make ends meet during this cost of living crisis.
The impacts of the climate crisis are already harming people around the world who will never set foot on a plane, let alone a private jet. This is plane greedy. We need urgent action to cut emissions, and it makes sense to start with the emissions which are most wasteful and least beneficial.
Let’s guide aviation towards a safe landing, and end the age of climate-killing private jets.
