But despite their initial reservations, the journalists became so passionate about the need for change, they decided to form the Environmental Journalists’ Association. Here Mary describes their dramatic change of heart.

All eyes were on the condom. It lay on a mountain of compost at the Mbale Municipal Council Compost processing plant.

Waste into compost is a fairly simple process which takes time, heat and a deal of rough treatment … hence the awe. How had this thing survived intact?

The journalists were baffled.

This is a Clean Development Project (CDM) in embryo. Funded by the World Bank it aims to turn the organic waste generated by the citizens of Mbale town into cheap compost and by so doing contribute to cleaning up the world’s atmosphere. Put briefly, well-managed waste means no gas emissions and that means cleaner atmosphere. Should the scheme be ratified in Bonn it will generate Certified Emission Reduction (CER) status and so money will change hands.

Try explaining all that to 33 journalists more interested in the mystery of the condom.

We were on the first of our field trips for the latest climate change course organised by the British Council (Uganda) and the Thomson Foundation, and funded by the Department for International Development (DFID – or UK Aid as it now likes to be called).

Mbale environmental officer Rhodah Nyarib speaks to the journalists about the achievement of the town's compost plant

The 33 were all experienced reporters and editors, carrying with them the cynicism and suspicion of the trade. My job for the Thomson Foundation was to deliver an understanding of climate change and the need for them to spread the word to a nation which is already feeling the stress of  the shifting weather patters.

What soon became clear is their lack of faith in the willingness of official agencies to be proactive. This may not be entirely fair on those who strive for change, but it is the perception of most of the group. NATO is the mantra. No Action Talk Only.

No pressure then.

We left the compost plant and headed for a school to plant trees. Tree planting has caught on in Uganda. Over our week together we accounted for at least eight million trees being planted in the region we were working.

Everyone cheered up until we discovered that most of the planting is agro-forestry for firewood and building. Plant close, harvest quickly and then the whole lot goes up in smoke (CO2) again as fuel. You can’t blame anyone – wood is all people can afford to cook on and there is already a shortage that gets worse by the season.

Unlike Rwanda, where re-forestation works with native hardwoods, Uganda is hoping that fast-growing imports like pine and eucalyptus will do the trick.

Stuck on the road to Bududa. The bus carrying the journalists finally arrived at its destination high in the Mt Elgon National Park

We dug on and planted mango, avocado and orange. At least the kids would have fresh fruit. The children sang their delighted thanks while displaying a greater knowledge of climate change than any of  the group.

The discussion about trees carried on as we rocked home on the washed-out road.

Our course was timed to coincide with the launch of a new United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) initiative called Territorial Approach to Climate Change (TACC). Put briefly, with funds from DFID and the National Assembly for Wales (amongst others), it is an attempt to find solutions to offset the effects of climate change on a regional level.

It makes sense. At regional level, people know each other, know the local challenges and stand a chance of finding answers.

The launch took place in the poshest hotel in Mbale. No carbon from us we walked there arriving hot but smug. The 33 journalists set to work. The Welsh Minister, John Griffiths, and DFID’s Kate Wedgwood went down a storm. Lots of media material there.

The next day we headed for the hills to see how important it is to work with local knowledge. Easier said than done. Our bus got stuck. It took 40 minutes, endless advice and shouting from onlookers and the determination of at least ten men to shift it from knee-deep mud. We set off again for the Bududa district, where so far this year at least 350 people have perished in landslides.

After an hour’s struggle up a steep hill through the bananas and eucalyptus the group were questioning the point of our mission. But, as usual with these courses, it was the evidence of the locals that did the trick.

Matia village farmer Mulla Moses speaks of his losing battle to stablise his farmland. A landslide near here killed 350 people just months ago

Farmer Mulla Moses, of Matia village, does his best to stabilise the soil, as do 70 others like him in the neighbourhood. But pressure of people on the land make it almost impossible. The national density of people per square kilometre in Uganda is one hundred and twenty nine. Here it is between six hundred and a thousand. Seventy percent of all natural disasters in Uganda are climate change related.

The message and the need were getting home.

Local environmental officer Charles Wakube laid out the core of the dilemma. The Mt Elgon region is one of the most important in Uganda. It is a watershed and supposed to be forested. It is rich in wetlands and in the not-so-recent past was rich in biodiversity. But survival and economic development are strong competitors.

If the gang of 33 felt something at the beginning of the week, it was resignation. But gradually the mood changed. And in the end something snapped. What they saw and heard shocked them beyond their limits of tolerance. After much discussion and debate, they gathered together and decided there CAN be action beyond talk.

The 33 journalists decided to form the Environmental Journalists Association and left the course pledging to work together to get the message of climate change out in a way the people can understand.

We’ll follow their progress with interest.

12►

Emerging from Lagos airport into the smoggy morning heat, the drive across the lagoon to the island housing the smarter parts of the city brought home the vulnerability of this megacity to the impacts of climate change.

At the lagoon’s edge, whole neighbourhoods of rickety houses built on stilts and connected by perilous walkways stretch far out into the water.

It won’t take much sea level rise to make refugees out of these people.

Helping Nigerian journalists to make sense of the complex and bewildering world of climate change politics in the run-up to the UN Copenhagen conference was my brief for the two-day course at the British Council’s office in Lagos, sponsored by FCMB bank.

Facing this reality of life on the edge – quite literally – and persuading Nigerians that anything meaningful to them could be decided at Copenhagen was going to be a hard sell.

The lively bunch of journalists on my course had a healthy dollop of cynicism about the whole UN process. This didn’t improve when I explained that the major source of carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol’s Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) in Nigeria is from projects to prevent the widespread practice of gas-flaring in the oilfields – a practice that blights local communities as well as creating about a third of the country’s carbon dioxide emissions.

Gas-flaring has also been declared illegal by Nigeria’s courts – but, for most companies, the cheapest option is just to pay the fines and carry on flaring.

One of my students looked at me incredulously: “So let me get this straight.

The UN is allowing these companies to earn money for not doing something that is illegal?” I nodded. “So are we going to start paying cocaine dealers for not dealing?” There was no answer to that one.

Having spent much of the last 12 years reporting on the post-Kyoto climate process, explaining it to an audience in Africa brings home just how marginalised this continent has been – and how sceptical its journalists are entitled to be.

For example, of more than 1900 projects approved under the CDM to bring investment in emission-abating technologies to the developing world, just 36 are in Africa. China, India, Brazil and Mexico have the lion’s share.

“Why don’t we have more? Don’t they trust us?” Again, no answer.

Despite the scepticism, there was a burning curiosity on the part of these journalists to understand better what the arguments at Copenhagen are about, because the process has almost zero visibility in the Nigerian media.

If the climate negotiators really want to engage Africa in this process, they have a long way to go.

The man on the plane is adamant: “You will never make people in Nigeria care about climate change.”

We are flying to Kano – a city of sheep, goats, horses and ten million people – to impart the basics of climate change to local journalists. It’s part of a British Council project called Climate UN covered: The future of our planet uncovered. Everything you ever wanted to know about climate change, Kyoto and Copenhagen. In five days.

So far the runes haven’t been optimistic. The sentiments of my travelling acquaintance are echoed by the journalists who show up for the launch. We know what sells, they say, and it isn’t global warming, environment or climate change. What’s more, no-one in the West is taking responsibility for it, so why should we care?

In the light of such enthusiasm, I opt for the Marine maxim ‘faint heart never won fair maiden’. Actually its ruder than that, but even the sanitised version is enough to pitch me into battle to prove everyone wrong. Kano would become a centre of excellence for climate change journalism no matter what.

‘What’ is soon clear. No one understands the jargon. They have heard the terms but their meaning is up there with the clouds of carbon monoxide. We begin, and much drawing and storytelling later we are slightly more enlightened.

The journalists are smart and willing, but ‘the greenhouse effect’ in a part of the world which rarely falls below 22 degrees is a hard sell. I begin the feel a certain sympathy for the conspiracy theorists among us. Their faces suggest this climate change stuff is yet one more western plot to stop Africa developing; to limit Nigeria’s wealth; to keep the people down. But, being a generous bunch, they say nothing and listen on.

It takes the guest appearance of Dr Abdul Auda to convert the doubters. A brilliant presentation from a man dedicated to bringing the reality of climate change to fellow Nigerians turns the local drought, creeping desert and dust storms from climate change theory to fact.

Strengthened by conversion we descend on the village of Kwa, where the desert is creeping in with the speed of an incoming tide.

Malam Josin, who looks about 80 but is probably closer to 60, draws his donkey to a halt to talk. He knows all about change … he’s been battling with it for 20 years. Late rains, short rains, crop failure, having to sell his animals for food, watching the village young go to town for work – he’s seen it all. But is climate change to blame? His good eye takes on a philosophical glint as he looks towards the heavens. “It’s from God,” he says. “Nothing we can do.”

We move on to talk to a couple of men splintering one of the few mature trees that have survived the lack of water and thinning soil. They work with tools which wouldn’t look out of place in the Stonehenge museum. This land is part of a government reserve – trees are protected – but slivered wood buys fertiliser and that helps the crops. A bit … if it rains.

We walk over the dusty soil. Dr Audu gestures to the landscape. “To be sustainable this place needs to be cloaked in bush at a density of 25 per cent,” he laments.  Today it has been measured at ten per cent and thinning.

Back to the shelter of the British Council to paint pictures through words that will convey the reality  of life. Surely there is someone, perhaps an editor in search of a campaign, prepared to take on the cause of 140 million Nigerians who are being effected by changing climate. Someone prepared to take the long view.

The catalyst for change will have to come from the band of nine journalists who have stuck with us. It’s their job to get the word out and try to prod those in power into action. They leave promising to fight for the cause.

I hope they do. I’d hate my friend from the plane to be proved right, especially as he turned out to be in the oil business.