‘Earth Hour’ is a WWF initiative where citizens around the globe show support for action on climate change. Having emerged as the largest climate change action in the history, ‘Earth Hour’ is meant to inspire individuals, governments and corporations to take a pledge and move towards responsible consumption and conservation of energy, said Sunny Shah, a WWF project officer. Shah, Sanjay Thakur and Jyotirmayee Jena, all senior project officers with WWF based in Mandla in Madhya Pradesh, were in the city on Tuesday to highlight the climate change campaign. In India, over 12 cities are on board and noted film actor Abhishek Bachchan is the ambassador for the campaign.

This year, ‘Earth Hour’ will be observed between 8.30pm and 9.30pm. Nearly 103 countries have so far extended support. ‘In 2009, over 4,000 cities and of the world, including Sydney, Singapore, Moscow, London and Mexico too joined to show support. Earth Hour’ began in 2007 in Sydney where 2.2 million people participated and it reached across the globe in 2008 when close to 50 m people from 370 cities of the world joined the cause.

“Close to five million people participated in ‘Earth Hour’, the first time we got this campaign to the country in 2009. It received unprecedented participation when over 56 cities, several corporations, and over 6,00,000 students supported the campaign,” Shah said.