[ANU Pacific.Institute] Message from Fossil Free ANU

[Vicki Luker]

Dear All,

The following message comes to you via Odette Shenfield from Fossil Free ANU. Please feel free to add your voice to their open letter - the campaign seeks support, and especially welcomes any from members of the ANU community who feel for the Pacific. (PS Odette has also been visiting staff and videoing their brief statements in advance of next Tuesday's meeting. Do contact her! The process is painless!)

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Fossil Free ANU is a student-run campaign calling on the ANU to stop investing in fossil fuel companies. We'd like to invite you to sign our Open Letter from ANU staff in support of divestment. We will be presenting the open letter to Council and the Vice-Chancellor in March. Names will not be disclosed until we reach a minimum of 100 signatures.

By demonstrating that hundreds of staff from across the university want to work for an institution that is fossil free, we will show the ANU Council that this is an issue they cannot ignore in 2016.

Add your voice to the open letter here: http://act.350.org/signup/ffanu-open-letter-2/

In 2014, the ANU made national headlines after divesting from seven socially irresponsible mining companies. The University stood by its decision despite unprecedented backlash from the Prime Minister and other federal ministers, the Australian Financial Review, and the mining industry. However, this divestment decision included only two
Moreover recent research indicates<http://350.org.au/news/carbon-costs-erase-billions-from-major-funds/> that had the ANU fully divested, they would have saved $53 million over the last three years. Investing in the fossil fuel industry is not only unethical, it no longer makes financial sense.

The movement is rapidly growing, with over 500 institutions<http://gofossilfree.org/commitments/> worldwide making divestment commitments, including the University of Oxford and Stanford University. The Australian Academy of Science and the ACT Government have both committed to full divestment.

It is now time for the ANU to finish what it started, and become the first Australian university to commit to full divestment.



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Dr Vicki Luker
Executive Editor, The Journal of Pacific History
Lecturer, School of Culture, History and Language
College of Asia and the Pacific
Australian National University ACT 0200
Australia

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