Cat Toys, Play-Doh And Pie Charts. Bill Gates' Video On Climate Change

Squishy toys and play-doh were Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates's tools of choice as he explained the challenge we face in tackling climate change. And it took him less than two minutes to drive home his point.

In an 80-second video he released on YouTube, the billionaire elaborates on the contribution of the manufacturing sector to greenhouse emissions and stresses on the importance of innovation in helping tackle the problem.

Mr Gates empties a box of toys in the video as he begins to talk about climate change. "People think 'Hey, aren't we getting the solar panels and windmills to get a lot less expensive and isn't that helping reduce greenhouse gases?' And the answer is, absolutely," he says.

He further goes on to say that the answer to tackling global warming is not just to bring down electricity to zero emission and with the help of a pie-chart made with play-doh, lists different contributors to greenhouse emissions like manufacturing, agriculture and transportation sectors, among others.

The 63-year-old says that these sectors are not talked about as much in the context of climate change. Holding up a toy cat, he chooses to focus on the manufacturing industry, which is seen in the video having one of the larger shares in the pie-chart. "Everything we make, including this cute little squishy, contributing to 21% of greenhouse gases," he says.

Touching upon the rapid urbanisation that is happening across the globe, Mr Gates talks about how the number of buildings in the world are projected to double by 2060. "It's like we are going to build a new New York City every month, for 40 years," he says, using toy buildings to demonstrate.

"It's a gigantic amount of materials. Steel, cement, wood - all emitting greenhouse gases."

Stressing on the need for alternative methods to produce these materials in order to bring down greenhouse emissions to zero, he says a lot of change and innovation is required.

The video has been viewed over 3 lakh times since it was posted on February 12.

Climate change is an acute threat to global development and without urgent action, climate change impacts could push an additional 100 million people into poverty by 2030, according to the World Bank.