The impact on the local community of the extraction of minerals in Madagascar by the London-based mining giant Rio Tinto graphically illustrates the message of Laudato Si’, which was officially published seven years ago, on 18 June 2015

“Every day I see a line of people around a public fountain because they do not have a water supply at home. It never used to be that bad.” This is the experience of Mialy Randrianirinaaly, who works at Arrupe Social Centre in Antananarivo, the capital of Madagascar.

Testimonies such as Mialy’s are increasingly common. People in the poorest parts of the world are already suffering from the effects of climate change, whether through drought, extreme weather events or soil degradation. Seven years on from the publication of Pope Francis’ landmark encyclical, Laudato Si’, responding to the cry of the Earth and the cry of the poor is taking on an ever-increasing urgency.

Too often the interconnectedness between the economies of the wealthier countries and the precarity of people in poorer communities is not fully appreciated, either in terms of the natural world or its people.