Help us make a difference The climate crisis is at the heart of our coverage. Here’s why

What is salient is not important. What is important is not salient. Most of the time, most of the media obsesses over issues of mind-numbing triviality. Much political journalism is little more than court gossip: who’s in, who’s out, who said what to whom. Issues of immense, even existential importance are largely or entirely ignored.

With the exception of all-out nuclear war, all the most important issues that confront us are environmental. None of our hopes, none of our dreams can survive the loss of a habitable planet. And there is scarcely an Earth system that is not now threatened with collapse.

Let’s begin with the ground beneath our feet. Soil is biological, created by the organisms that inhabit it. When conditions become hostile, the structure collapses, and fertile lands turn to dust bowls. We rely on the soil for 99% of our calories, yet we treat it like dirt.

Ocean ecosystems are in even greater trouble, hammered by industrial fishing, pollution and acidification. Forests, rivers, wetlands, savannahs, the cryosphere: all are being pushed towards the brink. And climate breakdown is gathering at shocking speed, with disasters occurring at 1.2C of heating that scientists did not expect until we hit 2 or 3C.

All Earth systems are complex systems, which means they do not respond to change in linear and steady ways. They absorb stress up to a certain point, then suddenly collapse. During previous mass extinctions, collapse seems to have cascaded from one ecosystem and Earth system to the next. The conditions in which the majority of life on Earth evolved could, if we do not take urgent and drastic action, suddenly come to an end.

Yet you would scarcely know it. Most of the media, most of the time, either ignores our environmental crisis, downplays it or denies it. Most of the media is owned by corporations or billionaires, who have a major financial interest in sustaining business as usual. If governments acted to prevent the collapse of Earth systems, business models would have to change drastically, and these changes would disfavour legacy industries and their investments.

Part of the Guardian’s mission is to fill in the gaps, to cover issues overlooked by most of the rest of the media, above all the issues whose neglect could be fatal to much of life on Earth. With correspondents all over the world, with a dedicated team of expert reporters and an open approach, the Guardian seeks to put environmental issues where they belong: at the front and centre of people’s minds.

Without a proprietor or other such interests leaning on us, we are free to explore issues and express opinions that in other places are treated as a kind of blasphemy. Our aim is to make the important salient and the salient important. But depth and scope do not come cheap. Investigating issues not covered elsewhere requires a great deal of time and money.

That is why we are so grateful to you for buying the Guardian Weekly. Subscriptions directly power our journalists investigating and reporting on all the above issues and more. With supporters all around the world, we can devote more resources than ever to these critical matters. So, if you are not already a Guardian Weekly subscriber, please consider becoming one. Together we can make a difference. Thank you for caring.

We believe that everyone should have the right to learn about such crucial topics, so we have resisted the commercial pressure to put our website content behind a paywall.

With your help we can continue to place environmental issues where they belong: at the front and centre of people’s minds.

None of our hopes, none of our dreams, can survive the loss of a habitable planet