Lights in South Korea will be turned off for an hour on Saturday as part of the World Wide Fund for Nature’s annual Earth Hour campaign to raise awareness about climate change, WWF said Thursday.

Held in major cities around the globe, Earth Hour is a worldwide event during which lights are turned off for an hour starting at 8:30 p.m. to show support for global efforts to save the planet.

In Seoul, the National Assembly, Seoul City Hall, Namsan Seoul Tower, Sebitseom, the 63 Building, the Lotte World Tower and Namdaemun Gate are among the landmarks that will go dark. Some 20 companies, including Herald Corporation and Samsung Electronics, will also take part.

The main event is scheduled for Saturday at 3 p.m. at Coex in southern Seoul, where Park Seo-joon, WWF’s promotion ambassador, will encourage people to join the campaign.

“Earth Hour 2019 is a good opportunity to draw the international community’s action to prevent the destruction of nature and restore it,” said Yoon Se-wong, head of WWF Korea.

In 2016, Korea prevented 3,131 tons of greenhouse gas emissions by having its public buildings participate in Earth Hour, an impact equivalent to the planting of 7,000 young pine trees, according to WWF. 

Globally, the Sydney Opera House, the Tokyo Skytree, the Shanghai Tower, the Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament in London, the Eiffel Tower in Paris and the United Nations headquarters in New York will join the campaign on Saturday.

Last year, 188 countries and more than 17,900 major landmarks took part in Earth Hour.

Earth Hour was launched in Sydney in 2007 to send the message that small actions can bring about big change.

Established in 1961 as the World Wildlife Fund, WWF is the world’s largest organization devoted to conserving nature with operations in 100 countries. The organization aims to conserve biodiversity, fight climate change and reduce unnecessary consumption and pollution. WWF Korea was officially launched in 2014.

(laeticia.ock@heraldcorp.com)