Protecting the Climate for People:Human Rights and Climate Change

Dr Tara Shine, Special Adviser to the Mary Robinson Foundation - Climate Justice

Law and the Environment 2015, UCC 23rd April 2015

Overview

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

2. How climate actions can pose risks to human rights

3. How human rights obligations can inform more effective climate action

4. What this means for the 2015 climate agreement and the Post 2015 development agenda

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

Climate change has implications for the full range of human rights, in particular the rights of poor, vulnerable and marginalised people.

The Right to Food : Climate change is unjustly and disproportionality affecting the food supplies of the most vulnerable

Arctic Niger

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

• IPCC Fifth Assessment Report (2014) describes the impacts climate change is having and will have on human health, food security, employment, poverty and security.

• Major disruptions to the basic functions of human society will occur unless the world takes aggressive action to limit greenhouse gas pollution.

• Continuing climate change will have serious impacts on human health, will slow economic growth and poverty reduction, further erode food security and trigger new poverty traps.

• A global average temperature increase of more than 4°C could make normal activities like growing food impossible in many regions where people currently live.

Climate Change Impacts Impacts on Human/Social Systems Human rights affected

Temperature rises Risk of extreme weather

events Threats to unique

ecosystems Changes in precipitation

and distribution of water. Threats to biodiversity Sea-level rises, flooding and

storm surges Large scale “singularities”

Increased health risks/fatalities from diseases and natural disasters

Increased water Insecurity Loss of livelihoods Changes in agricultural

productivity and food production

Threats to security/societal cohesion

Effects on human settlements, land and property leading to

migration and displacement Impacts on political/public

services Damage to vital Infrastructure

and public utilities Loss of cultural integrity Decline in natural systems

services Distribution of impacts

(vulnerable, poor, and marginalized are hit first and hardest)

Life Poverty, adequate standard of living, and means of

subsistence Food and hunger Health Water Culture Property Adequate and secure housing Education Work Property Women’s, children’s, and indigenous people’s rights Self determination

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

Resolutions of the UN Human Rights Council: • Resolution 7/23, 2008 - the first time a UN resolution stated explicitly that climate

change “poses an immediate and far-reaching threat to people and communities around the world and has implications for the full enjoyment of human rights”.

• Study by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) in January 2009 asserts that global warming “will potentially have implications for the full range of human rights”.

• Resolution 10/4, 2009 - the effects of climate change will fall hardest on the rights of those people who are already in vulnerable situations “owing to factors such as geography, poverty, gender, age, indigenous or minority status and disability.”

• Resolution 18/22, 2011 - affirmed that human rights obligations, standards, and principles have the potential to inform and strengthen international and national policy making in the area of climate change, promoting policy coherence, legitimacy, and sustainable outcomes.

• Resolution 26/27, 2014 - recognises the need to fully respect human rights when taking climate action. Mandated panel discussion in March 2015 on i) international cooperation; ii) right to food.

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

“If there is a major challenge on human rights that deserves global commitment, leadership and collaboration, this is the one: the moral responsibility to act now against climate change.”

President Tong, Republic of Kiribati at Human Rights Council panel on Human Rights and Climate Change, March 2015

1. How climate change undermines the enjoyment of human rights

• The Cancun Agreements, December 2010, note Resolution 10/4 of the UNHRC

• Decision 1/CP16 includes a reference to

existing human rights obligations in the overarching section on a shared vision for long-term cooperative action; it “emphasises that Parties should, in all climate change-related actions, fully respect human rights.”

2. How climate actions can pose risks to human rights

Policy Risks

Direct Impacts

• Inadequate consultation with citizens & communities

• [Violent] displacement of people and communities

• Exclusion from, or diversion of, essential resources

Indirect Impacts

• Increasing food prices and energy costs

• Loss of livelihoods for communities employed in fossil fuel sectors

• Diminished developmental progress reducing countries overall ability to provide conditions for the realisation of rights

Source: Zero Carbon Zero Poverty The Climate Justice Way. Mary Robinson Foundation, 2015

2. How climate actions can pose risks to human rights

“Climate change, exacerbated by increasingly scarce natural resources, biofuel policies and financial speculation trends, is

having a domino effect for food and nutritional security for the world’s poorest and most vulnerable people”.

Olivier de Shutter, former UN Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food.

It is generally accepted that the diversion of corn production to ethanol for biofuels was a significant contributor to global food price increases during 2007-2008. This led heightened food insecurity with the worst effects on poor and vulnerable people.

Series of reports (UNHRC 2008, 2009; De Shutter 2010) by Special Rapporteur on the Right to Food – outlines how climate change and climate mitigation may impact food security and offers suggestions for improving the protection of the right to food.

2. How climate actions can pose risks to human rights

Barro Blanco Dam, Panama • CDM project - approved in June 2011

despite the concerns of local people (Ngöbe)

• UN Special Rapporteur on the Rights of Indigenous People visited Panama in July 2013

• In his report he concludes that there is a strong opposition against the dam among the Ngöbe, and that they were not properly consulted.

• Feb 2015 - construction suspended pending outcome of complaint mechanism of the Dutch bank (FMO) financing the project.

3. How human rights obligations can inform more effective climate action

“Applying human rights in the context of climate change brings many benefits. It moves the rights of affected individuals and communities centre stage in all response strategies.”

‘….. make sure that human rights are at the core of climate change governance. Human rights must be pivotal in the ongoing negotiations and the new agreement must be firmly anchored in the human rights framework. Any response to climate change must respect, protect, promote and fulfil human rights.’ 48 UN Special Mandate Holders, 10 Dec 2014

3. How human rights obligations can inform more effective climate action

Costa Rica – right to a healthy environment informing climate mitigation actions Constitutional right to a healthy environment informs participative climate policies in livestock and coffee sectors that have reduced poverty, realised the right to food, increased resilience & contributed to more sustainable business.

80% the country’s livestock farmers are taking action to remove thirteen million tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent from the atmosphere over a 15 year period.

3. How human rights obligations can inform more effective climate action

Gender equality informing climate action in Vietnam • National Strategy and Law on Gender Equality • National Climate Change Strategy (2011) - successful

adaptation is dependent on marshalling the knowledge, skills, resources and potential of all citizens; emphasises the opportunities of climate change response for advancing rights and socio-economic goals. Includes gender equality as a specific objective.

• National Strategy for Disaster Prevention, Response and Mitigation to 2020 (2007) identifies the negative impacts that natural disasters cause to vulnerable groups such as women and children

• Actions to adapt to climate related disasters are informed by rights and are empowering previously vulnerable women to be actors in the national response to climate change.

• Ran Nguyen a farmer in the Bing Ding province in central Vietnam,

“Thanks to good preparation… …nobody in the village was killed or injured in last year’s storm season.”

Research - Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

Documents assessed

All National Communications since 2010 and all NAPAs

Most recent reports to the UN Human Rights Council Universal

Periodic Review (UPR) since 2010

Research - Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

The majority of countries do not address the link between human rights and climate change

Findings

Research - Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

Developing countries more frequently referenced substantive rights. Parties to the Aarhus convention were 4 times more likely to refer to specific procedural rights.

Substantive Rights 12% of references were made by

developing countries while only 1% came from developed countries

Procedural Rights10% of references were made by

developing countries and 10% came from developed countries

Findings

Research - Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

FindingsIn National Communications to the UNFCCC, specific rights received very little attention. For instance, only 2% of National Communications contained a reference to the right to access water.

Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

Developed Countries referred more frequently to the need for integration of human rights in developing countries climate policies than they did in relation to their own domestic policy.

Reference to domestic policy

Reference to international affairs

Findings

Respecting Human Rights in Climate Action

Findings

Only 12 countries demonstrated coherence in reporting on the link between climate change and human rights across reports to both the UNFCCC and the Human Rights Council

4. What this means for the 2015 climate agreement and the Post 2015 development agenda

Financing for Development

4. What this means for the 2015 climate agreement and the Post 2015 development agenda

1. Parties to UNFCCC ensure that the 2015 climate agreement under the UNFCCC requires the integration of human rights into climate action

2. Enable and support countries to adopt rights-based approaches into climate action

3. Strengthen monitoring and reporting on human rights and climate change

Research recommendations

4. What this means for the 2015 climate agreement and the Post 2015 development agenda

Geneva Pledge on Human Rights and Climate Action

• Voluntary initiative to facilitate the sharing of best practice and knowledge between human rights and climate experts at a national level – initiated March 2015.

• The pledge was signed by 18 countries including representatives from Latin America, Europe, Africa, Asia and Small Island Developing States.

• Pledge to enable meaningful collaboration between national representatives in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change and the processes of the Human Rights Council.

Thank you

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