ECO has had a long day and night, as Parties streamline the Just Transition Work Programme text. Which options will survive the (needed) simplification of the negotiating text?
Will inclusive, rights-based just transitions become a reality across diverse geographic, political and economic conditions?
Just Transition will not happen only through the sharing of domestic experiences. We need a Work Programme which recommends decisions that lead to actual actions, and delivers what our workers and communities need.
Just Transition will only happen if workers (both formal and informal, in sectors directly impacted by climate measures, and in those that are often invisible, such as care workers), their unions, and communities are at the centre.
Just Transition will only happen if rights – human, labour, gender, Indigenous Peoples – are respected and if rights-holders are explicitly recognised in this decision.
Just Transition will only happen if we seize this unique opportunity to connect climate action with the pressing challenge of securing dignity for all, out of poverty, exclusion and oppression, and if we do it within the multilateral system, with international cooperation and support.
In a few hours, ECO will read the outcomes of the informal conversations Parties have been holding behind closed doors. As a minimum, ECO expects the work programme will focus on:
- The labour dimension: labour rights, social dialogue, social protection, and decent work, building on the ILO’s work,
- The social and economic dimensions of the implementation of the Paris Agreement, including the importance of ensuring a gender-just transition, and;
- International cooperation to investigate and shape multilateral strategies that bring together climate action and sustainable development as well as accelerate just transitions.
And because the content can only be delivered if the process is right, the Work Programme must give each observer constituency a clear role in shaping up the Programme, in partnership with Parties and aiming at delivering key operational outcomes.
The world is a grim place these days. ECO believes the Just Transition Work Programme has the potential to deliver for people a pathway where aspiring to a dignified life is not a synonym for scrapping the planet. Let’s not miss the opportunity.