ECO Newsletter

Increasing climate ambition during this COP25 is one of the most anticipated results. This ambition must be effectively brought to action; in addition to climate finance and mitigation commitments, we need social conditions that facilitate implementation and ensure that the people most affected by climate change benefit from climate responses. 

It is in this context that the ratification of the Escazú Agreement takes on a fundamental importance. This agreement arises from the need to have a binding framework in Latin America and the Caribbean that recognizes the human right to a healthy environment and protects the access rights that make possible its effective implementation: the right of access to information, right of access to public participation in decision-making processes, and the right of access to justice in environmental matters. 

The Agreement is also particularly important as it explicitly recognizes the importance of protecting environmental defenders. Latin America is the most dangerous region for activists and local and Indigenous leaders who defend the rights of their communities and their land. According to Global Witness, in 2018, 51% of the reported 164 murders of environmental defenders were carried out in this region alone.

This legal and institutional framework can help ensure that climate commitments, such as NDCs, are developed in a participatory and democratic manner.
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Week 2 at COP is “rumours week”, and delegates turn into gossip-producing machines when it comes to predicting deals. One rumour in particular has made ECO’s heart skip a beat: let’s put all the old junk CDM credits in a reserve and only allow countries to use them if they don’t meet their NDC target. 

If it was up to ECO, the 861 million remaining CDM credits would be long gone and rules would be adopted to ensure an ambitious, fair, and equitable transition into the post-2020 era. The 4 billion CERs that risk flooding the Paris market would certainly not find their way into Article 6. So, here are ECO’s thoughts on the idea of a CDM reserve, keeping in mind we are not talking about valuable assets; we are talking about junk credits worth €0.20 a piece.

So, what’s wrong with the idea of a reserve? First off, a reserve could undermine climate targets. If the reserve can be accessed by a Party simply because it has not met its NDC, there is no point in having a reserve – the Party might as well use the credits directly. Second, transferring all CERs into a reserve does nothing to address the fact that a multi-gigaton carbon bomb is threatening to enter and destroy the Paris Agreement.
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Week 2 at COP is “rumours week”, and delegates turn into gossip-producing machines when it comes to predicting deals. One rumour in particular has made ECO’s heart skip a beat: let’s put all the old junk CDM credits in a reserve and only allow countries to use them if they don’t meet their NDC target. 

Being an Indigenous ally is no easy job, but neither has it been easy navigating the COP space as an Indigenous person this past week, having microphones cut off during the march, being lectured by non-Indigenous people or tokenised for our Indigenous songs and regalia. Indigenous people are key leaders in the climate space, and it is imperative that our allies can effectively support Indigenous participation and leadership, so that we can move quickly towards the milestones that we so desperately need to reach. 

Climate change is often contextualised within degrees of warming, scientific formulas, or articles, but if we re-lens climate change we can look back to its source. Colonisation has been the catalyst for redefining human relationships to land and water under the premise of ownership. This has allowed for centuries of land, water and human exploitation, namely within Indigenous territories and to the detriment of Indigenous peoples.
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Kill, invade, cut, burn it down. Repeat. The sad fate of Brazilian forests at the hands of gangs of land-grabbers have just gotten another hit from President Jair Bolsonaro, who never tires of inventing schemes to replace the forest with pasture and soybean plantations. Today, as ministers gather in Madrid to make the decisions that should steer us towards a safer climate, Brazil’s far-right leader is scheduled to sign an executive order that may legalize millions of hectares of invaded land in the Amazon. That means more deforestation and of course massive emissions: up to 6.5 billion tonnes by 2020.

Land-grabbing, or grilagem, in Portuguese, is the single most important driver of emissions in Brazil. It consists of invading public lands, shooting everybody in the way, chopping down the rainforest and burning it to clear the way for cattle – then using the pasture to fake a land title, selling it and moving to the next forest. The process is done by well-funded gangs, often under the eyes of or with open support from politicians. Deforestation makes up nearly half of Brazil’s emissions, and in 2019, 35% of deforestation in the Amazon happened on invaded public land.

Since it is a criminal activity, ECO readers might think the right way to address the problem would be through law enforcement.
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The COP Presidency’s text for the principal decisions from COP25 is now into its second iteration, and the contours and fault lines are becoming clearer. 

The text must clearly and unambiguously convey the collective will from all Parties to raise ambition on confronting the climate emergency, including through the communication over the coming months of NDCs that close the emissions gap to 1.5°C. 

The current text has some good language on enhancing ambition, and even calls the global climate emergency by its name! It must be improved and strengthened, but it is a solid floor for building a strong statement. 

Word trickling out from the noontime consultation with parties suggests broad support for the Presidency’s approach, although, of course, there is a lot of haggling over the key details. 

To respond to the growing call for action, the language of ambition must be preserved and strengthened with stronger references to the IPCC reports and clear guidance on NDC revision. The language around public participation in the enhancement of NDCs and related principles is encouraging.

Missing is language on ecosystem-based approaches, including in the recognition of the role of oceans, and on the need for a just transition to protect workers and communities.
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From the Maldives to Costa Rica, Senegal to the Marshall Islands, communities and Indigenous peoples of countries that are members of the Climate Vulnerable Forum (CVF)  live on the front lines of climate impacts. More so than any other governments, members of the CVF are very much aware of the unprecedented threat that inaction on climate change poses for human rights – not just for people under their jurisdiction, but for all nations. Rising sea levels, warming temperatures and changing weather patterns already undermine the realization of a wide range of human rights including the rights to life, water, food, adequate housing, culture, and self-determination. These impacts further reinforce existing structural discrimination and violence. Moreover, inadequate support and mitigation policies by the largest emitters exacerbate these impacts further with every additional delay. That is why CVF has also been championing the 1.5°C limit.

Instead of withdrawing in despair, these countries have risen to the challenge and demonstrated unmatched leadership by developing climate policies that are in line with the best available science. Since its creation, the CVF has championed ambitious climate policies by placing human dignity at the core of its ambition.

This leadership was on display again when the Marshall Islands, just shortly before the COP25, communicated a Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) truly in line with the objectives and principles of the Paris Agreement to contribute to keeping temperature increase below 1.5ºC, by implementing rights-based climate action.
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ECO keeps hearing about “finance that’s available for loss and damage” under the Sendai framework via disaster risk reduction (DRR), humanitarian assistance, and the SDGs. ECO calls bollocks on this idea. The amount of finance available for loss and damage is COMPLETELY INADEQUATE when compared to the scale of loss and damage being suffered.

According to the International Federation of Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies (IFRC) there is already a serious funding shortfall for both disaster response and long-term disaster risk reduction and development. In 2019, 40 percent of all humanitarian funding went to just two protracted emergencies – Yemen, and the Syrian region.  These emergencies are not going away, and given that climate change is a key driver of conflict, these kinds of emergencies are only likely to intensify. So, expecting the global DRR and humanitarian pots to accommodate a growing financial burden as loss and damage accumulates is wishful thinking.

Let’s look at a case by case basis at this “there’s already finance for loss and damage” bollocksy bollocks:

When Hurricane Marie caused loss and damage worth 226% of Dominica’s annual GDP in one storm, they got an insurance payout from the Caribbean Catastrophe Risk Insurance Facility, undertook a successful humanitarian fundraising drive, and received World Bank loans.
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When Energy Ministers meet today, ECO hopes to hear real talk about ambitious plans to phase out fossil fuels and accelerate the transition to a socially just, renewable energy economy. Because we need to get moving on that now to limit warming to 1.5 degrees – and that’s a matter of life and death for many people. ECO presents a little puzzle to get you warmed up for a robust dialogue on ending the fossil fuel era.

Dear Ministers, we need to talk! And frankly, before we do so, you need to learn to listen.

500,000 people were out on the streets of Madrid, marching for an outcome from this COP25 that adequately responds to the climate emergency. When you arrive here, you do so after a year that witnessed the rise of a historic climate movement as well as further aggravation of climate impacts. ECO is quite stunned by how ministers from large emitters praised the young people fighting for their future in an almost effortlessly self-serving manner while failing to taking substantive action.

ECO will not let you leave Madrid without listening to the demands of the young people, front line communities, and Indigenous Peoples. Coming to Madrid, you must respond to the people and the science. So far you have failed; take Madrid as an opportunity to change that. For ECO, this entails urgently enhancing NDCs, prioritizing environmental integrity, and delivering new and additional finance for loss and damage.

Here are some starting points for our conversation:

ECO is quite excited that Denmark’s ambitious climate target of reducing emissions by 70% by 2030 was just made binding this week. There is no reason why, as ministers from high emitting countries, you cannot give some clear signals of commiting to something similar here in Madrid.
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