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'We're Playing With Fire': World on Track for 'Catastrophic' 3.1°C of Warming
"Closing the emissions gap means closing the ambition gap, the implementation gap, and the finance gap," said U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres. "Starting at COP29."
Oct 24, 2024
The world's nations must commit to dramatically slashing greenhouse gas emissions in the near future or risk a "catastrophic" rise in global average temperatures, a key United Nations climate report published Thursday warned.
"It is still technically possible to meet the 1.5°C goal" set out in the Paris agreement, "but only with a G20-led massive global mobilization to cut all greenhouse gas emissions, starting today," the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) said in a summary of its annual Emissions Gap Report.
"Nations must collectively commit to cutting 42% off annual greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 and 57% by 2035 in the next round of Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs)—and back this up with rapid action—or the Paris agreement's 1.5°C goal will be gone within a few years," UNEP warned.
"Failure to increase ambition in these new NDCs and start delivering immediately would put the world on course for a temperature increase of 2.6-3.1°C over this century," the agency said. "This would bring debilitating impacts to people, planet, and economies."
UNEP said "solar, wind, and forests" have the potential to help the world "get on a 1.5°C pathway." However, "sufficiently strong NDCs would need to be backed urgently by a whole-of-government approach, measures that maximize socioeconomic and environmental co-benefits, enhanced international collaboration that includes reform of the global financial architecture, strong private sector action, and a minimum six-fold increase in mitigation investment."
"G20 nations, particularly the largest-emitting members, would need to do the heavy lifting," the agency added.
The task is daunting—according to the report, human emissions of greenhouse gases—CO2, methane, nitrous oxide, and fluorinated gases—reached a record 57.1bn tons of CO2 equivalent (GtCO2e) last year.
"The emissions gap is not an abstract notion," U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres stressed in a video message on the UNEP report. "There is a direct link between increasing emissions and increasingly frequent and intense climate disasters."
"Around the world, people are paying a terrible price," he continued. "Record emissions mean record sea temperatures supercharging monster hurricanes; record heat is turning forests into tinder boxes and cities into saunas; record rains are resulting in biblical floods."
"Today's Emissions Gap report is clear: We're playing with fire; but there can be no more playing for time," Guterres added. "We're out of time. Closing the emissions gap means closing the ambition gap, the implementation gap, and the finance gap. Starting at COP29."
The U.N. chief was referring to the United Nations Climate Change Conference, which is set to take place next month in Baku, Azerbaijan—a nation that is "aggressively" expanding fossil fuel production.
UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen said in a statement:
Climate crunch time is here. We need global mobilization on a scale and pace never seen before—starting right now, before the next round of climate pledges—or the 1.5°C goal will soon be dead and well below 2°C will take its place in the intensive care unit. I urge every nation: No more hot air, please. Use the upcoming COP29 talks in Baku, Azerbaijan, to increase action now, set the stage for stronger NDCs, and then go all-out to get on a 1.5°C pathway.
Even if the world overshoots 1.5°C—and the chances of this happening are increasing every day—we must keep striving for a net-zero, sustainable, and prosperous world. Every fraction of a degree avoided counts in terms of lives saved, economies protected, damages avoided, biodiversity conserved, and the ability to rapidly bring down any temperature overshoot.
Climate scientists and green groups expressed alarm over the UNEP report.
"The Emissions Gap Report is yet another clear warning about what needs to be done and fast," Andreas Sieber, associate director of policy and campaigns at 350.org, said in a statement. "Last year at COP28, nations agreed to transition away from fossil fuels. The report makes it crystal clear that governments must translate this decision into action in their national climate pledges if they are serious about the just energy transition."
Greenpeace International climate politics expert Tracy Carty said that "for 15 years, the UNEP has been sounding the alarm on the great chasm between political will for climate action and the worsening emissions trajectory fuelling rising temperatures."
"These reports are a historical litany of negligence from the world's leaders to tackle the climate crisis with the urgency it demands, but it's not too late to take corrective action," Carty continued. "We challenge leaders to embark on wholesale change in their 2035 climate plans, to come to COP29 prepared to finance climate action and to make up for lost time."
Rachel Cleetus, policy director and a lead economist in the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, issued a statement arguing that the new UNEP report "forcefully confirms that nations' efforts to cut heat-trapping emissions have been grossly insufficient to date."
"Global heating records are being topped year after year, and people and ecosystems worldwide are suffering the devastation of unrelenting climate change disasters and increasingly irreversible impacts," she noted. "To put it bluntly, decades of inadequate action have put the 1.5°C goal further out of reach and world leaders are failing their people. The consequences are profound—but the policy choices decided now are as crucial as ever to limit future harm."
Cleetus continued:
The best way forward is to implement sweeping changes to the global energy system by phasing out the destructive products fossil fuel companies are peddling and investing big in renewable energy solutions to sharply curtail heat-trapping emissions. Also urgent are scaled-up investments in climate resilience to cope with impacts already locked in. Rich, high-emitting nations—including the United States—are most responsible for these calamitous circumstances. Those living in climate-vulnerable, low-income countries that contributed very little to the fossil fuel pollution driving this crisis need more than hollow words; they need wealthy countries and other major emitters to live up to their responsibilities.
"At the upcoming U.N. climate talks, wealthy nations must significantly grow the amount of climate financing available to ensure all countries can slash their global warming emissions and prepare for the more frequent and severe climate impacts that are the punishing consequence of a warming world," Cleetus added.
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South Korean Court Hears First Asian Youth Climate Case
"Carbon emission reduction keeps getting pushed back as if it is homework that can be done later," said one plaintiff's mother. "But that burden will be what our children have to bear eventually."
Apr 23, 2024
One of South Korea's two highest courts on Tuesday began hearing Asia's first-ever youth-led climate lawsuit, which accuses the country's government of failing to protect citizens from the effects of the worsening, human-caused planetary emergency.
Nineteen members of the advocacy group Youth4ClimateAction filed a constitutional complaint in March 2020 accusing the South Korean government of violating their rights to life, the "pursuit of happiness," a "healthy and pleasant environment," and to "resist against human extinction."
The lawsuit also notes "the inequality between the adult generation who can enjoy the relatively pleasant environment and the youth generation who must face a potential disaster from climate change," as well as the government's obligation to prevent and protect citizens from environmental disasters.
"South Korea's current climate plans are not sufficient to keep the temperature increase within 1.5°C, thus violating the state's obligation to protect fundamental rights," the plaintiffs said in a statement.
South Korea's Constitutional Court began hearing a case that accuses the government of having failed to protect 200 people, including dozens of young environmental activists and children, by not tackling climate change https://t.co/XRIGE23KGM pic.twitter.com/snvqBaGGe9
— Reuters (@Reuters) April 23, 2024
Signatories to the 2015 Paris agreement committed to "holding the increase in global average temperature to well below 2°C above preindustrial levels and pursuing efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5°C."
According to the United Nations Environment Program's (UNEP) most recent Emissions Gap Report, the world must slash greenhouse gas emissions by 28% before 2030 to limit warming to 2°C above preindustrial levels and 42% to halt warming at 1.5°C. UNEP said that based on current policies and practices, the world is on track for 2.9°C of warming by the end of the century.
A summary of the lawsuit notes that South Korea is the fifth-largest greenhouse gas (GHG) emitter among Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development nations, and that the government is constitutionally obligated to protect Koreans from the climate emergency.
Instead, the plaintiffs argue, the Korean Parliament "gave the government total discretion to set the GHG reduction target without providing any specific guidelines." Furthermore, they contend that the government's downgraded reduction targets fall "far short of what is necessary to satisfy the temperature rise threshold acknowledged by the global community."
Lee Donghyun, the mother of one of the plaintiffs, told Reuters: "Carbon emission reduction keeps getting pushed back as if it is homework that can be done later. But that burden will be what our children have to bear eventually."
The South Korean case comes on the heels of a landmark ruling by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), which found that Switzerland's government violated senior citizens' human rights by refusing to heed scientists' warnings to swiftly phase out fossil fuel production.
The ECHR ruled on the same day that climate cases brought by a former French mayor and a group of Portuguese youth were inadmissible.
Courts in Australia, Brazil, and Peru also have human rights-based climate cases on their dockets.
In the United States, a state judge in Montana ruled last year in favor of 16 young residents who argued that fossil fuel extraction violated their constitutional right to "a clean and healthful environment."
Meanwhile, the Biden administration is trying to derail a historic youth-led climate lawsuit against the U.S. government.
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'Emissions Canyon': World on Track for 2.9°C of Warming
Keeping the 1.5°C temperature goal alive "requires tearing out the poisoned root of the climate crisis: fossil fuels," U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said.
Nov 20, 2023
Nations' current unconditional climate action plans under the Paris agreement would put the world on track for 2.9°C of warming by 2100, the United Nations Environment Program warned Monday.
The UNEP's 2023 Emissions Gap Report, released ahead of next week's U.N. Climate Change Conference (COP28) in the United Arab Emirates, finds that policymakers must slash greenhouse gas emissions by 28% by 2030 to limit warming to 2°C above preindustrial levels and 42% to halt warming at 1.5°C.
"The report shows that the emissions gap is more like an emissions canyon," U.N. Secretary-General António Guterres said in a statement. "A canyon littered with broken promises, broken lives, and broken records. All of this is a failure of leadership, a betrayal of the vulnerable, and a massive missed opportunity."
The annual Emissions Gap Report calculates the difference between climate-warming emissions under current policies and what needs to be achieved to limit global heating to "well below" 2°C and ideally 1.5°C. This year's report highlighted 2023's string of broken temperature records and extreme weather events: Scientists predict it's on track to be the hottest year in 125,000 years.
At the same time, global greenhouse gas emissions rose by 1.2% between 2021 and 2022, hitting a record 57.4 gigatonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent (GtCO2e) last year.
"Humanity is breaking all the wrong records when it comes to climate change," UNEP Executive Director Inger Andersen said in the report foreword.
"The 2023 edition of the Emissions Gap Report tells us that the world must change track, or we will be saying the same thing next year—and the year after, and the year after, like a broken record," Andersen added.
Even the report's full title expressed a sense of exasperation: Emissions Gap Report 2023: Broken Record—Temperatures hit new highs, yet world fails to cut emissions (again).
The report looked at both existing and promised policies, including countries' Paris action pledges, known as nationally determined contributions (NDCs). It did find that national actions since the Paris agreement was negotiated in 2015 have made a difference. At the time, greenhouse gas emissions were projected to rise by 16% by 2030 and now they are on track to rise by 3% by the end of the decade.
But that progress is not nearly enough to avoid ever more extreme climate impacts. Currently implemented policies put the world on track for 3°C of warming by 2100, unconditional NDCs for 2.9°C, conditional NDCs for 2.5°C, and conditional NDCs combined with net-zero pledges give temperatures a 66% chance of topping out at 2°C. Under the last, most optimistic scenario, the world is left with a 14% chance of limiting warming to 1.5°C. However, net-zero pledges are not currently seen as reliable, since no Group of 20 country is on pace to reduce its emissions in line with this goal.
The report found that nations must cut their emissions by 14 GtCO2e by 2030 to reach 2°C and 22 GtCO2e to reach 1.5°C. The way this can be done is by phasing out fossil fuels as soon as possible.
"The only way to curtail this spiraling crisis is through wholesale changes to the global energy system that will sharply drive down all heat-trapping emissions."
"We know it is still possible to make the 1.5°C limit a reality. And we know how to get there—we have roadmaps from the International Energy Agency and the IPCC [Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change]," Guterres said. "It requires tearing out the poisoned root of the climate crisis: fossil fuels. And it demands a just, equitable renewables transition."
The report comes as nations prepare to gather on November 30 for COP28, which will include the first global stocktake of their progress toward meeting the goals of the Paris agreement. This will lead to a new round of NDCs through 2035.
"Ambition in these NDCs must bring greenhouse gas emissions in 2035 to levels consistent with the 2°C and 1.5°C pathways. Stronger implementation in this decade will help to make this possible," Andersen said in the foreword.
"The world needs to lift the needle out of the groove of insufficient ambition and action, and start setting new records on cutting emissions, green and just transitions, and climate finance—starting now," Andersen added.
In response to the report, Rachel Cleetus, the policy director and a lead economist in the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, also called for ambition at the upcoming climate talks.
"The only way to curtail this spiraling crisis is through wholesale changes to the global energy system that will sharply drive down all heat-trapping emissions," Cleetus said. "At COP28, nations must heed these scientific truths by agreeing to a fast and fair phaseout of fossil fuels, ramping up renewable energy and energy efficiency, and significantly expanding climate finance commitments from wealthier countries for an equitable clean energy transition."
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Climate Lawsuits Are Becoming Key Drivers of Change as Courts Tie Policy to Human Rights
A growing percentage of litigation has been filed in the Global South, with plaintiffs arguing they have a right to adequate climate policy.
Jul 27, 2023
With a number of international courts ruling in recent years that climate justice must be recognized as a human right, the United Nations Environment Program released a report Wednesday that found that climate litigation is emerging as a key driver of concrete action being taken by governments and corporations—forcing them to commit to emissions cuts and take accountability for harming the planet.
UNEP joined with the Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at Columbia University to compile the Global Climate Litigation Report: 2023 Status Review, and found that the number of climate crisis-related legal challenges filed across the world has more than doubled since the group's first analysis in 2017.
Nearly 900 climate cases were filed in 2017, while 2,180 were brought to courts in 2022.
"Climate policies are far behind what is needed to keep global temperatures below the 1.5°C threshold, with extreme weather events and searing heat already baking our planet," said Inger Andersen, executive director of UNEP. "People are increasingly turning to courts to combat the climate crisis, holding governments and the private sector accountable, and making litigation a key mechanism for securing climate action and promoting climate justice."
A majority of cases have been filed in the United States, with plaintiffs arguing government agencies and companies are failing to comply with clean air and water laws and other regulations, taking aim at companies they say have "greenwashed" their climate records, and demanding that children have the right to a safe environment, among other litigation.
But the report finds that lawsuits in the Global South represent a "growing percentage of global climate litigation," with more than 17% of lawsuits filed in developing countries including Small Island Developing States.
A majority of cases focused on residents' right to a healthy environment and demands for national climate policies that reflect that right have been filed in the Global South, according to the report.
The Brazilian Supreme Court found in 2022 that the Paris climate agreement should be treated as a human rights treaty with "supranational status," invalidating any Brazilian law that contradicts the agreement's demand that nations reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in order to limit planetary heating to 1.5°C over preindustrial levels.
In Mexico in 2020, the Supreme Court invalidated a rule that would have allowed a higher ethanol content in gasoline, "concluding that the right to a healthy environment and the precautionary principle required the evaluation of the potential of increased GHG emissions and an analysis of the country's commitments under the Paris Agreement," reads the report.
In addition to federal courts in individual nations, international human rights panels have handed down landmark rulings in recent years, forcing companies and governments to change course on the climate.
The United Nations Human Rights Committee last year found that Australia had failed to adequately protect Indigenous Torres Straight Islanders from climate impacts, recognizing that "climate change was currently impacting the claimants' daily lives and that, to the extent that their rights are being violated, Australia's poor climate record was a violation of their right to family life and right to culture."
Australian officials were ordered to adopt "significant climate adaptation measures" as a result of the historic ruling.
Plaintiffs in recently filed lawsuits may benefit from "an increasingly well-defined field of law" which has begun to provide an understanding of the human right to adequate climate policy, said UNEP and the Sabin Center.
As Common Dreams reported in March, a coalition of elderly women in Switzerland argued before the European Court of Human Rights that they are uniquely affected by insufficient climate action and by continued fossil fuel extraction, as older people are vulnerable to the extreme temperatures that the climate crisis is causing.
A number of similar cases have been brought by children who have argued—in Australia, the U.S., Argentina, Haiti, and elsewhere—that their rights have been violated by their government's continued backing of fossil fuel emissions, improper waste disposal, and support for coal expansion.
Ongoing climate litigation largely centers on:
- Cases underpinned by international human rights laws;
- Challenges to domestic non-enforcement of climate-related laws and policies;
- Efforts to keep fossil fuels in the ground;
- Demands for corporate climate disclosures and liability and an end to greenwashing; and
- Challenges to governments' failure to adapt to the impacts of climate change, including extreme heat and sea level rise.
Future cases are likely to also focus on climate migration, as more than 30 million people were displaced in 2020 due to weather and climate events; demands for legal remedies after an extreme weather event has destroyed homes or businesses; and plaintiffs' claims that their harms were in fact caused by the climate emergency.
"Since 2020, few courts have yet to reach the merits of these types of claims, despite the growing body of science illustrating the connections," reads the report. "The science of climate attribution continues to be central to climate litigation, and as more cases are filed and reach the merits of the plaintiffs' claims, as was anticipated in the 2020 Litigation Report, there will be increased judicial attention on the matter."
As companies and governments seek to deny responsibility for climate harms, litigation targeting climate protesters may also be part of a "backlash" against campaigners' lawsuits, said UNEP and the Sabin Center.
In some high-profile cases recently, protesters have emerged victorious when their actions have been the target of litigation.
As the Sabin Center noted, a New Zealand District Court ruled in 2020 that without direct action like that of protesters who trespassed on an oil platform, "change may be too late." The campaigners were convicted but discharged without penalty.
In 2021, activists who halted operations at Charles De Gaulle Airport in Paris were acquitted because a court found their actions "were taken in a 'state of necessity' to warn of future danger, namely climate change."
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We Must Not Allow Industry Lobbyists to Destroy Global Plastics Treaty
The voices for real solutions to the single-use pollution crisis are being drowned out by the plastic industry’s overwhelming influence and power.
Jun 01, 2023
As I prepare to join the next round of United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) negotiations for a Global Plastics Treaty in Paris, one thing weighs heavily on my mind: It appears that powerful industry lobbyists and their allies are successfully gaslighting the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) process by convincing UNEP to promote their false solutions.
UNEP is an organization entrusted to seek real solutions to one of humanity’s greatest environmental challenges, yet it is now advocating for industry profits over people and the environment.
Their recent report “Turning off the Tap: How the world can end plastic pollution and create a circular economy” attempts to provide a blueprint for a future free of plastic pollution. However, the title couldn’t be more misleading and the report falls short on many fronts. Most concerning is the alarmingly low ambition to reduce plastic pollution by 2040: according to our calculations, only a 3.6 percent reduction per year from 2023 to 2040, while production is expected to double over the same period.
The strategy relies on the expanded use of chemical recycling technologies, along with other forms of incineration and waste disposal to achieve 43 percent of the reduction. These industry “solutions” generate large amounts of toxic pollution and hazardous waste and rely on a steady feedstock of plastic waste, exacerbating environmental injustices, waste colonialism and climate change. Maintaining high levels of annual plastic production and pollution will have catastrophic and irreversible effects on human health and the environment.
This latest UNEP analysis largely ignores the single most effective solution to ending the plastic crisis: investing in systems designed to eliminate the demand for non-essential plastics. This solution threatens the petrochemical industries that produce plastics, and large multinational consumer goods industries that rely on plastic packaging. These industries profit most from the plastic crisis while externalizing all social and environmental costs, estimated to reach $300-$600 billion per year, with some estimates exceeding $1.5 trillion according to the report. Considering the $600-700 billion in annual revenue from plastic production, it is clear almost all industry profits come at the expense of human health and the environment.
Moreover, these social costs are likely to be highly underestimated as the health consequences of plastics proven to be in our blood, digestive systems, lungs, breast milk, male and female reproductive systems and potentially brains, are not yet clear.
Increasing ambition to cap plastic production, and creating a strict time-bound strategy to eliminate single-use plastics are the solutions that environmental justice leaders, fenceline and frontline community leaders, Indigenous leaders, scientists, environmental and public health professionals, non-profits and other community-based organizations are demanding. Yet, all their voices are being drowned out by the plastic industry’s overwhelming influence and power.
As UNEP claims to advocate for a “just and inclusive transition,” I hope the participation of these groups in the INC process doesn’t become tokenism under the guise of “inclusivity.”
The “circular” plastic economy promoted in the UNEP report and backed by industry is an oxymoron at its core and contradicts UNEP’s own definition of a circular economy. It is doubtful that most reusable plastic products will circulate for more than a few months, let alone 25 or 30 years, and almost all recycled plastic is actually downcycled into a lower-quality product. Therefore the plastic reuse/recycle feedback loop is only a temporary delay of the inevitable, and perpetuates the toxic plastic economy that is impacting all of us.
As the world’s largest plastic polluters penetrate the rural economies of developing nations, the current plastic economy and proposed “circular” plastic economy continue to displace traditional systems that are truly sustainable and circular. UNEP’s scenario, according to the report, would result in over 145 million metric tons of plastic per year being converted to fuel, landfilled, chemically recycled, incinerated, openly burned or ending up as terrestrial or ocean pollution by 2040. All of these would continue to poison our air, water, land and bodies. That is not an acceptable measure of success.
Instead, innovative, bottom-up, community-based solutions should be promoted for plastic-free reuse, refill and packaging systems that are non-toxic, creating cleaner, greener, locally-owned businesses and jobs. Supporting small business incubators and microfinance for entrepreneurs and community organizations to develop plastic-free packaging and reuse/refill systems would be more effective to establish zero-waste systems compatible with local traditions, culture, socio-economic conditions and capacity to manage solid waste.
UNEP’s vision includes plans to “reorient and diversify” the market for safe plastic alternatives, and this is where innovation to eliminate non-essential plastics is needed most. Creating opportunities via bottom-up strategies to phase out single-use plastics and prevent their entry into local markets would create systems to provide clean and healthy alternative livelihoods for those working in the informal plastic economy under dangerous conditions.
While UNEP is calling for a transformation of the plastic economy, we are calling for the elimination of the plastic economy for all non-essential plastics. We are proposing real, equitable solutions with large-scale investments and financial models focused on plastic-free reuse/refill and other zero-waste systems. Drastically reducing plastic production and pollution is the first step in the transition to a truly circular economy.
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Celebrities Join Greenpeace in Demanding Biden Go Big on Global Plastics Treaty
"Will you be the president who helped put an end to the plastic pollution crisis, or someone who let it spiral further out of control?"
May 18, 2023
Actors known for their environmental advocacy—including Jane Fonda, Jason Momoa, Joaquin Phoenix, Susan Sarandon, and Laura Dern—joined Greenpeace USA on Thursday in an open letter to U.S. President Joe Biden urging his administration to "protect the planet from plastic pollution" and slash carbon emissions "by supporting a strong global plastics treaty."
"We appreciate your leadership in securing a global oceans treaty that creates a path to protecting 30% of our oceans by 2030," the letter's signers told Biden. "Winning the treaty was truly a historic moment, one of the greatest environmental achievements in history."
"We're calling on President Biden to put aside fossil fuel and plastics industry interests and lead us on the path that prioritizes human health, biodiversity, and our communities."
"At the end of May, delegates from around the world will convene in Paris for the second round of negotiations on a global plastics treaty," the letter continues, referring to talks hosted by the United Nations Environment Program (UNEP).
"While you have signaled support for this treaty, the U.S. position is not yet strong enough," the letter argues. "Currently, the U.S. is not calling for a cap on plastic production—which is the only real way to stop plastic pollution. In 2021, the U.S. only recycled a mere 5% of plastics produced."
The letter continues:
Plastics are polluting and harmful at every stage of their life cycle—from extraction to disposal. Ninety-nine percent of plastics come from fossil fuels; cutting plastic production will make a significant dent in carbon emissions. There are communities living next to refineries and petrochemical facilities who are bearing the combined brunt of the climate and plastic crises. People living near these facilities—overwhelmingly people of color—face higher rates of cancer, asthma, and adverse birth outcomes.
"President Biden, you have a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to help our climate, our oceans, and our communities this year by supporting a strong and ambitious global plastics treaty," the signers asserted. "The decision you make on this critical issue will help define your legacy—will you be the president who helped put an end to the plastic pollution crisis, or someone who let it spiral further out of control? We're calling on you to do the right thing."
Other actors who signed the letter include Rosana Arquette, Alec Baldwin, Ed Begley, Ted Danson, Piper Perabo, Kyra Sedgwick, William Shatner, and Shailene Woodley.
Greenpeace is proposing a seven-point plan for the global plastics treaty:
- Achieve immediate, significant reductions in plastic production, establishing a pathway to end virgin plastic production;
- Promote a shift to refill- and reuse-based economies, creating jobs and standards in new reuse industries and supporting established zero-waste practices;
- Support a just transition for workers across the plastics supply chain, prioritizing waste pickers who collect approximately 60% of all plastic that is collected for recycling globally;
- Promote noncombustion technologies for plastic stockpiles and waste disposal;
- Institute the "polluter pays" principle for plastic waste management and for addressing the health and environmental costs throughout the plastics life cycle;
- Significantly improve regulation, oversight, safety, and worker protections for existing recycling facilities; and
- Require transparency about chemicals in plastics and eliminate all toxic additives and chemicals used in the plastics life cycle.
"Many environmental groups and frontline communities are disappointed with the U.S.' current position on the treaty, as it does not call for a cap on plastic production and instead focuses on recycling," Greenpeace USA senior plastics campaigner Lisa Ramsden said in a statement.
"Recycling will never solve the plastic waste problem," Ramsden added. "We must stop plastic waste at its source, and we're calling on President Biden to put aside fossil fuel and plastics industry interests and lead us on the path that prioritizes human health, biodiversity, and our communities."
On Tuesday, UNEP published a report contending that global plastic pollution can be reduced by 80% by 2040 if countries and corporations enact major changes using existing technologies. However, the report was criticized by some environmentalists for promoting the burning of plastic waste.
UNEP has also come under fire in recent days for issuing just one pass per organization attending the Global Plastics Treaty negotiations in Paris.
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UN Provides Blueprint for 80% Cut to Global Plastic Pollution by 2040
"If we follow this roadmap, including in negotiations on the plastic pollution deal, we can deliver major economic, social, and environmental wins," said the director of the U.N. Environment Program.
May 16, 2023
Global plastic pollution can be reduced by 80% by 2040 if countries and companies make far-reaching changes using existing technologies, according to a report published Tuesday by the United Nations Environment Program.
Turning Off the Tap: How the World Can End Plastic Pollution and Create a Circular Economy comes less than two weeks before the start of a second round of negotiations in Paris on a legally binding global plastics treaty. While the required shifts outlined in the report are significant, UNEP stresses that they are practical, relatively inexpensive, and would yield benefits valued at more than $4.5 trillion.
Research has shown that plastic pollution is a life-threatening crisis poised to grow worse unless governments intervene to prevent fossil fuel and petrochemical corporations from expanding the production of single-use items.
"The way we produce, use, and dispose of plastics is polluting ecosystems, creating risks for human health, and destabilizing the climate," UNEP executive director Inger Andersen said in a statement. "This UNEP report lays out a roadmap to dramatically reduce these risks through adopting a circular approach that keeps plastics out of ecosystems, out of our bodies, and in the economy."
"If we follow this roadmap, including in negotiations on the plastic pollution deal," said Andersen, "we can deliver major economic, social, and environmental wins."
The report proposes a four-fold "systems change" to address "the causes of plastic pollution, rather than just the symptoms." As UNEP summarizes, it consists of the following:
- Reduce: By first eliminating problematic and unnecessary plastics, policymakers can reduce the size of the problem.
- Reuse: Promoting reuse options—including refillable bottles, bulk dispensers, deposit-return schemes, packaging take-back schemes, etc.—can reduce 30% of plastic pollution by 2040. To realize its potential, governments must help build a stronger business case for reusable items.
- Recycle: Reducing plastic pollution by an additional 20% by 2040 can be achieved if recycling becomes a more stable and profitable venture. Removing fossil fuels subsidies, enforcing design guidelines to enhance recyclability, and other measures would increase the share of economically recyclable plastics from 21 to 50%.
- Reorient and Diversify: Careful replacement of products such as plastic wrappers, sachets, and takeaway items with products made from alternative materials (such as paper or compostable materials) can deliver an additional 17% decrease in plastic pollution.
"Even with the measures above, 100 million metric tons of plastics from single-use and short-lived products will still need to be safely dealt with annually by 2040—together with a significant legacy of existing plastic pollution," UNEP explains. "This can be addressed by setting and implementing design and safety standards for disposing of non-recyclable plastic waste, and by making manufacturers responsible for products shedding microplastics, among others."
According to the agency: "The shift to a circular economy would result in $1.27 trillion in savings, considering costs and recycling revenues. A further $3.25 trillion would be saved from avoided externalities such as health, climate, air pollution, marine ecosystem degradation, and litigation-related costs. This shift could also result in a net increase of 700,000 jobs by 2040, mostly in low-income countries, significantly improving the livelihoods of millions of workers in informal settings."
Although UNEP's recommendations necessitate a substantial investment, it is "below the spending without this systemic change: $65 billion per year as opposed to $113 billion per year," the agency notes. "Much of this can be mobilized by shifting planned investments for new production facilities—no longer needed through reduction in material needs—or a levy on virgin plastic production into the necessary circular infrastructure. Yet time is of the essence: a five-year delay may lead to an increase of 80 million metric tons of plastic pollution by 2040."
While many progressive advocacy groups are likely to welcome UNEP's overall message that readily available solutions, backed by strong regulatory instruments, can help bring about a transformation from a "throwaway" society to a "reuse" society, the agency is facing criticism for its promotion of burning plastic waste in cement kilns.
"Burning plastic waste in cement kilns is a 'get out of jail free card' for the plastic industry to keep ramping up plastic production by claiming that the plastic problem can be simply burned away," Neil Tangri, science and policy director at the Global Alliance for Incinerator Alternatives (GAIA), said in a statement. "Not only does this pose a grave climate and public health threat, it also undermines the primary goal of the global plastic treaty—putting a cap on plastic production."
Larisa de Orbe of the Mexican environmental justice groups Red de Acción Ecológica and Colectiva Malditos Plásticos echoed Tangri's argument.
"To tackle the plastic crisis, waste should not be burned, but its production should be drastically reduced, and single-use plastics should be banned," said Orbe. "Environmental authorities in Mexico and the [U.N.] Human Rights Rapporteur on Toxic Substances have recognized that the burning of waste in cement kilns has caused environmental disaster and the violation of human rights in the territories and communities near these activities."
Imports of plastic waste into Mexico grew by 121% between 2018 and 2021. As GAIA noted, a large portion of that "is suspected to be burned in cement kilns, which operate with few controls or emissions monitoring systems."
Linda Birnbaum, former director of the National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences and National Toxicology Program, called the U.N.'s promotion of burning of plastic waste in cement kilns "an irresponsible choice that has significant health implications for the communities living nearby."
"Burning plastic waste releases dioxins that stay in the environment forever, and are linked to cancers, reproductive, and developmental impairments," said Birnbaum. "These are the very same chemicals that are threatening the residents of East Palestine, Ohio."
Ahead of the first round of global plastic treaty negotiations in December, civil society organizations, scientists, and other advocates demanded robust rules to confront the full lifecycle impacts of the plastic pollution crisis.
After talks opened, the Break Free From Plastic (BFFP) alliance, comprised of more than 100 groups, emphasized the need to limit the ever-growing production and consumption of plastic and hold corporations accountable for the ecological and public health harms caused by manufacturing an endless stream of toxic single-use items.
The coalition launched a petition outlining what it described as the "essential elements" of a multilateral environmental agreement capable of "reversing the tide of plastic pollution and contributing to the end of the triple planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution." According to experts associated with BFFP, an effective pact must include:
- Significant, progressive, and mandatory targets to cap and dramatically reduce virgin plastic production;
- Legally binding, time-bound, and ambitious targets to implement and scale up reuse, refill, and alternative product delivery systems;
- A just transition to safer and more sustainable livelihoods for workers and communities across the plastics supply chain; and
- Provisions that hold polluting corporations and plastic-producing countries accountable.
While the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee meetings in December (INC-1) and those scheduled to begin later this month (INC-2) mark the first time that governments have met to develop global regulations to restrict plastic production, the United States and the United Kingdom—the world's biggest per-capita plastic polluters—have so far refused to join a worldwide treaty aimed at curbing the amount of plastic waste destined for landfills and habitats, though both countries are reportedly now open to the idea.
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What If the World Cannot Save the World?
The crisis of international governance on a planet rife with emergencies.
Mar 05, 2023
The United Nations has convened 27 conferences on climate change. For nearly three decades, the international community has come together at a different location every year to pool its collective wisdom, resources, and resolve to address this global threat. These Conferences of Parties (COPs) have produced important agreements, such as the Paris Accords of 2015 on the reduction of carbon emissions and most recently at Sharm el-Sheikh a Loss & Damage Fund to help countries currently experiencing the most impact from climate change.
And yet the threat of climate change has only grown larger. In 2022, carbon emissions grew by nearly 2 percent.
This failure is not for want of institutions. There’s the UN Environment Program (UNEP), which oversees the complex of international treaties and protocols, helps implement climate financing, and coordinates with other agencies to meet sustainable development goals (SDGs). The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has marshaled all the relevant scientific data and recommendations. The Green Climate Fund is attempting to funnel resources to developing countries to advance their energy transitions. The Major Economies Forum on Energy and Climate, begun in 2020 at the instigation of the Biden administration, has been focusing on reducing methane. International financial institutions like the World Bank have their own staff devoted to global energy transition efforts.
Still, with the notable exception of the global effort to repair the ozone layer, more institutions have not translated into better results.
On climate change, notes Miriam Lang. a professor of environmental and sustainability studies at the Universidad Andina Simon Bolivar in Ecuador and a member of the Ecosocial and Intercultural Pact of the South, “it seems that the more we know, the less we are able to take effective action. The same can be said about the accelerated loss of biodiversity. We live in an era of mass extinctions, and there’s been little progress at the governance level despite many good intentions.”
One major reason for the failure of collective action is the persistent refusal to think beyond the nation-state. “It’s weird that nationalism has become so dominant when the challenges that we face are global,” observes Jayati Ghosh, professor of economics at the University of Massachusetts Amherst. “We know that these problems can’t be regulated within national borders. Yet governments and people within countries persist in treating these crises as ways in which one nation can benefit at the expense of another.”
Can existing institutions be transformed to more adequately address the global problems of climate change and economic development? Or do we need different institutions altogether?
Another challenge is financial. “Adequate funding at all levels is a fundamental prerequisite to improving climate governance and the implementation of sustainable development goals,” argues Jens Martens, executive director of the Global Policy Forum Europe. “At a global level, this requires predictable and reliable funding for the UN system. The total assessed contributions to the UN regular budget in 2022 were just about $3 billion. In comparison, the New York City budget alone is over $100 billion.”
In part because of these budgetary shortfalls, international institutions have increasingly relied on what they call “multistakeholderism.” On the face of it, the effort to bring other voices into policymaking at the international level—the various “stakeholders”—sounds eminently democratic. The inclusion of civil society and popular movements is certainly a step in the right direction, as is the incorporation of the perspectives of academics.
But multistakeholderism has also meant bringing business on board, and corporations have the money not only to underwrite global meetings but to determine the outcomes.
“I was at Sharm el-Sheikh in November,” recalls Madhuresh Kumar, an Indian activist-researcher currently based in Paris as a Senior Fellow at Atlantic Institute. “We were welcomed at the airport by a banner that read ‘Welcome to Cop 27.’ And it listed the main partners: Vodaphone, Microsoft, Boston Consulting Group, IBM, Cisco, Coca Cola and so on. Most UN institutions face a growing monetary problem. But this monetary problem is not actually at the crux of the issue. It is astonishing how through multistakeholderism, which has evolved over the last four decades, corporations have captured multilateral institutions, the global governance space, and even the big International NGOs.” He adds that 630 energy lobbyists were registered at COP 27, a 25 percent increase from the previous year’s meeting.
The challenges facing global governance are well known, whether it’s nationalism, funding, or corporate capture. Less clear is how to overcome these challenges. Can existing institutions be transformed to more adequately address the global problems of climate change and economic development? Or do we need different institutions altogether? These were the questions addressed at a recent webinar on global governance sponsored by Global Just Transition.
Global Shortcomings
Transforming the current system of global governance around climate, energy, and economic development is like trying to repairing an ocean liner that has sprung multiple leaks in the middle of its voyage with no land in sight. But there’s an additional twist: all the crew members have to agree on the proposed fixes.
Jayati Ghosh is a member of the new UN High-Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism. “The challenge is in its very title,” Ghosh explains. “Multilateralism itself is under threat in part because it hasn’t been effective. But also the imbalances that are rendering it ineffective are not likely to go away any time soon. We’re all aware of this on the board. But without much broader political will, there’s a limit to any given individual or group proposals.”
In addition to nationalism, she believes that four other broad “isms” have prevented a cooperative response to the global problems facing the planet. Take imperialism, for instance, which Ghosh prefers to define “as the struggle of large capital over economic territories when supported by nation-states. We see evidence of that in continuous subsidies of fossil fuels or the greenwashing of environmental, social, and governance (ESG) investments. The ability of large capital to sway international policies and national politics in its own interests persists unabated. That’s a major constraint to doing anything serious about climate change.”
Short-termism is another such constraint. In the wake of the Ukraine war, food and fuel corporations sought to profit in the short term by manufacturing a sense of scarcity. The rise in fuel and food prices, Ghosh notes, were created not so much by constraints on supply, but from market imperfections and control over markets by large corporations. That short-term profiteering in turn led to equally short-sighted decisions by the most powerful countries to reverse their previous climate commitments and make fewer such commitments at the last COP in Egypt. Politicians “reversed those commitments because they have midterm elections coming up,” she points out. “They’re worried that voters will support the far right, so they argue that they have to do whatever it takes to increase fuel supplies.”
Classism, in various forms of inequality, has also prevented effective action. “Globally, the top 10 percent, the rich, are responsible for one third to more than one half of all carbon emissions,” Ghosh notes. “Even within countries that is the case. The rich have the power to influence national government policies to ensure that they continue to take the bulk of the carbon budget of the world.”
Finally, she points to “status-quo-ism,” by which she means the tyranny of the international economic architecture, not only the legal and regulatory framework but also the associated global agreements and institutions. “We really have to reconsider the role played by international financial institutions, by the World Trade Organization, the multilateral development banks, and legal frameworks like economic partnership agreements and bilateral investment treaties that actually prevent governments from doing something about climate change,” she argues.
One way of addressing especially these last four obstacles is to reverse privatization. “The privatizations of the last three decades have been absolutely critical in generating both inequality and more aggressive carbon emissions globally,” Ghosh concludes. She urges the return of utilities, cyberspace, even land to the public sphere.
Revisiting Sustainable Development
In 2015, the UN endorsed 17 sustainable development goals. These SDGs include pledges to end poverty and hunger, combat inequalities within and among countries, protect human rights and promote gender equality, and protect the planet and its natural resources. But climate change, COVID, and conflicts like the war in Ukraine have all pushed the SDG targets further from reach—and made them considerably more expensive to achieve.
“The implementation of the 2030 agenda is not just a matter of better policies,” observes Jens Martens. “The current problems of growing inequality and unsustainable models of consumption and production are deeply connected with powerful hierarchies and institutions. Policy reform is necessary, but it is not sufficient. It will require more sweeping shifts in how and where power is vested. A simple software update is not enough. We have to revisit and reshape the hardware of sustainable development.”
In terms of governance, this means strengthening bottom-up approaches. “The major challenge for more effective global governance is a lack of coherence at the national level,” Martens continues. “Any attempt to create more effective global institutions will not work if it’s not reflected in effective national counterparts. For instance, as long as environmental ministries are weak at the national level we cannot expect UNEP to be strong at the global level.”
Stronger local and national institutions, however, operate within what Martens calls a “disabling environment” where, for instance, “the IMF’s neoliberal approach has proven incompatible with the achievement of the SDGs as well as the climate goals in many countries. IMF recommendations and loan conditionalities have led to a deepening of social and economic inequalities.” Also disabling is the disproportionate power wielded by international financial institutions. “One striking example is the Investor-State Dispute settlement system, which awards investors the right to sue governments, for instance, for environmental policies that reduce profits,” he notes. “This system undermines the ability of governments to implement stronger domestic regulations of fossil fuel industries or to phase out fossil fuel subsidies.”
Enhancing coherence also means strengthening UN bodies such as the High-Level Political Forum on Sustainable Development, which is responsible for reviewing and following up on the SDGs. “Compared to the Security Council or the Human Rights Council, the HLPF remains extremely weak,” he points out. “It meets only eight days per year. It has a small budget and no decision-making power.”
Some additional institutions are needed to fill global governance gaps, such as an Intergovernmental Tax Body under the auspices of the United Nations, that would ensure that all UN member states, and not only the rich, participate equally in the reform of global tax Rules. Another oft-cited recommendation would be an institution within the UN system independent of both creditors and debtors to facilitate debt restructuring.
All of this requires sufficient funding. Around $40 billion goes toward the development activities of UN agencies, Martens notes, “but far more than half of these funds are project-tied non-core resources mainly earmarked to favor individual donor priorities. That means mainly the priorities of rich donors.” UNEP, meanwhile, gets a mere $25 million from the regular UN budget, which is about $3 billion and doesn’t include separate assessments for activities like peacekeeping and humanitarian operations.
More democratic funding would have the side benefit of shrinking reliance on foundations and corporate contributions, which “reduce the flexibility and autonomy of all UN organizations,” he concludes.
Addressing Multistakeholderism
One path that global institutions have taken to address the funding shortfall is “multistakeholderism.” As with corporations pushing for privatization at a national level with arguments about the inefficiencies of state enterprises or the bureaucratic state, the advocates of multistakeholder initiatives (MSI) point to the failures of global public institutions to tackle common problems as a reason for greater corporate involvement. In effect, this boils down to large corporations buying more seats at the table for themselves.
Madhuresh Kumar has produced a recent book with Mary Ann Manahan that looks at how multistakeholderism has evolved in five key sectors: education, health, environment, agriculture, and communications. In the forestry sector, for instance, they looked at initiatives like the Tropical Forest Alliance, the Global Commons Alliance, and the Forest for Life Partnership. “We found that in their first decade, the initiatives primarily established the problem by arguing that the multilateral institutions are failing and that’s why we need solutions,” he reports. With the rise in global demand for raw materials, particularly in the context of a “green economy,” there was also greater demand to regulate the industries. The corporate sector responded with initiatives that emphasized “responsible” mining, forestry, and the like.
These “responsible” corporate initiatives revolved around “nature-based” solutions that rely on markets to “get the price right.” Kumar notes that “at the heart of these false, ‘nature-based’ solutions promoted by MSI is the notion that if nature does not have a price, human beings are not incentivized to take care of it, that we have to use nature and also replace it. Carbon offsets, for instance, come out of the principle that you can continue to produce as much carbon as you want as long as you also plant some trees somewhere else.”
According to this logic, nature can be priced according to various “ecosystem services.” He continues: “Seventeen ecosystem services have been identified along with 16 biomes. Together they have an estimated value of $16-54 trillion. If they can be unlocked, the idea is that this money can be put toward solving the climate crisis. But we won’t see that money. Ultimately, what rolls out on the ground won’t help our communities.”
Not only nature is commodified but knowledge itself, for instance through intellectual property rights. “Increasingly, we have a reinforcement of very rigid rules and very rigid systems that lead to the concentration of knowledge and to large corporations appropriating traditional knowledge,” notes Jayati Ghosh.
Another essential part of MSI is the focus on technical fixes, like carbon capture technology, geoengineering, and various forms of hydrogen energy. “These divert a lot of attention from climate justice,” Kumar notes. “It is also having an impact on indigenous communities. For instance, the One Trillion Trees Initiative that the UN backs is promoting a monoculture, the destruction of biodiversity, and the eviction of indigenous communities and many others.”
The disenfranchisement of indigenous communities is especially worrisome. “Indigenous peoples are responsible for preserving 80 percent of the biodiversity that still exists today, which is even confirmed by the World Bank,” Miriam Lang explains. “Nevertheless, we somehow do everything to disrespect, weaken, and threaten indigenous people’s modes of living. We still systematically treat indigenous people as poor and in need of development. We are reluctant to guarantee their land rights, their rights to clean water, their rights to the forest where they live. Instead, we propose to pay them money to compensate their losses, which is just another way of weakening their social organization and decision-making. It causes division and lures them into consumerism, individualism, and entrepreneurialism: precisely those aspects of capitalism that have brought about the current environmental breakdown.”
In addition to corporations, large NGOs like World Wildlife Fund, and major funders like Michael Bloomberg, Kumar notes that “the UN has been a willing participant in all of this. Sustainable Energy for All, which is another MSI, was started by former UN General Secretary Ban Ki-Moon in 2011 as a response to a statement made by a group of countries. But Sustainable Energy for All later acquired an independent status of its own over which the UN has no control. The UN General Assembly plays an important role in shaping the agenda and setting standards. But then these institutions, like the Renewable Energy and Energy Efficiency Partnership that was initially backed by UNIDO, later go out on their own, become unaccountable, and fall into the lap of corporations.”
Democratizing Governance
In 1974, the UN declared a New International Economic Order to free countries from economic colonialism and dependency on an inequitable global economy. The developing world was unusually unified in supporting the NIEO. Though some elements of the NIEO can be seen in the Agenda 2030, the effort did not translate into any substantial changes in the Bretton Woods institutions—IMF, World Bank—that form the international financial architecture.
“The reason we had demands for a NIEO is precisely because developing countries felt that the global economy was not just or equitable,” Jayati Ghosh observes. “Yes, it was a period of relatively more access to certain institutions. But some of the imbalances that we’re talking about in trade or finance or technology existed even then. Of course, it’s also absolutely true that neoliberal financial globalization has dramatically worsened conditions globally. But I would put it more in terms of the supremacy of large capital over everyone else.”
Also, the United States and European Union continue to wield disproportionate power: appointing the leaders of the World Bank and IMF and controlling the majority of votes in these institutions. “Middle- and low-income countries, which together constitute 85 percent of the world’s population, have only a minority share,” observes Miriam Lang. “There is also a clear racial imbalance at play with the votes of people of color worth only a fraction of their counterparts. If this were the case in any particular country, we would call it apartheid. Yet, as economic anthropologist Jason Hickel points out, a form of apartheid operates right at the heart of international economic governance today and has come to be accepted as normal.”
Developing countries have long demanded a reform of the governance of these IFIs. “The voting rights were originally allocated on the basis of a country’s share of the global economy and of global trade,” reports Jayati Ghosh. “But this was done based on the data of the 1940s, and the world has changed dramatically since then. Developing countries have significantly increased their share of both, and certain countries are much more significant while a number of European countries are much less significant.”
Despite a very minor change in this distribution of votes, the United States and European Union retain the majority of the votes and the lion’s share of the influence. “When you have a new issue of Special Drawing Rights (SDRs)—which we just had in 2021 for $650 billion— this liquidity created by the IMF is distributed according to quota, which really means that the developing world doesn’t get very much. And 80 percent goes to countries that are never going to use them. So, it’s an inefficient way of increasing global liquidity.”
“Obviously the rich countries that control these institutions are not going to give up their power easily,” she continues. “They have blocked every attempt to change because they have the voting rights now. So, do you say, ‘Okay, let’s demolish the whole thing and start afresh’? But then, how do you create a new institution? How do you even create a minimally democratic way of functioning?”
If the rich countries won’t give up their power voluntarily, they’ll have to be pushed to do so. “I have to confess: I’m saddened by the lack of public outcry,” Ghosh adds. “Even in the very progressive state of Massachusetts, where I’m teaching, people couldn’t be bothered with this. Similarly, in Europe. People’s movements need to point out how this is against not just the interests of the developing world, it’s against the enlightened self-interest of people in the rich countries as well.”
A similar problem applies to the power of the rich within countries. “There’s a need for tax justice at the global level, and not only with the rich countries with all governments involved in setting the tax rules, especially from the global south,” Jens Martens says. “We have a tax system with the highest rates much below what we had in the 1970s or even the 1980s. The international community recently established a minimum tax of 15 percent for transnational corporations: this is a very minor first step at the global level.”
“We had suggested 25 percent,” Jayati Ghosh adds, “which is the median of corporate tax rates globally. But it isn’t just increased tax rates. It’s important to emphasize redistribution. Regulatory processes have dramatically increased the profit share of large companies. Before we get to taxation, we have to look at the reasons they’re able to have these very high profits. We allow them to profiteer during periods of scarcity or assumed scarcity. We allow them to repress workers’ wages. We allow them to grab rents in different ways. So, we need a combination of regulation and taxation to rein in large capital and to make sure that the benefits ultimately produced by workers come back to workers and society as a whole.”
“In the last decade of the twentieth century, we managed to make these corporations villains,” points out Madhuresh Kumar. “But today they are not seen as the villains. Governments in the global North and in the South have given them a platform. There is muted celebration if we are able to shift these corporations toward providing more renewable energy, which they have done by diversifying. But if we can’t shift the power imbalance, we won’t achieve any equality in global governance, in the financial architecture, or anywhere.”
Where Does Change Come From?
In March 2022, Jayati Ghosh was named to a new High Level Advisory Board on Effective Multilateralism created by UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres. The dozen board members come from different countries and perspectives.
“We have to have a bit of a reality check on what commissions and advisory boards can achieve,” Ghosh points out. “We can advise. We can say this is what we think should happen, this is how we believe the international financial architecture must be changed. Everything else really depends on political will, which is not just governments suddenly seeing the light and becoming good. Political will is when governments are forced to respond to the people. Until that happens, we’re not going to get change no matter how many high-level boards and commissions come up with excellent recommendations that we can all agree with.”
After the 2008-9 global financial crisis, former World Bank economist Joseph Stiglitz headed up a UN-created commission. “It came up with some really fine recommendations, which are still valid,” Ghosh recalls. “But they were not implemented. They were not even considered. I don’t know if anyone at the IFIs even bothered to read that whole report.”
Multistakeholderism has elevated the status of corporations in high-level climate negotiations. But this is precisely the wrong strategy. “When the World Health Organization negotiated the Tobacco Control Convention, they decided to exclude lobbyists from the tobacco companies from the negotiations,” Jens Martens points out. “In the end they agreed to a quite strong convention, which is now in place. Why can’t we convince our governments to exclude fossil fuel lobbyists from negotiations in the climate sphere because there’s a conflict of interest?”
In the end, Martens is not so pessimistic: “I see a lot of social movements occurring in the last couple years as a counter-reaction to nationalism and the inactivity of our governments: Fridays for Future, Extinction Rebellion, Black Lives Matter. It’s very necessary to put pressure on our governments, because they only respond to pressure from below.”
Jayati Ghosh sees some positive momentum, particularly around the growing trend of acknowledging the rights of nature. “Ecuador and Bolivia included the rights of Mother Earth in their constitutions,” she reports. “But there’s also a movement of civil society groups fighting for the rights of nature in many countries including Germany. If nature is a subject by law, then we can have better instruments to protect nature. We also have discussions at the global level about alternatives to GDP that focus on well-being.”
“Can the world save the world?” she asks. “Yes, the world can save the world. Will the world save the world? No, not at the current rate. Not unless people actually rise up and make sure that their governments act.”
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Fueled by Industry Pollution, Superbugs Could Kill 10 Million People Per Year by 2050: UN
"Antimicrobial resistance is one of the definitive challenges of our times," said one U.N. leader. "Getting a grip on environmental pollution is critical."
Feb 07, 2023
A new report out Tuesday from the U.N. Environment Program warns that as many as 10 million people could die from so-called "Superbugs" annually by 2050 as the result of antimicrobial resistance driven by environmental pollution and irresponsible practices from a range of industries.
The report, titled Bracing for Superbugs, explains how pollution from hospital wastewater, sewage discharged from pharmaceutical production facilities, and run-off from animal and plant agriculture can be rife with "not only resistant microorganisms, but also antimicrobials, various pharmaceuticals, microplastics, metals, and other chemicals, which all increase the risk of AMR [antimicrobial resistance] in the environment."
The more prevalent AMR becomes, the more likely the global community is to face a fast-spreading "superbug," which would threaten people in wealthy countries with well-funded healthcare systems and people across the Global South alike.
Preventing the spread of antibiotic-resistant superbugs is just the latest reason for global policymakers to ensure "solid regulation of discharges [and] strengthening [of] wastewater treatment," wrote U.N. researchers in the report, as UNEP executive director Inger Andersen noted that the report shows the far-reaching benefits of acting to protect the environment.
"Polluted waterways, particularly those that have been polluted for some time, are likely to harbor microorganisms that increase AMR development and distribution in the environment."
"The same drivers that cause environmental degradation are worsening the antimicrobial resistance problem," said Andersen at the sixth meeting of the Global Leaders Group on Antimicrobial Resistance (GLGAMR) in Barbados. "The impacts of anti-microbial resistance could destroy our health and food systems. Cutting down pollution is a prerequisite for another century of progress towards zero hunger and good health."
Currently, AMR is linked to as many as 1.27 million deaths per year, and as Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley, the chair of the GLGAMR, said at the conference, the crisis "is disproportionately affecting countries in the Global South."
According to the study, the pharmaceutical industry frequently releases untreated wastewater containing "active pharmaceutical ingredients" such as "antibiotics, antivirals, and fungicides, as well as disinfectants."
Those contaminants increase the likelihood that "resistant superbugs" will "survive in untreated sewage," reads The Guardian.
According to UNEP, chronically polluted waterways are more likely "to harbor microorganisms that increase AMR development and distribution in the environment."
From the agricultural industry, the report warns that the "use of antimicrobials to treat infection and promote growth" among livestock, the "use of reclaimed wastewater for irrigating crops, use of manure as fertilizer, and inadequate waste management" all serve as entry points for AMR organisms into the environment.
UNEP noted that countries including Belgium, China, Thailand, the Netherlands, and Denmark have all "meaningfully reduced antimicrobial use in food animal husbandry."
According to a study published in OnEarth in 2014, Denmark instituted reforms including significantly limiting how much veterinarians could profit from the sale of antibiotics starting in 1995, and four years later outlawed all "nontherapeutic use of antibiotics in pigs... a huge change in a nation that is the world's leading exporter of pork."
"Although the situation is improving in some parts of the world, vast amounts of antimicrobials are used to treat and prevent infections in food animals," Matthew Upton, a professor of medical microbiology at the University of Plymouth in the U.K., told The Guardian. "Improved husbandry and other infection prevention and control methods like vaccination should be used to reduce infections and the need for antimicrobial use, which in turn limits environmental pollution with antimicrobials, antimicrobial residues, and resistant microbes."
Other steps policymakers can take, said UNEP, include:
- Increasing global efforts to improve integrated water management and promote water, sanitation, and hygiene to limit the development and spread of AMR in the environment as well as to reduce infections and need for antimicrobials;
- Integrating environmental considerations into national action plans on AMR which were developed in 2016 through the U.N.'s "One Health" campaign aimed at linking concerns for the well-being of humans with that of the environment and wildlife;
- Establishing international standards for what are good microbiological indicators of AMR from environmental samples, which can be used to guide risk reduction decisions and create effective incentives to follow such guidance; and
- Exploring options to redirect investments, to establish new and innovative financial incentives and schemes, and to make the investment case to guarantee sustainable funding for tackling AMR.
"AMR is one of the definitive challenges of our times," Andersen
tweeted on Tuesday. "Getting a grip on environmental pollution is critical."
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