If ratified, the Mercosur-EU trade deal may reinforce the parties’ commitment to climate action. Yet, its potential relevance is weakened by a language that often stops short of concrete commitments, as well as political resistance.
Brazil has demoted climate diplomacy as part of a foreign ministry shake-up, in Jair Bolsonaro’s first two weeks as president.
In order to help address escalating violence, UN Environment has launched the UN Initiative for Environmental Defenders. This brief analyses the initiative and looks into how member states can support peace by engaging in environmental diplomacy, with a focus on Brazil.
Brazil’s president-elect Jair Bolsonaro has named an anti-globalist diplomat to lead foreign affairs and his country’s relationship with the Paris Agreement. Ernesto Araújo, a relatively junior diplomat, accuses the left of using the environmental cause ‘to serve their political project of total domination’
Climate action and free trade have been perceived as contrary agendas for a long time. Despite more and more governments seeing tremendous potential for win-win outcomes, aligning trade and climate has become harder. This is due to changes in our current geopolitical landscape, as Christian Hübner explains in light of the upcoming G20 summit.
Fourteen Latin American and Caribbean countries made history at the UN General Assembly on September 27 by signing the Escazú Agreement, a regional accord on public participation and access to information and justice in environmental affairs. It is the first region-wide agreement of its kind and has been touted a big step forward in recognising the rights of environmental defenders. Signatories now need to ratify the Agreement internally before it can enter into force.
In October 2019 the Environmental Peacebuilding Association will host the First International Conference on Environmental Peacebuilding at the University of California. The conference will bring together academics, practitioners, and decision-makers to examine the links between environment, conflict, and peace.
Jair Bolsonaro, Brasil’s current de facto presidential frontrunner, says he would withdraw Brazil from the Paris Agreement if he wins the October election. The withdrawal of such an important developing country, home to the world’s largest rainforest, would deal a blow to international climate cooperation. Bolsorano’s opposition to the international pact has drawn criticism from the UN’s environment chief.
In May 2018, the Brazilian Institute for Climate and Society and the German Embassy in Brazil hosted an event on international climate and security in Rio de Janeiro. The meeting, joined by experts from the public sector, civil society and international think tanks, reflects Latin America’s increased interest in the international dimension of climate fragility risks.
The EU is currently negotiating a trade agreement with the four founding members of Mercosur. Negotiations cover a broad range of issues—but 1) do they consider climate change and 2) can compromises on environmental issues be found? In our interview, Christian Hübner, Head of the Regional Programme Energy Security and Climate Change Latin America, notes points of contention and shares how the EU and Mercosur can both benefit from deeper cooperation on energy and climate policy.
Diplomacy has an important role to play in creating an economy compatible with the target of staying below 2°C warming, agreed in Paris in 2015. At the climate conference in Marrakech (COP22) from 7 to 18 November 2016, dubbed the “implementation conference”, many new initiatives strengthened the impression that low-carbon transformation had gone mainstream.
This brief summarises the insights of the regional workshop on Foreign Policy Contributions to Climate Economy in Latin America that was organised by adelphi, Fundación Futuro Latinoamericano (FFLA) and the German Embassy in Lima as part of the climate diplomacy initiative. It aimed to promote regional dialogue on the climate economy and brought together representatives from foreign ministries and other line ministries, civil society and the private sector from across Latin America, in particular the Andean countries.
The Closing Event for the exhibition “Environment, Conflict and Cooperation” (ECC) in Lima takes place on 1 December 2016 at the Pontifica Universdad Católica del Peru (PUCP). The ECC exhibition visualises the growing impact of global environmental change on our world and, in particular, on South America.
The Spanish version of the Exhibition Environment, Conflict and Cooperation (ECC) that includes a specific module on South America is currently shown in Chile in cooperation with the NGO Fundación Terram. During 9-20 May, the Exhibition was hosted by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs (MFA) of Chile. The launch event on 10 May was attended by over a hundred participants: foreign policy, defence and environmental decision makers from Chile, representatives of several Latin American countries, Germany and USA, as well as members of Chilean and international civil society.
To ensure that Paris will be a sustainable success, active engagement is required to fully implement the INDCs and to ratchet up ambition in the coming years. Catalyzing the climate economy will be the key to accelerate the path towards a much-needed climate-friendly trajectory.