Both ENDS
The impacts of climate change are largely mediated by water. Changes in precipitation and glacial melt patterns, variations in river flow, increased occurrence of droughts and floods, and sea level rise all impact both urban and rural communities in developed, emerging, and especially developing countries. The book:'Adaptation to Climate Change through Water Management: Capacity, Equity and Sustainability' presents evidence of the emerging wealth of knowledge and experience on adaptation to climate change from across the world. It identifies common barriers and bridges for local adaptation to climate change through water resources management, looking at adaptive capacity, equity, and sustainability.
Last Thursday June 13, Rahmawati Retno Winarni of TUK, an Indonesian partner organisation of Both ENDS, presented a symbolic tree and an appeal to the Dutch Minister of Agriculture Carola Schouten, also on behalf of 10 NGOs. The joint NGOs are pushing the EU, including the Dutch government, for strict EU legislation to prevent the destruction of forests and ecosystems and to protect human rights.
Almost 100 candidate EU Members of Parliament have signed a pledge drafted and endorsed by European NGOs and prominent individuals in which they commit - once elected - to promoting policies to protect and restore forests worldwide and to recognising and securing forest peoples’ territories and their rights, including the rights of women, for generations to come. The organisers hope to get many more signatures before the EU elections, to make sure the new EU parliament will start treating these topics with high urgency as soon as it is installed.
On Wednesday, November 14, Dutch Newspaper De Volkskrant published a joint op-ed by Both ENDS, Hivos, Greenpeace Netherlands and Witness about the deforestation in the Amazon region which is still going on rapidly, having disastrous consequences for the indigenous people who live in the area, for biodiversity and for the climate. The Netherlands is one of the largest buyers of Brazilian agricultural products such as soy and beef, and should ensure that deforestation, land grabbing and human rights violations do not occur in these production chains. Unfortunately, this is not at all the case yet.
During the UNFCCC Climate Change Conference next week in Bonn, Both ENDS,Transparency International, Human Rights Watch and Carbon Market Watch will host the side event “Environmental and social accountability for results based finance - Lessons learned and ways forward’’. This event will discuss how lessons from International Financial Institutions can inform the design and operation of appropriate redress mechanisms for the Green Climate Fund and other private and public climate finance flows.
