Both ENDS
Both ENDS is co-plaintiff in the climate lawsuit brought by Milieudefensie (Friends of the Earth The Netherlands) in 2018 against Shell to stop the company from causing harm to the climate. In 2021, the judge ruled in favor of the climate, but unfortunately the company appealed. The court will therefore render its verdict at the end of 2024.
On April 2, 2009 the G-20 - the 20 countries with the largest national economies in the world - will be meeting to discuss new, (mostly) short term solutions for the financial crisis. The Netherlands is not a member country, but will be allowed to sit in. But which long term changes should Balkenende be advocating? To inspire him Both ENDS organises on wednesday March 25th, 2009 a Crisis Café: 'De Duurzame Daalder'.
Export support – and especially that to fossil projects – has been in the spotlights quite often recently. This is a positive development, because the Netherlands alone provides fossil export support worth 1.5 billion euros per year. At the climate summit in Glasgow, the United Kingdom launched a statement promising to stop providing export support to fossil projects by the end of 2022. After having denied at first, the Netherlands decided to join the statement after all – which now has already been signed by nearly forty countries and financial institutions.
The parliamentary elections in the Netherlands are over, and the dust has somewhat settled. No matter what government emerges from the process, one thing is clear: in the Netherlands the main focus is on the Netherlands. Foreign affairs were hardly mentioned during the elections and the same applies to the process of forming a new coalition. More alarmingly, some of the winners in the elections want to cut themselves off even further from the world around us.
The EU is the world's largest "importer of deforestation," due to the huge volumes of unsustainably produced soy, timber, palm oil, and other raw materials that EU member states import. After many years of delay, the European Parliament and the European Council passed a law in December 2023 to address this problem: The EU Deforestation Regulation (EUDR). Both ENDS is part of a broad coalition of organizations that have been pushing for this European legislation. However, there is now a serious delay, and perhaps even postponement, of the law's implementation. Objections have been raised by a number of member states, who are sensitive to lobbying by certain business sectors and producer countries.
January 25th, 2024 is the solemn 5-year mark of the Brumadinho upstream mining dam collapse, Brazil’s worst environmental and industrial disaster that killed 272 innocent people and unleashed 12 million cubic metres of ore tailing into the surrounding areas including the Paraopeba River – a crucial tributary of the second largest river in the country.
A number of our colleagues at Both ENDS made a lot of noise at various locations around the country today, as part of the national Klimaatalarm (Climate Alarm) campaign. Annelieke Douma gave a short speech in Haarlem on the major role played by the Netherlands in climate change and environmental degradation beyond our borders. She made a number of suggestions that would immediately make Dutch foreign policy a lot more climate-friendly. Below is the text of her speech.
