Africa

View of a solar power plant in Santa Marta, a favela or shantytown in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. One of the tentative commitments of COP28, to be held Nov. 30-Dec. 12 in Dubai, seeks to triple the growth of installed renewable energy capacity. CREDIT: Mario Osava / IPS

By Emilio Godoy
MEXICO CITY, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

Throughout 2023, Latin America has suffered heat waves, long, intense droughts, destructive floods and devastating hurricanes – phenomena related to the effects of a climate crisis derived mostly from the burning of fossil fuels.

Against this backdrop, the region will attend the 28th Conference of the Parties (COP28) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), to be held Nov. 30-Dec. 12 in Dubai in the United Arab Emirates. The region is bringing inadequate climate plans to address these phenomena and, at the same time, will voice demands for the international community to combat them.

Miriam García, associate director of Policy Engagement at the non-governmental CDP Latin America, said the mitigation plans are not adequate."There is a very powerful agenda. The key is seeking uniform positions in the global South in terms of mitigation-adaptation-loss and damage." -- Pilar Bueno

COP28 “should define a collective and quantifiable financing goal. To meet the NDC (Nationally Determined Contribution) targets, six trillion dollars are needed,” she told IPS from São Paulo.

As in most of the world, the voluntary NDC climate targets undertaken by Latin America are inadequate or insufficient.

Although most of the region’s nations have plans to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, adapt to the aftermath of the climate emergency and promote renewable energy, they are still tied to the use of oil and gas, which means they fall short when it comes to meeting the challenge.

In the case of Mexico and Argentina, the international platform Climate Action Tracker described their NDCs and mitigation and adaptation measures as “critically insufficient”.

It ranked the plans of Brazil, Chile and Colombia as “insufficient”.

The NDCs are a core part of the Paris Agreement on climate change, adopted in 2015 and in force since 2021, aimed at limiting the global temperature increase to 1.5 degrees Celsius, considered the minimum indispensable rise to avoid irreversible climate catastrophes and in consequence human disasters.

In the NDCs, nations must establish their 2030 and 2050 GHG emissions reduction targets, taking as a baseline a specific year; a path to achieve those targets; the peak year of their emissions and when they would achieve net zero emissions, absorbing as many gases as they release into the atmosphere.

Transportation is one of the most polluting activities in Latin America. The deployment of electric vehicles is the only one of 42 indicators that has shown progress in reducing carbon emissions. CREDIT: UNEP

Road to disaster

Overall, the Latin American NDCs, which contain net-zero emissions targets (with the exception of Mexico), would lead to global warming of between 2°C and 4°C, resulting in higher emissions.

By that count, GHG emissions from Mexico, the second largest polluter in the region after Brazil, would amount to between 807 million and 831 million tons of carbon dioxide (CO2), the gas generated by burning fossil fuels and the main cause of the rise in global temperatures, in 2030, without including emissions from land use change, deforestation and forestry.

In the case of Argentina, its emissions, without counting forestry, are projected to grow to 398 million tons of CO2 in 2030, approximately 25 percent above 2010 levels.

Meanwhile, Brazil’s pollutant emissions would reach 1145-1171 million tons in 2030, between 25 and 28 percent above 2005 levels.

Chile would be the only case where greenhouse gases would fall by 13-18 percent compared to 2021, to between 87 million and 104 million tons in 2030. Finally, Colombia would release 199-203 million tons into the atmosphere, 41-44 percent more than in 2010.

Since 2022, 38 countries, including Bolivia, Brazil, El Salvador, Guatemala, Mexico and Uruguay, have submitted an update of their NDCs to the UNFCCC Secretariat, while 157 countries have not revised their targets. Eight countries, including Mexico, have set less ambitious targets.

The State of Climate Action 2023 report, produced by several international climate monitoring organizations, found that progress has only been made in the deployment of electric vehicles, one of 42 indicators, leaving the planet far short of the Paris Agreement’s 1.5 degree Celsius temperature rise goal.

States parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change have formed groups that defend common interests in climate negotiations. CREDIT: Wikimedia

Suitcase of wishes

In this contradictory panorama of inadequate policies, unmet goals and financial and technological needs, Latin America is coming to COP28 with a variety of positions.

At the 23rd Meeting of the Forum of Ministers of the Environment of Latin America and the Caribbean, which took place Oct. 24-26 in Panama, the delegations agreed to support the transformation of the international financial system, food for the “loss and damage fund”, the progressive reduction of fossil fuel subsidies, a gender focus and the promotion of renewable energy.

Some of these proposals contained in the final declaration are in line with the priorities chosen by the Emirati presidency of COP28, such as accelerating the energy transition to triple the installed capacity of renewable energy to 11 terawatts (11 trillion watts).

They also agreed to double global annual average energy efficiency by 2030 and to curb methane emissions, which have increased over the past five years and have a greater heat-trapping capacity than CO2.

In addition, COP28 will discuss voluntary commitments on hydrogen adoption, green public procurement from sectors that emit the most pollution, such as the steel industry, the Emirates’ declarations on sustainable agriculture, resilient food systems and climate action and on climate and health.

Pilar Bueno, an academic at Argentina’s National University of Rosario, said Latin America has a substantive role to play in climate negotiations.

“There is a very powerful agenda. The key is seeking uniform positions in the global South in terms of mitigation-adaptation-loss and damage,” she told IPS from Buenos Aires, where she is also a researcher with the government’s National Scientific and Technical Research Council.

Adaptation actions and the scheme to address losses and damage from the effects of the climate crisis are the biggest differences between industrial and developing countries, because those in the South are demanding that the rich North, which has historically created more pollution, foot most of the bill.

The countries of the industrialized North appear to have met three years late the goal of contributing 100 billion dollars per year to the climate fight, which raises concerns about new commitments.

On other issues there are discordant positions within the groups that operate in the negotiations of the governmental delegations at the COPs, according to their specific interests.

For example, the Environmental Integrity Group (EIG), of which Mexico is a member, does not support the abandonment of fossil fuels or coal, one of the hot topics in Dubai.

On the other hand, the High Ambition Coalition (HAC), to which 12 Latin American countries belong, considers “high priority” the elimination of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies, the doubling of financing for adaptation, the alignment of NDCs to meet the 1.5 degree target in 2035, peak emissions in 2025 and financial flows that follow the guidelines of the Paris Agreement.

HAC also maintains that the phasing out of fossil fuels and coal, the tripling of renewable energy capacity and improvements in energy efficiency are key.

Meanwhile, the Independent Association of Latin America and the Caribbean (AILAC), made up of eight nations, prioritizes guidelines for fossil fuel phase-out and loss and damage assessment, as well as a mechanism for monitoring accountability regarding commitments.

Finally, the Like-Minded Group, to which six Latin American countries belong, says a high priority is for industrialized countries to achieve the goal of zero carbon and to pay increasing attention to adaptation measures.

María Paz, executive president of the Peruvian non-governmental organization Libélula, said it is imperative for the region to accelerate the implementation of measures.

“We must focus on a roadmap, to know where to go, the stops and the path to those goals. There is a lack of ambition and implementation. We are way behind,” she told IPS from Lima.

Armed men attacked a military barracks and a prison in Freetown, the capital of Sierra Leone on November 26th.

Tackling gender inequalities in agrifood systems and empowering women would not only reduce hunger and reinforce resilience, it would boost the global economy too. Credit: Jency Samuel/IPS

By Paul Virgo
ROME, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

Objections to progressive policies are often based on cost. It would be great to have a fairer, more sustainable world, the argument goes, but where will the money come from to pay for it?

Such objections, which strangely do not seem to apply to issues such as public subsidies for fossil fuels or corporate tax breaks, are mostly bogus because they do not account for the cost of a range of what economists call ‘externalities’, the negative impact the existing way of doing things has on the climate, the environment, quality of life, human health and so on.

But what is perhaps even worse is that these arguments frequently do not make sense even if one focuses purely on the ‘bottom line’.

Closing the gender gap in farm productivity and the wage gap in agricultural employment would increase global gross domestic product by nearly $1 trillion. It would also reduce the number of food-insecure people worldwide by 45 million

A recent report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) on The Status of Women in Agrifood Systems shows that the food business is a good example of this.

The report goes beyond agriculture to provide a comprehensive picture of the status of women working across agrifood systems – from food production to distribution and consumption.

It demonstrates how tackling gender inequalities in agrifood systems and empowering women would not only reduce hunger and reinforce resilience to the effects of climate change and shocks like the COVID-19 pandemic, it would boost the global economy too.

The study explains that closing the gender gap in farm productivity and the wage gap in agricultural employment would increase global gross domestic product by nearly $1 trillion.

It would also reduce the number of food-insecure people worldwide by 45 million.

Furthermore, if half of small-scale producers benefited from development interventions that focused on empowering women, it would significantly raise the incomes of an additional 58 million people and increase the resilience of a further 235 million, it says.

“Tackling gender inequalities in agrifood systems and empowering women is pivotal for achieving the global goals of poverty reduction and ending hunger,” Lauren Phillips, the Deputy Director of the Inclusive Rural Transformation and Gender Equality (ESP) Division at FAO and one of the report’s authors, told IPS.

“As highlighted in our report, the benefits of creating opportunities for women in agrifood systems are huge and can improve food security, well-being, economic growth, and resilience for entire communities, particularly in rural areas.

“By adopting policies, programmes, and investment intentionally designed to empower women and address the gaps they face in accessing resources and assets, we would be a step closer towards more just, resilient and sustainable agrifood systems”.

The report details the many ways in which women working in agrifood systems frequently get a rough deal.

Inequalities in agrifood systems hold women back at all levels, it says.

The report says women’s roles tend to be marginalized and their working conditions are frequently worse than men’s, as they are often irregular, informal, part-time, low-skilled, or labour-intensive.

It says women engaged in wage employment in agriculture earn 82 cents for every dollar that men earn.

Women also have less secure tenure over land, less access to credit and training, and have to work with technology designed for men.

Along with discrimination, these inequalities create a 24% gender gap in productivity between women and men farmers on farms of equal size.

The report also indicates that, when economies shrink, women’s jobs go first. It says 22% of women in the ‘off-farm’ segments of agrifood systems lost their jobs in the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic compared to 2% of men.

The study confirms that women are more vulnerable to climate shocks and natural disasters, as resource constraints and discriminatory gender norms can make it harder for them to adapt.

For example, women’s work burdens, including hours worked in agriculture, tend to decline less than men’s during climate shocks such as heat stress.

The report said that progress in reducing most gender gaps has stagnated or reversed since the FAO’s last similar study was released in 2010.

It says gender inequality in agrifood systems persists partly because policies, institutions and discriminatory social norms are still constraining equal opportunities and equal rights to resources.

The study shows that interventions to improve women’s productivity are successful when they address care and unpaid domestic work burdens, provide education and training, and strengthen land-tenure security.

Access to childcare also has a large positive effect on mothers’ employment.

Phillips says there are many examples of how projects targeting working women, 36% of whom are employed in agrifood systems worldwide, compared to 38% working men, generate greater benefits than those that just mainstream gender.

One is the Joint Programme ‘Accelerating Progress Towards Rural Women’s Economic Empowerment’ (JP RWEE), run in partnership with the FAO’s sister Rome-based UN food agencies, the WFP and IFAD.

The programme mobilized over $1.9 million through savings and loan schemes and reached almost 80,000 direct beneficiaries and more than 400,000 indirect beneficiaries during the first phase of implementation between 2014 and 2021 in Ethiopia, Guatemala, Liberia, Kyrgyzstan, Nepal, Niger and Rwanda.

These included 40,000 who benefitted from capacity strengthening activities in agricultural production techniques and 20,000 people trained through gender-transformative approaches.

Among other results, the programme generated an average increase of 82% in production by the rural women involved.

“Even though many people told me I couldn’t do it, because technology is for men, not women, I knew I could,” said Marta Benavente, a JP RWEE trained solar engineer from Guatemala.

“The JP RWEE taught me that women can do much more than just housework. And now my community knows that and so do my daughters.”

 

Cardinal Peter Turkson is at odds with bishops in his country, who back a harsh anti-gay proposal.

The government is determining whether armed attacks on capital city Freetown were an attempted coup.

By Farhana Haque Rahman
TORONTO, Canada, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

Another year and another UN climate change conference. As our ‘world leaders’ prepare for two air-conditioned weeks of wrangling at COP28 in Dubai later this month, forgive us for sounding underwhelmed, despairing, and even cynical about these annual jamborees where actions rarely match promises.

Farhana Haque Rahman

Some context: 2023 is almost certain to be the hottest year for Earth for some 125,000 years, and it has already seen devastating storms, floods, extreme drought, and wildfires. September and October set shocking records for monthly global temperature highs.

Earth’s systems are flashing warning signals. Immense carbon sinks in peatlands and tropical wetlands show signs of morphing instead into sources of greenhouse gas emissions; the melting of Antarctic Sea ice has accelerated; the Arctic risks total loss of late summer sea ice in the next decade; drought and deforestation in the Amazon could turn rainforest to savannah.

This year’s Conference of the Parties (COP) comes mid-way between the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement and the 2030 interim target of reducing greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent from 2010 levels to reach net zero emissions by 2050 and thus keep global temperature increases within 1.5 degrees Celsius of pre-industrial levels.

But we are way off target. Based on national commitments made by governments worldwide, we are still heading towards a sizeable increase in emissions by 2030 compared to 2010.

A roadmap to accelerate climate action is desperately needed at COP28. But instead of phasing out fossil fuels – by far the major source of emissions – big and wealthy nations are, in the words of UN Secretary General António Guterres, “literally doubling down on fossil fuel production.”

In aggregate, according to the UN-led 2023 Production Gap Report, governments still plan to produce more than double the amount of fossil fuels in 2030 than would be consistent with limiting warming to 1.5 degrees C.

The report names the top 10 countries responsible for the largest carbon emissions from planned production: India for coal, Saudi Arabia for oil, and Russia for coal, oil, and gas. Major oil producers with big plans also include the US and Canada.

The United Arab Emirates is the host of COP28, due to start on November 30, and is presided over by Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber, UAE industry and advanced technology minister and group CEO of the Abu Dhabi National Oil Company.

Of course, producers would not produce without customers. China, the world’s largest emitter of greenhouse gases, approved the equivalent of two new large coal plants a week in 2022.

So, have we humans already pushed the planet to the point of no return, to a stage of cascading negative feedback loops already triggering a sixth mass extinction of species, the last being 65 million years ago when the dinosaurs were wiped out?

Perhaps not yet… quite… but maybe soon.

In the best judgment of the scientists on the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in their Sixth Assessment Report published this year, the world has a “rapidly closing window of opportunity to secure a liveable and sustainable future for all…The choices and actions implemented in this decade will have impacts now and for thousands of years.”

They said the same thing last year, but few listened then. Will they now?

Cuts in emissions must be deep and immediate, which is the crux of COP28. As Guterres and many others have shouted from the rooftops, world leaders must agree in Dubai to phase out fossil fuels and shut their ears to the lobbyists who have enabled their petro-state masters to earn billions of dollars in profit this year alone.

As the IPCC scientists also bravely note, there is, thankfully, some climate action. The rate of increase in global greenhouse emissions has slowed and may be peaking; costs of solar and wind energy and batteries have tumbled; the deployment of renewable energy has risen faster than expected; the rate of deforestation has decreased.

IPCC Chair Hoesung Lee did remind everyone last April: “We have the tools and know-how required to limit warming.”

The International Energy Agency’s latest World Energy Outlook 2023 also has some encouraging elements. An analysis of the IEA data by UK-based Carbon Brief suggests that global CO2 emissions from energy use and industry could peak as soon as this year. This is due in part to the worldwide energy crisis triggered by Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. China’s slowing economic growth also helps.

Fossil fuel peaks are driven by the “unstoppable” growth of low-carbon technologies, but renewable energy capacity targets will be tripled by 2030, the IEA says. This has to be a key outcome of COP28, an element that China should approve of, given its dominance worldwide in this sector.

It is sad but also just that COP28 may, in the end, be best remembered for the man who will not be there.

Prof Saleemul Huq, Bangladeshi scientist and climate justice activist, died on October 28, aged 71. A man who constantly raised the great moral questions over the unequal sufferings inflicted by the climate crisis, Huq was seen as the champion of the “loss and damage” fund, which was agreed in principle at COP27 in Egypt but has yet to be implemented.

Recent preparatory talks made some progress, with developing countries conceding that the fund will be under the World Bank for an interim period. But the US still insists that contributions from wealthy nations historically responsible for the climate crisis be voluntary, while China insists on exemption given its “developing nation” status. COP28 must get this fund off the ground, and China, too, should stop playing geopolitics.

Named by Nature as one of the world’s top 10 scientists last year, Huq had penned an open letter to the UAE’s Al-Jaber urging him to pre-empt drawn-out debates by announcing the intended creation of the “Dubai Loss and Damage Fund.”

“As far as I am concerned, if all you can say at the end of COP28 is that ‘progress’ has been made on the issue of funding loss and damage, that will be the kiss of death,” Huq wrote, demanding urgent support for the “poorest and most vulnerable people on the planet,” citing by way of example the “over 2,000 climate displaced people” who arrive daily “by foot, cycle, boat and bus in Dhaka and disappear into the city slums.”

Another leftover pledge from COP26 in Glasgow was to double adaptation finance from 2019 levels by 2025. Provisions are dwarfed by needs. They are also dwarfed many times over by the subsidies given to fossil fuels, estimated by the IMF to reach $7 trillion globally last year.

Veteran scientists recently warned that Earth will cross the 1.5 degrees threshold this decade, much earlier than the IPCC fears on our current course. Either way, the trend is clear, and so are the actions needed. The world will judge harshly any failure at COP28 to redress climate injustice or declare a clear pathway to end the exploitation of fossil fuels.

Farhana Haque Rahman is the Executive Director of IPS Inter Press Service Noram and Senior Vice President of IPS; she served as the elected Director General of IPS from 2015 to 2019. A journalist and communications expert who lived and worked in Africa, Asia, Europe and North America, she is a former senior official of the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization FAO and the International Fund for Agricultural Development IFAD.

IPS UN Bureau

 

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UN Secretary-General António Guterres looks across the ice sheet at Frei Antarctica base. Credit: UN Photo/Mark

By Hisham Allam
CAIRO, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

The recent U.S.-China summit on November 15 in San Francisco, against a backdrop of low expectations, surprisingly made significant strides with the unveiling of the “Sunnylands Statement on Enhancing Cooperation to Address the Climate Crisis.” This agreement, the result of two years of negotiations between climate envoys John Kerry and Xie Zhenhua, represents a considerable advancement following the 2021 joint declaration at the Glasgow Climate Summit.

The declaration has a dual focus: it establishes a working group to address critical climate issues through U.S.-China collaboration, and it sets forth commitments to amplify international efforts, particularly under the Paris Agreement. Importantly, this collaborative endeavor aims to reactivate a working group that was stalled in 2021 due to geopolitical disputes, demonstrating a renewed commitment to overcoming hurdles in climate cooperation.

The statement covers practical areas of collaboration, ranging from methane reduction to large-scale carbon capture projects. It also signals a revival of the U.S.-China Energy Efficiency Forum and endorses subnational cooperation, spotlighting successful initiatives between California and China.

A key aspect of the Sunnylands Statement is its reference to the upcoming 28th United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP28) in Dubai, with a promise of a jointly hosted summit on methane and non-CO2 gases. It introduces a commitment to economy-wide targets on all greenhouse gases by 2035, a significant step for China, and addresses the contentious issue of climate finance, a topic that has ignited heated debates in previous COP meetings. It was welcomed by Dr Sultan Ahmed Al Jaber,
COP28 President-Designate, who noted that the “Global Stocktake evidences that there is much to be done to get back on track and keep 1.5C within reach. It will require all parties to unite, act, and deliver a high-ambition GST decision at COP28.”

John Englander, a US expert in climate change, global warming, and rising sea levels, told IPS that China’s new commitment to GHG reduction is significant. It holds importance not only in potentially reducing their emissions but also in encouraging others to do the same. However, he emphasized that this will not “solve climate change.”

Englander added that despite all our efforts, we are losing ground each year.

“While being hopeful and innovative is great, we also need to be realistic. With the excess heat already stored in the ocean, Greenland and Antarctica will almost certainly continue their quickening melt rate, raising global sea levels.”

He stressed the need for planning and implementing more adaptation, even with all the glimmers of hope.

He stated that it was a positive step. If all the CO2 emitters adopted tighter standards, it would help slow the rate of warming a little bit. It’s a good start, but even with all the current efforts, we are losing ground. Sea levels will rise for centuries in any scenario. We need to slow the warming as much as possible, but we also need to realize that sea level is going to rise significantly.

As the world prepares for COP28 in Dubai, António Guterres, during a visit late last week to Antarctica, reflected on the impact of global warming on the region and appealed to world leaders to limit the global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius.

He also urged them to protect people from climate chaos and end the fossil fuel age, saying, “We must not let all hopes for a sustainable planet melt away.”

Khaled Suliman, an expert in climate change from Iraq, has pointed out that China, during the inception of the Industrial Revolution, was not among the industrial nations primarily accountable for carbon emissions. As such, China leans on its historical lack of responsibility and argues that it shouldn’t be obligated to undertake climate mitigation efforts like other countries, such as Britain, which is recognized as the pioneer of the Industrial Revolution, the technological revolution, and carbon emissions. Suliman emphasized that China’s heavy reliance on oil is a crucial factor. Any disruption in its oil dependence could lead to an economic downturn. Currently, China is in urgent need to persist with its economic development to ascend as the world’s leading industrial nation.

From the onset of the Industrial Revolution until now, British emissions have totaled 78 billion tons. In contrast, Chinese emissions from 2010 to 2021 have surpassed 150 billion tons of carbon, according to Suliman. This situation poses a significant challenge. Although it’s generally accepted that China isn’t historically responsible, the vast amount of carbon emissions it has produced in recent years is difficult to manage. This predicament could potentially hinder negotiations between China and major industrial nations, particularly the United States, which is the second-largest carbon emitter after China.

Any commitment from China to reduce carbon emissions inherently implies a decrease in the consumption of fossil fuels. Consequently, this commitment is likely to impact other countries that export oil to China. Moreover, it could also affect Chinese companies operating in the oil sector in Africa and the Middle East, especially as these companies are expanding globally.

“This agreement could therefore influence the oil and gas industries in these countries and their respective companies. Additionally, it could also impact the Chinese industry known for supplying globally competitive goods due to their low prices, a feat achieved largely due to fossil fuels and oil and gas,” Suliman told IPS.

Given the world’s reliance on fossil fuels, any agreement between developed and emerging industrial countries, as Suliman stated, could initially have a negative impact on the world economy.

“These agreements, however, are expected to produce positive outcomes and significant benefits in the future, particularly if there is a shift toward renewable energy and reducing emissions from fossil fuels. Such measures would benefit biodiversity, natural ecosystem conservation, smart agriculture, and nature-based solutions. All of these factors are expected to benefit economies, communities, food sources, and global food security,” Suliman said.

He warned that if the dependence on fossil fuels continues, by the end of the century, we could see a temperature rise exceeding 4 degrees Celsius compared to pre-Industrial Revolution levels. Consequently, many regions worldwide, including the Middle East, could become uninhabitable.

 

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Many African countries are mainstreaming migration governance for greater coherence and inclusivity. Europe can draw some valuable lessons from this. Credit: Africa Renewal

By Felicity Okoth
BERGEN, Norway, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

Popular migration discourses in Europe often question the ability of African states to govern migration effectively. Media images of African migrants squeezed into dingy boats in the Mediterranean constantly reinforce these discourses.

However, positive examples of what migration governance should be now exist within the continent, and they can provide important lessons for many of the EU Member States. One such example is the National Coordination Mechanism on Migration (NCM) adopted by countries in the East and Horn of Africa.

NCMs are government-led interagency platforms that bring together different ministries to promote dialogue on migration issues and formulate holistic migration policies. They have realised coherent and inclusive migration governance in the region, and more states in other parts of Africa are now adopting this approach.

The African continent boasts of diverse migration experiences, including but not limited to regular cross-border trade, labour migration, forced migration, seasonal migration and migration for educational purposes. These happen at the domestic, regional and international levels and can be documented or undocumented.

Currently, 85 per cent of mobility occurs within the continent, as most African migrants – including refugees – prefer moving to neighbouring countries.

Ensuring coherent and inclusive migration governance

Against this backdrop, African Union (AU) Heads of State adopted the African Migration Policy Framework in 2006. Its current version is the Migration Policy Framework for Africa and Plan for Action (2018-2030).

The framework provides comprehensive and integrated policy guidelines to AU Member States and Regional Economic Communities (RECs) in their endeavours to promote migration and development. It further provides a guideline on how to address migration challenges on the continent.

The Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD), a REC in the Horn of Africa comprising eight members (Djibouti, Eritrea, Ethiopia, Kenya, Somalia, Sudan, South Sudan and Uganda), decided to establish NCMs to implement the African Union’s framework.

The REC also has a Regional Migration Policy Framework guided by the AU’s policy framework, and NCMs are also part of this implementation.

NCMs, as stated earlier, are platforms that foster dialogue on migration-related issues to realise coherent and inclusive migration governance. For instance, Kenya’s NCM, spearheaded by the Ministry of Interior and National Administration, includes the Ministry of Labour and Social Protection, the Ministry of Foreign and Diaspora Affairs, the Ministry of Investments, Trade and Industry, the Ministry of Youth Affairs, Sports and the Arts, the Ministry of Health, the Ministry of Education and, last but not least, the Ministry of Environment and Forestry.

Government agencies like the National Bureau of Statistics and the National Employment Authority are also involved. The NCM also holds consultative workshops with academia, civil society, trade unions, the private sector, church, as well as faith-based organisations, including county assemblies at local governance levels.

More broadly, NCMs in the IGAD region endeavour to mainstream migration into national development through a whole-of-society and government approach. They mobilise resources, offer technical support and directly participate in implementing migration programmes rolled out by different government ministries.

As such, it makes it possible for various ministries to know what the others are doing, avoiding duplication of activities and save limited resources.

Lessons for Europe

It is thus fair to say that European Union Member States have something to learn from IGAD Member States. In most EU countries, the migration docket currently falls solely within the Ministries of Interior or Home Affairs. These ministries often work in silos and formulate migration policies without fully involving other relevant ministries.

As a result, migration policies and overall migration governance take off from a security standpoint first and foremost. Consequently, migration is viewed and governed as a threat to the nation-state.

On the contrary, numerous peer-reviewed studies and reports show that migrants contribute to their destination countries’ economic and social development. The EU and its Member States continuously disregard this fact and put more funds into externalisation than into opening regular migration pathways.

The union has set aside millions of euros to outsource migration management to countries outside Europe to prevent migration into its territory. This strategy has, however, not been successful, as evidenced by hardline stands, pushbacks by African border states and the abuse of migrants’ human rights within these states.

The number of migrants that reached Italy’s shores in the summer of 2023, for example, was at a record high compared to previous years. It is, therefore, imperative for the EU to look at migration differently and develop new approaches to manage it effectively.

Bringing together all migration stakeholders through one platform is a daunting task — but not an impossible one. IGAD Member States have proven that it is an achievable endeavour. Kenya, Uganda, Ethiopia and Djibouti, considered to be on a development trajectory, have had more progress in the implementation of NCMs and provide lessons that could be a starting point for countries in the EU.

NCMs, as highlighted, offer a platform to critically address specific migration issues and challenges and share diverse ways to manage migration in a coordinated manner. NCMs also allow the sharing of migration data across different ministries and agencies to inform policies coherently.

For instance, Kenya’s NCM has developed and validated Standard Operating Procedures on migration data management by all NCM stakeholders. Different government ministries have also signed a Memorandum of Understanding on data sharing, exchange and dissemination.

These initiatives have facilitated informed dialogue on migration issues within the NCM and further resulted in inclusive migration policies.If accompanied by political goodwill, a similar undertaking can achieve maximum results within EU Member States.

The EU Member States have proven that they are able to make great strides, such as with the General Data Protection Regulation, and they have the financial and technical capabilities to implement such a platform.

But with the migration narrative currently being run by far-right politicians, the time to act is now!

Felicity Okoth coordinates the International Migration and Ethnic Relations (IMER) research network in Bergen, Norway. She is also pursuing a PhD at the department of Social Anthropology at the University of Bergen. Her research looks at the situated and trans-local practices of Sub-Saharan African migrants in Nairobi and how these influence their migration aspirations (return or move to third countries).

Source: International Politics and Society (IPS)-Journal published by the International Political Analysis Unit of the Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung, Hiroshimastrasse 28, D-10785 Berlin

IPS UN Bureau

 

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UN Human Rights Council in session. Credit: UN Photo/Violaine Martin

By Thalif Deen
UNITED NATIONS, Nov 27 2023 (IPS)

The rise in authoritarianism worldwide has prompted a coalition of over 85 civil society organizations (CSOs) to call on the Geneva-based Human Rights Council to appoint a Special Rapporteur—an independent UN expert– to protect democracy and reverse its decline.

The joint appeal comes ahead of the 75th anniversary of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights which will be commemorated on 10 December 2023.

Andreas Bummel, Executive Director, Democracy Without Borders, told IPS the proposed Rapporteur is not necessarily supposed to make general judgements on whether a country is democratically ruled or not.

But it will be useful for the Rapporteur to identify specific democratic shortcomings based on principles the UN has set up thus far, he pointed out

For instance, the existence of a pluralistic system of political parties is one such principle. Obviously, one party states are at odds with this.

Apart from shortcomings, the Rapporteur should also try to identify best practices, or in other words, where does democracy perform very well and why, so others can learn from this, said Bummel.

“Democracy is a human right and human rights depend on democracy. The UN can no longer look the other way while this right is being denied, undermined and weakened in many countries around the world. A UN Rapporteur on Democracy (UNRoD) is urgently needed”, he argued,

In terms of which countries are facing challenges, the Rapporteur can draw on international assessments like those made by V-Dem or International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance (IDEA), a Stockholm-based intergovernmental organization that works to support and strengthen democratic institutions and processes around the world.

According to International IDEA’s latest report, presented earlier this month, the strongest democratic decline in the past years was observed in Benin, Belarus, El Salvador, Afghanistan and Myanmar, among others. Syria, North Korea and China are among the most autocratic countries according to V-Dem, he said.

Currently two of the world’s largest democracies are India (population: 1.4 billion) and the US. (332 million)

India ranks 108th in the Electoral Democracy Index of the V-dem Democracy* report 2023. The U.S., described as a flawed democracy, ranks 30th overall in the world. At the top of the democracy index are Norway ranking number one, followed by New Zealand, Finland and Sweden.

Although Joe Biden won the 2020 US presidential election, his rival Donald Trump has refused to concede defeat, making false allegations that the voting was rigged—which prompted an attack by his supporters on the seat of the US government on Capitol Hill on January 6, 2021.

The charges of a “stolen election” have also undermined democracy in the US.

In an article on November 21, the New York Times said that Trump, who is currently the leading Republican candidate for the US presidential elections next year, has “used language that echoed totalitarian leaders who rose to power in Germany and Italy in the 1930s degrading his political adversaries as “vermin” who needed to be “rooted out”.

The Times said Trump’s rhetoric has sounded new alarms among experts on autocracy who have long worried about his praise for foreign dictators and disdain for democratic ideals—all of which will be on full display if he is returned to power.

Meanwhile, the recent epidemic of coups in Africa — including military take-overs in Mali, Burkina Faso, Niger and Gabon– have also triggered the inevitable question: Is multi-party democracy on the retreat?

The Open Society Barometer, an annual global survey from Open Society Foundations, launched last September, reflects the positive and negative aspects of the state democracy worldwide.

The survey finds that young people around the world (Generation Z and millennials) “hold the least faith in democracy of any age group, presenting a grave threat to its future”.

Over a third (35%) of respondents in the 18-35 age group were supportive of a strong leader who does away with parliament and elections.

A large minority of young people surveyed (42%) feel that military rule is a good way of running a country. A similar number (35%) feel that having a strong leader who does not bother with elections or consulting parliament/congress is a good way of running a country.

This compares to 20% that support military rule and 26% that are in favor of a strong leader in the 56 plus age bracket.

According to a statement by the coalition, “democracy is threatened and authoritarianism is on the rise”. In this situation, the UN “needs to do more to strengthen human rights and democracy”, the statement says

The statement points out that the new mandate can be based on UN resolutions that identify and support democratic principles. This includes the “central democratic principle” that “public authority must derive from the will of the people” which is expressed in Article 21 of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.

At a time when democracy is challenged by autocracies and undermined in many democracies, the proposal for a UN Rapporteur on Democracy deserves urgent and serious consideration. It is fully endorsed by the V-Dem project and its Steering Committee, said political scientist Staffan Lindberg, Director, Varieties of Democracy Institute* (V-Dem) at the University of Gothenburg.

Natalie Samarasinghe, Global Director of Advocacy, Open Society Foundations, said people believe in democracy. But their hopes are being crushed as states fail to deliver and trample on the rules that protect us.

At a time of crisis and contested narratives, the UN must use every possible tool to empower people: a Special Rapporteur on Democracy would be a good start, she said.

Rebecca A. Shoot, Executive Director, Citizens for Global Solutions said democracy is a fundamental human right that cannot be taken for granted in any corner of the world.

“In recent years, we have seen backsliding, erosion, and authoritarian encroachment that democracy champions have bravely stood against across the globe. They must not stand alone”.

The UN Special Rapporteur system is an invaluable tool for advancing human rights. It is time that this powerful mechanism be deployed in support of democracy, she declared.

https://www.democracywithoutborders.org/files/UNROD_endorsements.pdf

IPS UN Bureau Report

 

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"He who loves does not kill, does not humiliate or mistreat" reads a poster carried in a protest against violence against women in Lima, the capital of Peru, which is part of a slogan repeated in demonstrations against femicides and other forms of sexist violence in Latin America. CREDIT: Mariela Jara / IPS

By Mariela Jara
LIMA, Nov 24 2023 (IPS)

“The Latin American and Caribbean region has made many advances in the fight against gender violence, but now we are facing reactions that show that our rights are never secure and that we must always be on the alert to defend them,” said Susana Chiarotti, a member of Mesecvi’s Committee of Experts.

The Committee of Experts is the technical body of the Follow-up Mechanism to the Inter-American Convention on the Prevention, Punishment and Eradication of Violence against Women (Mesecvi), known as the Convention of Belem do Para, which will celebrate its 30th anniversary in force in the countries of the region in 2024. The committee is made up of independent experts appointed by each state party.

Chiarotti summed up the regional situation of progress and setbacks in a conversation with IPS from her home in the Argentine city of Rosario, ahead of the United Nations’ Day for the Elimination of Violence Against Women, commemorated on Saturday, Nov. 25.

Gender violence violates the human rights of one in four women in this region with an estimated female population of 332 million, 51 percent of the total, and escalates to the extreme level of femicide – gender-based murders – which cost 4050 lives in 2022, according to figures confirmed Friday, Nov. 24 by the Gender Equality Observatory for Latin America and the Caribbean.

Likewise, UN Women‘s regional director for the Americas and the Caribbean, María Noel Vaeza, told IPS from Panama City that the emblematic date seeks to draw the attention of countries to the urgent need to put an end to violence against women once and for all by adopting public policies for prevention and investing in programs to eliminate it.

She pointed out that Nov. 25 is the first of 16 days of activism against gender-based violence, which run through Dec. 10, Human Rights Day.

Vaeza said that less than 40 percent of women who suffer violence seek some kind of help, which clearly shows that they do not find guarantees in the prevention and institutional response system and therefore do not report incidents.

“This has serious consequences for their lives and those of other women, as the perpetrators do not face justice and impunity and violence continue unchecked,” she said.

Uruguayan María Noel Vaeza, UN Women regional director for Latin America and the Caribbean, draws the attention of countries to the urgent need to put an end to violence against women through the adoption of public policies for prevention and investment in programs to eliminate it. CREDIT: UN Women

Vaeza said that, despite these worrying trends, there is more evidence than ever that violence against women is preventable, and urged countries in the region to invest in prevention.

“The evidence shows that the presence of a strong, autonomous feminist movement is a critical factor in driving public policy change for the elimination of violence against women at the global, regional, national and local levels,” said the UN Women regional head.

She explained that many studies have shown that large-scale reductions in violence against women can be achieved through coordinated action between local and national prevention and response systems and women’s and other civil society organizations.

So in order to move towards regulatory frameworks and improve the institutional architecture and budget allocations to prevent, respond to and redress gender-based violence, strengthening the advocacy capacity of feminist and women’s movements and organizations is indispensable.

She also mentioned that whenever progress is made, there are setbacks as well, and “unfortunately history shows us that social changes against things like machismo/sexism and violence require the efforts of society as a whole and plans and policies that give answers to the victims today, but also make it possible to improve the system in the medium and long term.”

Vaeza stressed that violence against women and girls remains the most pervasive human rights violation around the world. Its prevalence worsened in the aftermath of the COVID-19 pandemic and is growing further due to the interrelated crises of climate change, global conflicts and economic instability.

She also mentioned the proliferation of new forms of violence and the persistence of those “who believe that we do not have to guarantee women’s human rights, and organize themselves, and in the region we have situations such as attacks against women human rights defenders and activists that have become more frequent.”

Vaeza, from Uruguay, underlined that there is more evidence than ever that it is possible to change this reality and that in order to have peaceful societies, reducing inequality and poverty is key, and all this will depend on advancing gender equality and the rights of those who have historically faced discrimination.

They are mainly, she said, women living in poverty, indigenous women, women of African descent, rural women, women migrants, and women and girls with disabilities.

Susana Chiarotti is a member of the Committee of Experts of the Follow-up Mechanism to the Belém do Pará Convention, which has been monitoring the performance of States in their obligation to prevent, punish and eradicate violence against women for the past 30 years. CREDIT: Cladem Argentina

Strong reactions to progress

Chiarotti said: “I have been with Mesecvi for 20 years and I can see the changes. Let’s remember that it was only in 1989 that laws on violence against women began to be enacted and that we did not have services, shelters, specialized courts and even less a specific Convention to address this issue, which was the first in the world.”

The lawyer and university professor emphasized that in 40 years the women’s movement has put the issue of violence against women on the public agenda and has made such huge strides that “we could be called the most successful lobby in history in positioning an issue in such a massive and global manner.”

And she added that “we did not believe then, in 1986, 1987 or 1988, that the phenomenon had permeated all structures, not only the intimate sphere; there was symbolic, institutional, political and many other forms of violence, which led us to demand more answers, especially from the State, which, being patriarchal, admitted women only with forceps.”

Chiarotti, who is also a former head of the Latin American and Caribbean Committee for the Defense of Women’s Rights (Cladem), warns that they are now facing reactions to the extent that unimaginable alliances have arisen to stop them, such as that of the Vatican with conservative evangelical churches and far-right groups.

She also mentioned the decision of the U.S. Supreme Court that in June 2022 overthrew the right to abortion in that country, which had been in force for almost 50 years.

“That makes you realize that our rights are never secure, that we must always be on the alert to defend them. And it is difficult for a movement that is cyclical, that has waves, that rises and falls, to be always alert,” she said.

In addition, she mentioned the recent victory of the candidate Javier Milei as future president of Argentina and the dangers he represents for women’s rights, sexual diversity and the historical memory of human rights abuses.

“This will not be the first time that this people, and women especially, will enter a stage of resistance, because we have been resisting misogynistic attacks and fighting for life for centuries, but we have a very hard time ahead of us,” Chiarotti said.

She added that Latin America has fragile democracies that are only a few decades old and in crisis, which impact women’s rights. “Many of our countries came out of dictatorships, the longest has had 50 or 60 years of democracy. We will have to work to defend democratic institutions, to use them to defend our rights,” she said.

Holding up signs demanding “No to violence” and “No to machismo,” women demonstrate against gender violence in front of Peru’s main courthouse in Lima. CREDIT: Mariela Jara / IPS

Prevention: a task eluded by the States

The expert argued that since the work of preventing gender-based violence is more costly and time-consuming than that of punishment and less politically profitable, the efforts of countries are weak in this area despite their importance.

“Limiting the work to punishment and addressing incidents is like seeing a big rock that people stumble over and bang up against, and they are cured and taught to go around it, but without removing it from the path. Without prevention we will always have victims because the discriminatory culture that reproduces violence will not be transformed,” she warned.

But even adding up what countries invest to address and eradicate violence against women in the region, none of them reach one percent of their national budget according to the Third Hemispheric Report published by Mesecvi in 2017, a proportion that has apparently not changed since then.

In September of this year, the United Nations published a study showing that an investment of 360 billion dollars is needed to achieve gender equality and women’s empowerment by 2030, established as one of the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). This would help to eliminate the scourge of gender-based violence.

Excerpt:

This article is part of IPS coverage of the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women, celebrated Saturday, Nov. 25.

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