Last week, the Women’s Major Group had a strong presence at the online consultations with Major Groups and other Stakeholders and the bureau of Member States for UNEA 5. Representing WMG, Isis Alvarez, Noelene Nabilivou and Neth Dano gave powerful presentations.

Here you may find the Draft short report from MGs Consultation 7th June.

Below you may find excerpts of the document, including a description and WMG’s key requests.

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“In preparation for the UN Environmental Assembly 5 (UNEA5), an international online
consultation for major groups and stakeholders was held on 7th June 2020.
The main themes of the consultation was: Tackling Ocean Pollution, Health and
Environment, Ecosystem Restoration, Biodiversity and Development and
Involvement and Implementation. Following public panel discussions and closed
group discussions, the major groups gathered to develop their concrete key requests
on these themes.”

 

WMG Key Requests

Tackling ocean pollution

  • UNEA5 to adopt a mandate to negotiate a legally binding instrument to tackle plastic pollution that covers phase-out/reduction of plastic at the up-stream and middle-stream level, and addresses health impacts of plastic pollution;
  • Address other kinds of ocean pollution such as geoengineering (i.e. synthetic micro-bubbles, ocean fertilisation, marine cloud brightening), deep-sea mining, chemicals/hazardous wastes dumping to the ocean;

Proposals for implementation of the requests:

  • Include the impacted communities and vulnerable populations in the plastic negotiation process (i.e. fish-eaters, communities impacted by fracking activities, petrochemicals industry pollution).
  • Meaningful engagement with the right-holders to assess new technologies

 

Health and Environment: What a post-pandemic recovery looks like

  • Stop bailing out polluters (chemicals industry, airlines, agro-industry, ) and divesting from dirty technology/industry.
  • Admit and emphasize the link between environmental pollution with human health (communicable diseases as well as non-communicable diseases) that affect all populations especially the vulnerable populations (women, children, people with underlying health problems).

Implementation:

  • More work towards planetary health, not only environmental health.
  • Polluters-pay principle need to be strengthened, no fiscal incentives/subsidies for polluters and dirty businesses.
  • Replace agriculture and food production system with decentralised, localized, biodiverse peasant, and women-led agriculture system with agroecology approach.
  • Enforce existing environmental health conventions and agreements (Climate Change, BRS and Minamata Conventions, and SAICM), phase-out harmful chemicals production and use in products and processes, replace with organic and nature-based materials.

 

Ecosystem Restoration, Biodiversity, and Development: How can we have development in harmony with nature?

  • End dirty business practices that destroyed the ecosystem and ecosystem services.
  • Rethink the development paradigm, and development financing, stop funding false solutions.
  • Support interventions using a landscape approach to maintain high biodiversity mix in the ecosystem.

Implementation:

  • Promote and support sustainable economic activities especially in the impacted communities in harmony with nature.
  • Promote and support more investment in real renewable energy (solar, wind, wave).

 

Road to Stockholm+50, UNEP@50 and achieving the SDGs: Involvement and Implementation

  • We are the right-holders. UNEA should recognise the devastating impact of business stakeholder (profit-focused) on rights-holders and the environment. UNEA needs to recognize the conflict of interest of UNEP partnerships with polluters (#nodirtybusiness).
  • Gender-digital UNEA should recognize the gender-digital-divide: fewer women than men have smartphones /access to the internet (OECD) and are affected by the environmental and social impacts of digital tech (energy use, emissions, scammer, etc.).
  • More meaningful We are upset that we have no voice in the town halls next week, this lack of meaningful engagement, limited participations, never facilitates meaningful stakeholders engagement/dialogues with higher delegates.
  • Business stakeholders should also include sustainable solutions providers (recycling industry, alternative delivery system providers, biomaterials packaging etc.).
  • Meaningful engagement and dialogues with high levels delegates, not only between the major groups.
  • Provide more support for sustainable community-led solutions.
  • UNEA should support/facilitate rights-holders to meaningful participation, to assess/evaluate the impact of new technologies.