2018 United Nations Forum on Business and Human Rights

Interpretation is provided into Spanish

Organized by OHCHR

Brief description of the session:
 This session will explore the responsibilities of businesses with respect to climate change, mitigation and adaptation. Businesses must be accountable for their climate impacts, participate responsibly in climate change mitigation and adaptation efforts with full respect for human rights, and exercise human rights due diligence in the course of their activities. States must also ensure that their own business activities, including activities conducted in partnership with the private sector, contribute to mitigating climate change while respecting human rights, and ensuring effective remedies for climate and human rights harms. Businesses and governments should go beyond simply avoiding climate harms and actively work to promote development that benefits both people and planet.

Session objectives:
 Raise awareness of business responsibilities related to human rights and climate change.
 Identify good practices and concrete solutions to human rights challenges faced by businesses in the context of climate change.

Key discussion questions: 
 1. What is the responsibility of the private sector for climate change?
2. What does a rights-based approach to climate action look like for companies? What responsibilities does the private sector have to limit their carbon footprint (e.g. human right due diligence)?  
3. How can companies be held accountable for climate-related human rights harms?

Background to the discussion:
 Climate change is a key challenge facing the global community, and one that impacts, directly and indirectly, an array of internationally guaranteed human rights. Private actors, including businesses, contribute significantly to the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, and thus contribute to the impacts of climate change on human rights. At the same time, international agreements, including the Addis Ababa Action Agenda for Financing for Development, the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, and the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change recognize that private actors must play a significant role in climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts and in ensuring development that is truly sustainable and in line with the vision elaborated in the United Nations Declaration on the Right to Development.

Today, global attention is increasingly trained on the impact that businesses have on the enjoyment of human rights around the world, and businesses are increasingly aware of human rights as both a risk factor and as a moral and legal imperative. Despite strong understanding of the links between climate change and human rights, climate change and business, and business and human rights, there is a lack of action to ensure business accountability for climate change.

Interpretation is provided in English, French and Spanish

Organized by Friedrich Ebert Stiftung

Brief description of the session:
Shifting to renewable energy is a fundamental part of the transition towards green economy. The 2015 Paris Climate Agreement and the SDGs both underline the necessity of a transition toward a sustainable, zero-carbon future for all as a human rights imperative. If undertaken responsibly, this transition has the potential to contribute to peacebuilding and a rights-respecting energy system. However, if managed without human rights in mind, it carries risks harming lives and livelihoods, as well as causing financial and legal costs for companies and investors. In order for it to be successful this transition has to be a Just Transition, leaving no one behind and maximizing climate protection as well as minimizing the risks and hardships for workers and communities.
This session focuses on how companies can ensure their climate actions respect human rights and benefit from the transformative potential of the transition to a green economy. It will unpack the concept of a green economy, explore the concept of a just transition away from fossil fuels in a way that respects the rights of workers and communities, and address how we can support a model of renewable energy that contributes to peacebuilding, provides decent jobs throughout its supply chain, and respects the rights of indigenous communities.

Session Objectives:

•  Provide participants with space to discuss what a green economy and a just transition entail in the context of companies’ responsibility to respect human rights
• Share with participants ways in which rights-based climate action can be a positive force for peacebuilding
• Explore factors that contribute to best practice examples of just transition away from fossil fuels and towards renewable energy

Format of the session:

• Recap of outcomes of previous session "What related human rights responsibilities apply to businesses with respect to climate change?" and introduction of session (15 mins)
• World Café Round 1 (tables 1 and 2) in key question "cafes" (25 mins)
• Rotation and World Café 2 Round 2 (tables 3 and 4) in key question "cafes" (25 mins)
•  Report back from cafes to plenary (15 mins)

Key questions for discussions in World Cafes1 
World Cafe Table 1:
Guiding question: How can a rights-based approach to climate action contribute to peacebuilding?
Facilitator: Hannah Peters, Friedrich-Ebert-Stiftung
Resource person: Justine Taylor, Quaker United Nations Office
World Cafe Table 2:
Guiding question: What do we mean by a green economy? How does our current economic model contribute to climate change and how can we address this in a rights-based way?
Facilitator: Eniko Horvath, Business and Human Rights Resource Centre
Resource Person: Elena Espinoza, Principles for Responsible Investment
World Cafe Table 3: 
Guiding question: What do we mean by a just transition to a low-carbon economy? How can a radical reduction of fossil fuels be managed in a just way?
 Facilitator: Nabylah Abo Dehman, Principles for Responsible Investment
 Resource Person: Philip Gass, International Institute for Sustainable Development
World Cafe Table 4:
Guiding question: How can renewable energy companies ensure their operations respect human rights? What role do investors and companies buying renewable energy have?
Facilitator: Isobel Edwards, Researcher
Resource Person: Melissa Ortiz Massó, Business & Human Rights Resource Centre

Bacground to the discussion:
Climate change is a key challenge facing the global community, and one that impacts, directly and indirectly, an array of internationally guaranteed human rights. Private actors, including businesses, contribute significantly to the greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change, and thus contribute to the impacts of climate change on human rights. At the same time, international agreements, including the Addis Ababa Action Agenda for Financing for Development, the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda, and the Paris Agreement under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change recognize that private actors must play a significant role in climate change adaptation and mitigation efforts and in ensuring development that is truly sustainable and in line with the vision elaborated in the United Nations Declaration on the Right to Development.
 Today, global attention is increasingly trained on the impact that businesses have on the enjoyment of human rights around the world, and businesses are increasingly aware of human rights as both a risk factor and as a moral and legal imperative. Despite strong understanding of the links between climate change and human rights, climate change and business, and business and human rights, there is a lack of action to implement proposed solutions to the challenges faced by the private sector in the context of climate change.


LIGHT REFRESHMENTS WILL BE SERVED PRIOR TO THE EVENT