Tag Archives: Food Systems

Letters

Civil society calls on Brazil’s COP30 Presidency: Deliver a Just Transition in Food and Agriculture 

The UNFCCC Children and Youth, Women and Gender, and Environmental NGO constituencies—including Demand Climate Justice and Climate Action Network—have come together to demand that COP30 meaningfully include food systems and agriculture in its Just Transition agenda. 

In a joint letter to the Presidency, we demand: 

  • A full transition away from industrial, extractive agriculture 
  • Agroecology as a core climate solution 
  • Smallholders, women, youth and Indigenous Peoples must lead in creating policy solutions 
  • Finance and technology that reach the most affected: smallholders, Indigenous Peoples, women and youth 
  • Coherence between climate, biodiversity and desertification agendas 
  • Clear safeguards to prevent greenwashing and protect people, animals and the planet 

Food systems are not a side issue. They are a frontline battleground for justice.
🌍 Read our full letter and share our demands. 

Cross constituency Letter to the COP30 PresidencyDownload
Interventions, SB60

INTERVENTION BY GLOBAL CAMPAIGN TO DEMAND CLIMATE JUSTICE BY SeS JOINT WORK ON CLIMATE ACTION ON FOOD AND AGRICULTURE

My name is Angel Flores from the Philippines. I’m from World Animal Protection, delivering this statement on behalf of the ENGOs, Climate Action Network and Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice:

We are happy to see a roadmap drawn for this joint work and appreciate the flexibility of all to move forward, this is really good news for the “Sharmonivia” family. Congratulations and thanks to everyone

So we’re excited to already get going and to share ideas here for the workshops. Dont worry, we won’t miss out on the submissions either. 

Our networks represent many grassroots organisations and agroecological food producers, and we are very committed to contribute to this space, we have both the expertise and legitimacy for this. We want to ensure that voices on the frontlines of the climate crisis are heard, and that local knowledge is reflected here. 

For the workshop on systemic and holistic approaches to agriculture, food systems and food security, these bottom up contributions will be crucial to showcase lived experiences, and how agroecology enhances livelihoods.

We urge you to see us as active participants, not just mere observers in this process. We are ready to collaborate, also to put you in touch with experts on human rights, all interconnected with the Right to Food. 

For the first workshop, we ask that this space highlights real climate solutions that benefit the one in four people on the planet whose livelihoods depend on agriculture – solutions like agroecology. This workshop also provides a critical opportunity to go beyond agricultural production, and tackle the entire food system with a focus on food loss and waste, food security, and nutrition, and equitable approaches to diets. 

For the Means of Implementation workshop we have many ideas, the most important will be to ensure those means of implementation including finance, in the form of grants, NOT loans, will be accessible and match the needs and priorities of small-scale food producers, with a special focus on youth, women, indigenous peoples, marginalised communities and their collectives. We could work on the following tasks:

  • map opportunities for public finance to reach the local level
  • shape recommendations so that finance flows never undermine livelihoods, human rights and the right to food, and respect Locally-led adaptation principles
  • define a set of safeguards, so that climate finance in agriculture goes in the right direction, the agroecological transformation of food systems, with farmers’ livelihoods at its heart.  

We are looking forward to the work ahead, thank you.

COP29, Interventions, SB60

SES JOINT WORK ON CLIMATE ACTION ON FOOD AND AGRICULTURE

Undelivered Intervention

Thank you co-facilitator. I am speaking on behalf of the collaboration between YOUNGO food & agriculture, the Global Campaign to Demand Climate Justice, the Women and Gender constituency, the Indigenous Peoples constituency, and YOUNGO Animal Rights. 

We appreciate the updates that are being discussed here today, this is the spirit of collaboration and the strength of the agriculture negotiations. We are supportive of the removal of annex 4 mentioned in paragraph 3.

While we recognize that these multistakeholder initiatives seek to support food systems action, they should NOT be central to the Joint Work or form the basis for action, voice, power, and decision-making. The focus must remain on inclusive, Party-driven, democratic processes that prioritize the needs and voices of vulnerable communities and Indigenous Peoples.

These initiatives platform and enable false solutions —-  such as GMOs, pesticides, factory farms, carbon offsets, ‘carbon farming’, and ‘carbon capture’ — that are heavily promoted by the agribusiness sector to keep business as usual in place of food sovereignty and agroecology as a real solution. We also want to emphasize that any innovation has to be people centred – it should not use technology to undermine livelihoods, rights and nature, for the sake of consolidating corporate control and profits. 

This is why we strongly support the removal of multistakeholder initiatives from the official text and removing the annex altogether We urge you to show your commitment AGAINST the very perpetrators of harm in food systems and in vulnerable communities and Indigenous Peoples around the world.

We hope that moving forward, participation of Observers will continue to be a pillar of the Sharm El Sheikh workshops and negotiations on agriculture and food security – we have so much to offer to keep this process moving forward to our shared goals. 

We look forward to the SSJW creating a special space to address the fundamental issues faced by farmers and those whose livelihoods and food security are particularly vulnerable to climate change, especially women, youth, indigenous peoples and marginalised communities.

Keen to get the work started and for that reason we strongly suggest that the first workshop already takes place at COP29 this year . As Civil society we remain available to support these efforts. Thank you.