By Jane McCall Politi, PhD (FAWCO UN Rep in NY)
During the week of September 23, 2019, I attended several events around the Climate Summit. Most events on climate did not address migration and children - just fossil fuels and the like. It was disheartening.
I made a comment at an event on Refugee Children and Climate Change about the need to include Early Childhood Development in humanitarian responses. Ms. Espinosa Garces, former President of the UN General Assembly suggested to include it in the first response protocol along with water, food etc. She said she would think about how to do it, including speaking with the High Commissioner.
There were a few events on Climate and Internally Displaced Persons (IDPs), Climate and Early Childhood Development, education in emergencies, and the 30th anniversary of the Convention on the Rights of the Child (CRC).There are plans to have a high-level event on IDPs as well as an event on Nov. 20th to celebrate the CRC during which Member States and multi-stakeholders make commitments to implement/advocate for policies/programs on behalf of children.
I attended “Changing the Forecast for Girls: Targeted Responses to Climate Change that Strengthen the Resilience of Girls”. It was at the Permanent Mission of Finland to the UN - on the 35th floor overlooking downtown. There was a logjam of trucks and cars for blocks due to road closures around the UN. I met Jessica Cooke who is the Resilience and Climate Change Policy Officer for Plan International. She explained that migration is not given weight. Topics are still separated, instead of being integrated and overlapping like the SDGs. I think now that Resilience would be an entry point for a discussion about climate-displaced women and children along with Objective 7 of the Global Compact on Migration on protecting vulnerable people along the migration route.
Bridget Burns spoke as the focal point for the Women and Gender Constituency. She was very positive about opportunities to address the power imbalances, advocate for the rights of girls, change attitudes on bodily autonomy and generally flip the narrative that females are inherently vulnerable. She gave an example of a group of Indigenous women who have come together to organize against mechanisms that hold up food security. Land ownership is critical for their survival, both physical and spiritual.
There were multiple examples of how girls are deprived of education because they are in charge of getting water and collecting firewood for their families. They spend several hours a day walking - often in danger of being raped. If girls are educated they marry later, have healthier children later, and develop the skills to cope with extreme weather.
Finland is the most advanced in this area of all Member States; women and girls are at the core of their policies. Investment in women and girls increases GDP by 26%. The community as a whole benefits because of the reduction of mass poverty.
Mary Robinson reminded us that small NGOs can have a powerful impact with gender interventions at the grassroots level. She applauded Greta Thunberg and young people. Ireland will invite UN Irish Youth delegates to form a Youth Council on Climate. They will recruit through the schools.
I was reminded that we should support youth groups efforts to realize their needs and not insist on their help with our agenda for them.
Ireland has a Climate Action Plan that prioritizes gender. When women and youth do not get involved in decision making at all levels, there is a loss of innovative ideas, loss of knowledge about climate change and tools to develop change.
I also attended an event at Columbia Law School,about the Global Pact on the Environment and the SDGs, in the works to be launched in 2022. It is supported by 100 jurists and the UN. The co-facilitators from Lebanon and Portugal spoke about it. They suggested to read the resolutions, their draft and about the hard work done bridging differences of opinion among Member States in Nairobi. At the end, no one had spoken about displaced people, so I brought it up. It's just astonishing to me that people aren't at the center of the discussions.