InterAction Members Addressing Climate Change
InterAction is currently investigating what, if any, expanded work on environmental issues would increase our strategic impact and what is the best means for InterAction to engage its members on climate change issues. InterAction recognizes that climate change is a global reality that has, and will increasingly have, multiple impacts on the work done by the humanitarian and development communities. We surveyed our members on their current and future work on climate change. This article details what they said.
If you would like to stay informed on any working groups on climate change, please email Kimberly Darter, Program Associate for Partnerships & Development Impact.
CARE
CARE implements co-benefit mitigation (i.e. carbon sequestration, or avoidance of, deforestation, poverty reduction and ecosystem conservation) projects in East Timor, Guatemala and Indonesia. We have also implemented adaptation projects in Bangladesh, the Philippines and Tajikistan. The last two are ongoing. Many of CARE’s other projects relate to climate change by:
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Encouraging forest, soil and water conservation;
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Enhancing people’s capacity to cope with climatic variability;
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Reducing people’s level of risk vis-à-vis extreme weather events; and
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Advocating national and international policies that can reduce vulnerability to climate change, strengthen adaptive capacity and secure resources for future generations.
Looking ahead, climate change is a priority in CARE’s new long-range strategy. We are:
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Developing a learning portfolio of adaptation projects in Africa;
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Partnering with the World Agro-forestry Centre and World Wildlife Fund to develop a global portfolio of co-benefit Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU) projects;
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Developing a series of country profiles; and
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Joining others advocating for fair, responsible policies to address the unprecedented threat to development posed by climate change, and particularly the disproportionate impact borne by the world’s poorest people.
More broadly, as part of CARE’s new strategy, we will better conceptualize and launch a portfolio of programs that unite thinking from our water, food and livelihood security work with environmental justice and climate change. This nexus is crucial, we believe, for the future of extremely poor and marginalized, people and the resultant learning will inform our policy advocacy going forward.
Church World Service
Church World Service is a member of several coalitions including the Global Ecumenical Climate Change Network and the working group on Climate Change and Water. We are co-sponsoring awareness raising events at the UN in September and have an organizational policy position on Climate Change. Learn more...
Counterpart International
Counterpart International is involved in the Carbon Poverty Reduction Initiative (CPR) with several other NGOs. The NGO-driven initiative seeks to use carbon credits to re-forest degraded lands and alleviate poverty.
Floresta
Floresta was uniquely designed to simultaneously address both environmental and humanitarian issues. From the time of our founding we have concentrated on the interaction between deforestation and poverty, observing a vicious cycle between the two. Deforestation is a major cause of rural poverty – reducing soil fertility and damaging water resources, to name a few of the effects. In turn, rural poverty is often a cause of deforestation, as the poor clear land for agriculture or cut trees for fuelwood. To respond, we have addressed both the environmental and economic sides of the equation, planting millions of trees and making thousands of loans. By focusing on interventions that have both environmental and economic benefits, we seek to change the vicious cycle of deforestation and poverty into a virtuous cycle of reforestation and prosperity.
Thus we are very interested in carbon credits as a source of funding for reforestation and forest conservation efforts that benefit the poor. We are currently working to set up a system for taking advantage of voluntary carbon markets, and looking at how we can structure that to directly help the poor dependent on the forest.
At the same time, we are working preparing the rural poor and those dependent on rain-fed agriculture to deal with the local effects of climate change. Thus we are also working on rainwater harvesting systems, the promotion of drought resistant crops and other ways of ensuring that the poor can survive through unpredictable rainy seasons.
We expect climate change to be one of our major foci in the years ahead.
Heifer International
For decades Heifer International has trained farmers in soil conservation, composting, planting trees, improving pasture and forage, controlled grazing and other practices that impact climate change. The goal has been to increase farm output while preserving the environment. In January 2001, Heifer sponsored a major conference on agroecology, focusing on the environmental impact of its work, and then appointed a Director of Environmental Strategies to spearhead a new environmental focus.
Those efforts include environmentally sound program work, recycling, new policies to allow four-day work weeks and working from home, and to encourage “cow-muting” (such as using hybrid cars, carpooling and bicycling). A major initiative was cleaning up an industrial brownfield and building a truly “green” headquarters that this year was named one of the top 10 green buildings in the U.S. by the American Institute of Architects.
In the future, our plan is to be a carbon neutral organization. Recently a major study published by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO), Livestock’s Long Shadow, highlighted the negative impacts of livestock on the environment, particularly that livestock emit greenhouse gasses and that clearing land for livestock production leads to destruction of forests.
Heifer plans to conduct a careful assessment of the carbon impact of its work, as well as assessing the impact of our organization as a whole to determine our total carbon footprint. We then hope to develop program components and organizational practices to offset all carbon emissions. That means not only reducing or offsetting carbon emissions, but improving the local environment through soil and water conservation, using energy efficient stoves, planting trees, preserving indigenous species and using as many other agroecological based practices as our resources and creativity will allow.
Hesperian Foundation
In 2008, Hesperian will publish A Community Guide to Environmental Health. Rooted in an environmental rights and justice perspective, this approximately 600-page guide will provide practical, accessible information for communities to address climate change and global warming and improve environmental health and livelihoods at a local level.
Through popular education activities, the Guide will offer ways for people to actively work to reduce climate change and global warming including:
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Protecting and managing increasingly scarce sources of water;
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Watershed and forest protection, and management and restoration of damaged lands;
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Principles of food security and sustainable farming, including natural management of pests and plant diseases;
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Preventing and reducing harm from industrial pollution; and
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Reducing the use of fossil fuels and increasing reliance on clean energy.
The underlying principles of this guide flow from a public health harm reduction approach to help communities start taking steps to reduce climate change, improve their health and wealth, and begin to plan for a sustainable future.
As with all of Hesperian’s publications, this book has been developed with a vast global network of partners including hundreds of lay health workers, trainers, health educators and others who participate in reviewing, writing, illustrating, translating and distributing our books. Their participation helps ensure the information is practical and culturally appropriate.
International Rescue Committee
The IRC has a climate change-working group that is assessing the organization’s programming and operations in relation to climate change. The goal of the working group is to develop a framework to ensure climate change causes and effects inform IRC’s programming with conflict-affected communities and that minimal environmental damage is caused by the organization's operations. Initial work includes: engagement of IRC’s board of directors in assessing the organization’s mandate in relation to climate change; identifying external expertise in framing the climate change issue in relation to humanitarian aid; conducting an organizational baseline assessment of electricity and paper consumption, recycling practices, and air travel; and carrying out initial operational changes to promote good, green office practices.
Lutheran World Relief
Lutheran World Relief addresses climate change through a perspective of sustainable rural livelihoods and risk management for the communities where we work. Examples include drought control, provision of irrigation, reforestation, watershed management and protection of water sources. In our risk management projects, for example, we help communities identify and analyze climatic and environmental risk, and develop plans that address environmental sustainability. LWR hopes to look at this issue more systematically over the next two to three years.
National Wildlife Federation
National Wildlife Federation is tackling global warming as the single most urgent challenge to protecting wildlife for our children’s future. Our plan is to organize a groundswell of public awareness and action that will reposition the United States within the next five years as a world leader in reducing global warming pollution and inspiring international cooperation. We seek to achieve the long-term goal of cutting U.S. emissions about 80 percent by mid-century and, through our Fair Climate Campaign, to lessen the burden of climate change impacts on poor people worldwide.
Specifically we are working to:
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Reduce U.S. global warming pollution;
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Organize powerful grassroots support for global warming action;
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Foster U.S. international leadership on global warming and sustainable development and help poor countries adapt to global warming; and
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Protect wildlife in a world of changing climate.
Global warming is now recognized as a major threat to global antipoverty efforts and sustainable development. The National Wildlife Federation is working to confront global warming by partnering with like-minded people across a broad spectrum of civil society.
We believe InterAction members will share many common concerns about the threat of global warming and also a common interest in the opportunities presented by growing public awareness. Engagement by InterAction on global warming provides the potential for InterAction to increase its strategic impact because the effort to confront global warming is emerging as a necessity in poverty alleviation and as a major opportunity to mobilize action to address poverty.
To address our common concerns, we hope InterAction will adopt global warming impacts on poverty as a priority. We hope InterAction will help facilitate mutual learning among development groups and environmental organizations and will provide opportunities for cooperative action to influence public opinion and policy. InterAction can play a critical role in informing the debate with knowledge about on-the-ground impacts. Those in the field know first hand what is happening. Also, InterAction efforts to help facilitate action by its members would be invaluable in strengthening the coalition working on this issue.
Plan USA
In 1992, Plan USA first started to reflect on the environmental aspects of its interventions, denoting that the term “environment” implies a focus on natural resource management, disaster preparedness and/or urban hygiene. Accordingly, Plan’s principles related to sustainability are as follows: “understanding of the community’s relationship with the (broad) environment (environmental sustainability)” and “strengthening the long-term capability of all community members to manage matters that affect the well-being of their children and to influence the priorities and quality of service of local institutions and organizations (empowerment and sustainability).” At the beginning, Plan International indicated that it “would not undertake ‘stand alone’ environmental or natural resource programs, but should seek to ensure that the land and water base is maintained and, if possible, enhanced in the long term.”
At the same time, environment policy and program areas are less developed than other sectors or domains that have a more direct and visible link to the rights and well-being of children. Programs with a mere focus on environmental resource management are not yet well-developed and initiated within Plan. Most programs within the livelihood and habitat domains have a focus on food security, microcredit or home improvement schemes. Furthermore, there are programs in the health domain that can be considered to some extent to be environmental programs as they are meant to avert risks to the health and development of the child. Plan’s experiences in environmental management in urban areas focus mainly on the provision of clean water, sanitation and waste removal/processing.
However, program design ensures that there is no negative impact on the environment of the community covered by the program or that of neighboring communities. Plan facilitates the ability of communities to ensure that biodiversity is maintained and enhanced and the depletion of non-renewable resources is minimized. In addition, with regard to disaster risk reduction and response, Plan recognizes that environmental changes such as climate change, environmental degradation and threats to food security are increasing the vulnerabilities of many. Disasters resulting from natural hazards have increased in frequency and scope, and Plan is committed to minimizing vulnerabilities and disaster risks throughout a society, to avoid (prevention) or to limit (mitigation and preparedness) the adverse impacts of hazards within the broad context of sustainable development, through actions including environmental management and land-use and urban planning.
UNDP-USA
The United States Committee for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP-USA) will be helping to launch UNDP’s Human Development Report on climate change this fall and will likely have carry-on events in 2008.
USA for UNHCR
The U.S. Committee for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees does not work on this issue directly. However, we think it is an important one for InterAction to take up.
Women’s EDGE
We are currently not working on this issue. However, Women’s EDGE would like to explore climate change’s impact on women's poverty, economic opportunity, women's natural resource management and U.S. policy/funding for mitigation of impacts on women; and integration of gender into U.S. mitigation efforts overseas. We would also like to explore possibilities for expansion of women's economic opportunity created by climate change and U.S. programs to promote this.
Women’s Environment and Development Organization
WEDO is a global advocacy organization that has pioneered efforts to bring women’s voices into the formulation of policy on sustainable development since the UN Earth Summit in 1992. WEDO’s groundbreaking success in mobilizing advocacy on behalf of gender-sensitive policies has contributed to a dramatic transformation of development and environment policy-making internationally. These policies, when implemented in countries the world over, have substantially improved the day-to-day lives of women, their families and their communities. Today, 16 years after its founding, WEDO remains committed to working with global partners to ensure that women are leading the way to a just, healthy and peaceful planet for all. WEDO’s current work on climate change includes: (1) an advocacy campaign with partners in developing countries to introduce a gender perspective and women’s participation into national adaptation planning; and (2) Women Demand U.S. Action on Climate Change, a project to push for U.S. engagement in global climate change negotiations in order to improve women’s lives around the world. WEDO’s fact sheet “Changing the Climate: Why Women’s Perspectives Matter” and an online resource guide on gender and climate change can be found at www.wedo.org.
World Resources Institute
By conducting independent research and developing innovative policy and business options, WRI is promoting an effective international and U.S. response to the threat of global climate change. WRI aims to:
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Develop robust international agreements and U.S. policies to protect the climate system;
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Foster widespread investment in climate-friendly energy and transportation technologies; and
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Reduce greenhouse gas emissions through clean alternatives supported by businesses, governments, nongovernmental organizations and the public.
Tackling the climate problem will require tremendous political, scientific, technological and financial resources. To that end, WRI is focused on:
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International action with governments, corporations and NGOs, finding ways to limit greenhouse gas emissions and improve adaptive capacity in all countries.
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U.S. action with leaders at all levels, developing policies to significantly reduce our greenhouse gas emissions, and with major U.S. companies, developing technologies and growth strategies for a carbon-constrained world.
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Sustainable business and markets with key members of the U.S. and international business community, finding ways to protect the climate system while protecting the bottom line.
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Technology options advancing viable technology options throughout the global economy that lead directly to major reductions in greenhouse gas emissions.
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Green power/renewable energy use working to enhance use of clean, renewable energy sources and reduce our dependence on fossil fuels.
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Information and analysis tools developing products that provide valuable and easily accessible data to help decision makers effectively respond to climate change.
World Society for the Protection of Animals
WSPA is heavily involved in the Planning Committee for the 60th UN Department of Public Information/NGO Conference, which will focus on climate change. We have been asked to coordinate the Declaration as well, which will be a place for NGOs to lay down priorities, and likely will also coordinate a post conference report to be presented at the 61st Conference in Paris in 2008. The post conference report (based on a year's worth of research) will examine what NGOs are doing and their perspective on what needs to be done.
