Black Voices for Climate Network, Geledés – Black Women’s Institute, Institute of Religious Studies (ISER), Conectas Human Rights, Research Association, and IYaleta invite the government to discuss anti-racist adaptation at COP 29 – Baku.
The 29th UN Climate Change Conference is taking place in Baku, Azerbaijan.
The COP is made up of several spaces, and between international negotiations, presentation of papers and fundraising, this is also an important space for the dispute of concepts.
In this sense, the Black Voices for Climate Network, Geledés – Black Women’s Institute, ISER, Conectas, Research Association and Yaleta joined together in a panel on anti-racist climate adaptation, inviting Alice Amorim, xxxxx from the Federal Government, to participate in the dialogue.
Yeah, folks, it was a conversation full of surprises..
The truth is that the concept of adaptation is still under dispute. Spaces like this are real opportunities to demonstrate the need to include the term race in documents that will guide the construction of national and international policies. Therefore, recognizing the need to confront racism as a priority in global discussions is extremely urgent and necessary.
The panel “For an anti-racist adaptation to climate change” was moderated by Thales Machado, advisor to Conectas Human Rights. After making some initial considerations, Thales gave the floor to Letícia Leobet, international advisor to Geledés, who shared the submissions for climate negotiations highlighting the fight against racism made by her institution to the UNFCCC (United Nations Framework Convention to Combat Climate Change) and the MRE – Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Brazil.
“We cannot only deal with it locally, racism is a global issue.” (Letícia Leobet)
Next, Luciana de Oliveira, from Black Voices for Climate Network, brought her contributions to the panel. She, who identifies herself as an Afro-indigenous woman, began her speech by moving everyone with a hymn from Regência, her territory.
“If we were heroes like Caboclo Bernardo
Who saved many lives in the waves of the sacred sea
His fame as a hero spread throughout Brazil
He was born in Regência and his story came out from here.”
According to Lu, leadership comes from the people, from doing, from the territory. She reaffirmed that “we, black women, do not just want to participate in agendas and justify funding. We want to lead our own projects.” Sharah Luciano, coordinator of the #BotoFénoClima training program at the Institute of Religious Studies (ISER), highlighted the importance of talking about the intersection between faith and the environment. According to Sharah, people belonging to faith communities are doubly affected: in the physical dimension and in the dimension of their beliefs. She said that “faith communities are the places that welcome people when there is an extreme climate event. But when communities are affected by their structures, they also become vulnerable.”
Emanuelle Goes – PhD in public health from UFBA and scientific coordinator at Yaleta, in turn, shared her analysis of the process of inequality that underpinned the carbonization of the planet, highlighting the feedback loop of the precariousness of black and indigenous lives.
“The layer of violence will become denser due to extreme weather events. The prolonged droughts in the north and northeast will mainly affect girls and adolescents in countries in the global south, such as Kenya, the Philippines and Brazil.” (Emanuelle Goes – IYaleta)
Finally, Alice Amorim, from the Federal Government, closed the round by highlighting the progress of Brazilian society in diversifying the actors participating in the Conference of the Parties. She, who has already participated in 8 COPs (COP 21 – Paris to COP 29 – Baku) recalled that the participation of Brazilians has always been very homogeneous: white and male. Thus, discussing anti-racist climate adaptation in this space of international influence is already a major development.
“This touches me a lot. And the revolution is on the path we need to take. We need to know what can be done, how to change the concept of adaptation at the international, national and local levels. Thinking about anti-racist climate adaptation needs to be tested at all these levels.” (Alice Amorim)
That’s right, my climate beauty. Despite the many challenges, we are moving forward. Just the act of making an official proposal already begins to shape the outcome of the process. Now we need to pressure the government to get the content off the ground and bring the political density that the issue demands.
The government recently opened a public consultation for the NDC (Nationally Determined Contributions). We saw that climate justice is one of the references of the federal government’s Adaptation plan. Now our great challenge is to mainstream this measure into national policies, intersecting different dialogues and assuming commitments ranging from tax reform, public health and education policy to anti-racist climate adaptation.
This does not happen overnight; this process is continuous and ongoing. However, it is essential to bring the anti-racist issue into all of our policies in formation, such as the concept of adaptation. From there, it is necessary to bring the territorial dimension and think at the community and municipal level. Next year, new mayors and councilors will begin a new term, but to what extent is anti-racist climate adaptation placed as a space where municipal public policy takes place?
Yeeeeeh, it is up to us to reflect, dialogue and pressure! All of these aspects need to be evaluated so that the state can deliver anti-racist adaptation measures in practice. After all, the dispute over language is part of the actions necessary to establish policies for those who have historically been made invisible, impoverished and marginalized.