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By Sharon Kimathi, Energy and ESG Editor, Reuters Digital

Hello!

Sir Isaac Newton once said, “for every action, there is an equal and opposite reaction.”

The action, for today’s newsletter, is the ruling by the European Court of Human Rights in favor of over 2,000 Swiss women who said the Swiss government violated their human rights by failing to take sufficient action on climate change.

The equal and opposite reaction is the influential newspapers in Switzerland that criticized the climate change ruling against the Swiss government, saying it risked undermining democracy and the political clout of environmental groups if there is a backlash against voting for green parties wishing to use the ruling for their political agenda.

Also on my radar today:

• Lloyd’s of London inadequate on ESG, report says
• Balkan countries eye hydrogen in rush to lower emissions
• US bets on climate friendly farming; experts doubt it is climate friendly enough

Siofra O’Leary, ECHR Court President, issues the verdict on three climate cases which argued that government inaction on climate change violates human rights Strasbourg, France. REUTERS/Christian Hartmann

As environmental groups celebrated the ruling by the Strasbourg court, newspaper editorials said the decision would fan fears that the judiciary was getting involved in politics.

“Absurd verdict against Switzerland: Strasbourg pursues climate policy from the judge’s bench,” the center-right Neue Zuercher Zeitung (NZZ) newspaper wrote.

Describing the ruling as “activist jurisprudence” that could pave the way for “all kinds of claims”, the paper said the elderly plaintiffs were ultimately pawns of environmental lobbies that used the court to circumvent democratic debate.

Switzerland, where referendums regularly test the limits of national policymaking, has committed to cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 50% by 2030, from 1990 levels.

The government had proposed stronger measures to deliver the goal, but voters rebuffed them in a 2021 referendum.

Under the headline “We don’t want climate justice”, national daily Blick called the court’s ruling “questionable” and warned it was likely to deepen divisions over climate policy.

“And in European politics, it should be noted, this plays into the hands of those who smell foreign judges everywhere,” the paper wrote.

The Court’s ruling against the Swiss government does not only matter for Switzerland, but for all 46 countries which are signatories to the European Convention on Human Rights.

This is the first time a regional human rights court has ruled that countries can violate human rights by failing to reduce their climate-warming emissions fast enough.

The Court said it interpreted the European Convention on Human Rights language on a right to private and family life to encompass a right to effective protection by governments from climate change’s adverse impacts on lives, health, well-being and quality of life.

Any climate and human rights case brought before a judge in Europe’s national courts will now need to consider the top human rights court’s ruling in whatever decision they make.

While the outcome of the Swiss women’s case is not legally binding in jurisdictions outside Europe, experts expect international courts will consider the ruling in future judgments.

Three other international tribunals — the International Court of Justice, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights and the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea — are also writing advisory opinions now on states’ obligations on climate change.

In the United States, similar litigation has been filed largely on behalf of young people who claim their futures and health are jeopardized by climate change.

There are at least three youth-led climate cases pending in U.S. federal trial courts and state court in Hawaii. Youth plaintiffs have already notched one big win in Montana state court.

The lawsuits broadly accuse governments of exacerbating climate change through policies that encourage or allow the extraction and burning of fossil fuels. The young people, represented by the nonprofit law firm Our Children’s Trust, claim the policies violate their rights under U.S. or state constitutions.

A man tows an inflatable boat with his belongings along a flooded street in the settlement of Ivanovskoye, Orenburg region, Russia. REUTERS/Maxim Shemetov 

Sundeep Reddy Mallu, senior vice president at Indian-based data science firm, Gramener, shares his thoughts on looking into regeneration as a new approach to the climate crisis and beyond:

“The current model of sustainability is not sustainable. True sustainability requires a fundamental shift from our current extractive (exploitive) economic model to a regenerative one (uplifting).

“The regenerative system prioritizes life and well-being for the entire human species and not the privileged few. The primary focus is to build on the synergy between social, economic and natural systems that thrive together.

“Current sustainability goals look to limit the rise of growth in global temperature to 1.5 ‘C by 2100. This will not create an equitable future for humans globally. A regenerative future requires becoming “planet positive” by actually improving ecosystems and natural cycles.

“By embracing a regenerative future, we must prioritize solutions that have cascading benefits, addressing multiple social, environmental, and economic challenges at once. We need to transition from a linear, extractive economy to a regenerative one.”

A bird perches on an elephant as it walks at the Amboseli National Park in Kajiado County, Kenya. REUTERS/Monicah Mwangi

In the rolling grasslands of the Amboseli wildlife park, conservationists fret about an emerging threat to Kenyan elephants that are crucial to its tourism business: licensed hunters across the border in Tanzania.

The two East African neighbors manage elephant herds differently. Tanzania issues some trophy hunting licenses to wealthy sport hunters every year, while Kenya gets all its revenue from wildlife safaris.

Tanzania’s way of supervising elephant herds is aligned with many southern African nations like Zimbabwe, Namibia, Botswana and South Africa, while Kenya’s zero tolerance of wildlife hunting or sale of ivory mirrors that of Gabon.

Conservationists and Kenyan officials, however, are now urging Tanzania to restrict trophy hunters to its heartland, to protect Kenyan elephants, after three of them were shot across the border in recent months.

Today’s Sustainable Switch was edited by Elaine Hardcastle

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