Farmland in the foothills of the Himalaya Mountains in Almora in the Indian state of Uttarakhand / credit: Charanjeet Dhiman on Unsplash
Editor’s Note: The following is the writer’s analysis.
Although the poorer and vulnerable sections of the Global South are least responsible for climate change, they are the most likely to suffer from its ravages. Despite this, their concerns have been the least heard in negotiations at the 26th Conference of Parties (COP26), the largest annual climate-change summit that attracted more than 190 countries. Meanwhile, leading businesses have influential lobbyists who quickly move to use any opportunities to corner funds.
Having sniffed out new opportunities, they have occupied important positions in the planning and negotiations relating to climate change to try to prioritize their projects as beneficiaries of new green funding.
Officially constituted expert committees have in recent years linked dam projects in the Himalayan region to ecological destruction and flash floods, which have claimed thousands of lives. Yet, similar kinds of projects are now being advertised as examples of green energy and solutions for climate change. Climate smart agriculture is being defined in ways business lobbies vying for more control of farm and food systems are being strengthened. At the same time, this weakens small farmers’ sincere efforts for ecologically protective farming. Projects that displace poor people in the name of protecting the environment are wrongly prioritized, alienating them.
Hence, it is important at this stage to warn against the misuse of funds marked for climate change mitigation and adaptation. These funds should reach those who need this help the most and are likely to put this to the most just and ecologically protective use. This means in practical terms that most funds should reach small peasants and rural landless workers for taking up mitigation as well as adaptation work. Indigenous people and tribal communities have a particularly important role in this as they have been closer to nature.
What’s more, this concern should be extended to wider planning in which reduction of greenhouse gas emissions is linked to meeting the basic needs of all people, with an emphasis on a justice-based resolution of climate change.
Small peasants should be supported for ecologically protective farming, including soil and water conservation work, which can improve the organic content of soil in just a few years. Organic soil spread over vast areas can absorb large quantities of carbon dioxide. At the same time, by avoiding or reducing chemical fertilizers, pollution caused by nitrous oxide can be reduced. That gas is about 300 times more potent compared to carbon dioxide. Mixed farming that includes indigenous trees can be well integrated, supplying more staple foods that are produced in healthy ways and close to home, reducing a long transportation burden. While contributing to mitigation, millions of acres under organic farming will ensure small farmers are less dependent on expensive chemical inputs and improve their adaptation capacity. Hence, both adaptation and mitigation can be achieved simultaneously on a sustainable basis. This is a particularly important aspect of such efforts. In fact, the more the organic content of soil improves with the passage of time, the more the mitigation and adaptation capacity increases. Such efforts simultaneously improve food sovereignty, reducing dependence on polluting and expensive substances.
Land reforms can help the landless emerge as small farmers and be a part of such efforts. In addition, the landless should be assured employment close to home in various tasks of the ecological rehabilitation of villages and nearby areas. One possibility is protecting degraded land and giving nature time to regenerate it. Yet another is to increase protections for remaining natural forests. New afforestation with indigenous species of trees should seek to mimic local natural forests.
Apart from fair wages, the landless should get longer-term rights to non-timber forest produce. This again helps mitigation as well as adaptation at the same time.
All these efforts should seek to tap and encourage creativity of workers and farmers for local solutions and innovations. To give just one inspiring example, a farmer from the Bundelkhand region of India named Mangal Singh invented a special turbine that can lift water from streams and canals without using diesel or electricity.
A turbine invented by farmer Mangal Singh. The device can lift water from streams and canals without using fossil fuels or electricity
Although the primary aim of the inventor was to help farmers and reduce costs, calculations show that a single unit serving over 15 years can reduce the use of 125,400 liters (33,127 gallons) of diesel oil and avoid 335 tons of greenhouse gas emissions. This can increase further if, with a few adjustments, this innovation is put to additional use, such as in crop processing. This has been highly praised by many senior experts, including those in official positions.
However, government apathy has stood in the way of its spread, even though the Maithani Committee appointed by India’s Rural Development Ministry strongly recommended its rapid deployment. Potentially, tens of thousands of units can be installed worldwide wherever suitable conditions exist. These kind of innovations by villagers can help greatly in simultaneously addressing climate change mitigation and adaptation. If there is better support for such initiatives, the creativity of farmers and workers can contribute much more because they are the most familiar with their local conditions.
In urban areas, construction of improved design shelters to provide protection from excessive heat to workers and homeless persons could be an obvious priority.
Democratic participatory systems based on transparency and honesty should be established to implement such initiatives. Such work is best achieved by grants, not by loans. Hence, climate funds also should be based on grants, not on loans. Unfortunately, the trend in the recent past has been rich countries providing a much bigger share of climate funding for the Global South in the form of loans. This must change to favor grants.
Bharat Dogra is Honorary Convener of the Campaign to Save Earth Now. He has been involved with several social movements in India. Dogra’s most recent books include Man Over Machine and Planet in Peril.
Flowers reach their final destination on an Ecuadorian farm and are packaged at high speeds in the post-harvesting room. The women strip off leaves with gloves and cut the flowers to the proper size before depositing them in bunches on the conveyor belt (running through the middle of the photo). The flowers are then placed in large refrigerators before being shipped to international destinations / credit: Laura Kraft / Flickr
Editor’s Note: Kawsachun News spoke to Ecuadorian economist Juan Fernando Terán on April 2 about Western sanctions, the Ukraine war and how Latin America can protect its economy. The original interview can be found here.
Who is paying the price of western sanctions on Russia? Ecuador’s banana industry has collapsed without the Russian consumer market.
Juan F. Terán: Countries that export food and agricultural goods are in an incredibly difficult position now. Ecuador, Colombia, Brazil and Argentina are among the worst affected. These countries import almost all the supplies they need for agricultural production; fertilizer, agrochemicals and even seeds in some cases. Sanctions have cut off these supplies. We could have prevented this situation.
Latin America lived through a golden era of development and integration during the period of leaders such as [former Ecuadorian President Rafael] Correa, [former Bolivian President] Evo Morales, [former Brazilian President] Lula [da Silva] and others. During these years, a lot of work went into the issue of how the region can start producing its own agricultural supplies. This was a flagship project of [Union of South American Nations] UNASUR. The aim was to guarantee food security in the face of fluctuations in international markets. There was also the proposal for a Latin American-wide bank and a common currency. This could’ve helped the region’s economy survive this current monetary crisis, too.
What’s happening now, though? Let’s look at the case of Ecuador: We have two main sources of income in exports. The first is oil. Logically, the war in Ukraine should have been beneficial because the price of oil has risen, which should mean more income from sales for Ecuador. However, the conservative President Guillermo Lasso had already promised the IMF the payment from future oil sales. Even if the price of oil goes to $300 (per barrel) it won’t benefit ordinary citizens.
What about agriculture?
JFT: The country also earns a lot by exporting goods such as bananas, coffee, shrimp and flowers. The primary market for Ecuadorian flower production is Russia. Now those producers are facing a dramatic crisis because sanctions have cut them off from their clients. This is a huge industry for Ecuador. In the provinces of Pichincha and Cotopaxi, there are entire regions dedicated almost entirely to flower production. They even have airports there because these flowers are exported to the world by plane. A small part of their production goes to the United States and Europe, but the large majority goes to Russia. Russia is one of the few countries where people buy flowers all year round rather than just for certain dates like Valentine’s Day.
What about our shrimp, coffee, or cacao exports? All that requires fertilizer and other imported agricultural supplies. Now there’s a global shortage, Russia was the world’s leading producer and now they’re sanctioned.
What has been the government’s response?
JFT: Countries can survive this storm if they have an umbrella, but Ecuador doesn’t have a progressive government. It has a neoliberal government. Our economy has no umbrella now.
What has been the neoliberal response to this current crisis? The flower producers were the first to ask for assistance. They asked for loans, so they can sustain themselves temporarily during this drop. President Lasso replied by saying that going into business means assuming risk and that the state has no obligation to bail anyone out. This idea of not bailing anyone out is a great idea in my opinion, but only if it’s applied evenly. We shouldn’t have to bail out the bankers when they have a crisis. But, of course, Guillermo Lasso will never abandon his people. He only abandons small farmers, who are now in crisis.
Electing progressive governments in Latin America is not a question of ideology; it’s also about citizens defending their economy and living standards. If a banker manages to win an election, then these are the results.
Many countries now see Washington as an unreliable ally and are looking to trade in different currencies. Do you think the U.S. dollar will lose its international hegemony? What would that mean for Latin America?
JFT: When the [Brazil, Russia, India, China, South Africa] BRICS countries start trading entirely in Yuan, or any currency that isn’t the dollar, then the world is going to really change. I think we can expect to see this transformation within the next five years. It’ll represent the definitive defeat of the U.S. empire. History shows us that a country’s military power is linked to the power of its currency.
When Britain ruled the world, the British pound dominated international trade. Even Ecuador’s external debt was in pound sterling during those years. The reserves of our central bank were in pound sterling. This came to an end after the end of World War 2 because the U.S. became the new dominant power and built the world’s financial and monetary institutions for its own ends. The current war in Ukraine is also about currency. The U.S. is participating in this conflict against Russia because they need to defend the power of the dollar.
What can the region do?
JFT: Latin America needs to slowly de-link our region from the U.S. dollar. We need to diversify our international currency reserves. Correa began to do this in Ecuador by investing in gold reserves. This was criticized by the opposition at the time. However, this diversification can only happen if we make the necessary changes to our commercial relations. If we’re to start building reserves in the Chinese yuan, then we need to deepen commercial relations with China to achieve this.
I think we should return to the proposal of UNASUR of creating a common Latin American currency with its own central bank. We also need a Latin American payment system. Look at how the U.S. is using SWIFT to cut off any country they don’t like from the global economy. We can’t allow that. It makes us vulnerable. Russia and China are creating their own payment systems. We should have our own as well.
There’s no use in just complaining about U.S. aggression. That’s what they do. They invade and attack countries all over the world. The real problem is that Latin America is exposed and unable to deal with this kind of economic war. In response, we need to turn towards Asia in a serious way. Why isn’t the Ecuadorian government securing new markets for our shrimp and banana in China? There’s huge demand there. Bolivia and Ecuador both have vast mineral wealth, we need to bypass the West and focus on Asia when it comes to trade and investment in these commodities.
U.S. media has attacked countries like Mexico, Brazil and Argentina, for not imposing their own economic sanctions on Russia. Do you think this capricious request from the United States will further break down the U.S. sphere of influence here and across the rest of the global South?
These sanctions are causing an inflation crisis for people everywhere. Europeans are paying 8-9 euros for a gallon of gasoline. In the U.S., it’s $4.75. Up to $6 in places like California and Miami. This is shocking. The sanctions are having a boomerang effect on the U.S. and its citizens. Though not everyone is suffering: Arms manufacturers are not suffering. People like [U.S. President Joe] Biden’s son [Hunter], with shady dealings in the gas business, are not going to suffer.
Financial analysis reports came out this week indicating that if the price of gasoline remains at $4.75 as a national average in the U.S., then the U.S. economy will enter into a recession at the end of this year. None of what they’re doing is reasonable from the perspective of ordinary citizens.
Indigenous cereals and pulses grown by Shakila and Gulab Mullani. Top row from left: Udid (black gram), tur (pigeon pea). Bottom row from left: Kala pavtha (black beans), chavali (black-eyed pea), and kar jondhala (indigenous sorghum) / credit: Sanket Jain
Eighty-eight-year-old Sakharam Gaikwad never anticipated that farming sugarcane would become a bittersweet endeavor.
In 1972, a drought hit the western Indian state of Maharashtra. Considered one of the most devastating disasters of the last century, it affected 20 million people (57 percent of the state’s rural population) and 5.6 million—or 40 percent of—cattle.
The disaster prompted Gaikwad to move in the direction of his fellow villagers toward sugarcane cultivation. At the time, the young farmer had been growing indigenous rice varieties, and a wide collection of nutritious millets, including sorghum, finger millet, pearl millet, and little millet.
Starting in the late 1960s, he began using chemical fertilizers to cultivate hybrid sugarcane and sorghum varieties. Seeing bumper harvests in shorter periods of time, he said, “Farmers abandoned the traditional millets and moved rapidly toward sugarcane.” Year after year—during the 1970s—farmers began cultivating sugarcane in his village of Jambhali until an overwhelming majority were involved with the fast-growing plant.
Everything went well for Gaikwad until climate change disasters started destroying his crops. For instance, a 200 percent increase in rainfall in one week in October destroyed the majority of his sugarcane. In 1.5 acres, he managed to harvest 70 tons. He has noticed a drop over the last five years by almost 50 tons, costing him $1,830 per year.
However, stories like those of Gaikwad are increasing across India, with most farmers moving either toward commercial crops, like soybean and sugarcane, or hybrid varieties of indigenous crops. Last year, India reported producing 500 million metric tons of sugarcane worth 1.18 trillion Indian Rupees ($14.26 billion).
Meanwhile, in 2019, India cultivated 80 percent of traditional and hybrid millet in Asia and 20 percent of the world’s production. Grains like traditional millets that can withstand rapidly changing weather are on the decline in India. With India now having convinced the United Nations to declare 2023 the International Year of Millets, what does it mean for Indian farmers?
Farmer Vasant Kore from Sangli district’s Dongarsoni village said his family has been cultivating kar jondhala for over 120 years / credit: Sanket Jain
Farmers Say UN Designation Isn’t Enough
“Just announcing that this year is dedicated to millets doesn’t change things for the farmers,” said Amol Naik, a farmer, activist, lawyer and a member of the All India Kisan Sabha, the farmers’ wing of the Communist Party of India (Marxist). He and farmer Narayan Gaikwad, the younger brother of Sakharam Gaikwad, suggested a series of reforms to ensure fair prices to farmers.
“In several villages, we can’t even find the seeds of traditional millet varieties,” said Narayan Gaikwad, a 77-year-old activist and a farmer from Jambhali. “The government should conduct awareness sessions in villages and help farmers by ensuring a better price for millet and making traditional seeds more accessible to farmers.”
Gaikwad added that traditional seeds have become so rare that many farmers need help understanding the difference between a traditional variety and a hybrid variety.
“Just declaring a year dedicated to millets is not going to help.”
A 4-month-old kar jondhala panicle. A panicle is a loose branching cluster of flowers / credit: Sanket Jain
Why Millet Cultivation Declined
Traditional millet once was a staple food in India, helping people remain healthy. India, the sixth-highest sorghum-producing country globally, produced 4.2 million metric tons of sorghum last year, almost a 40 percent decline since 2010. Some reasons for the decline include fluctuating local climatic patterns, changing eating habits, rising heat waves, and a shift to non-native remunerative commercial and food crops.
Starting at age 17, the first crop 76-year-old Vasant Kore learned to cultivate was kar jondhala (indigenous sorghum). However, retaining the heirloom seeds wasn’t lucrative enough for many farmers. “The hybrid sorghum varieties yield double the produce as compared to traditional ones in almost half the time, whereas kar jondhala takes five months to grow,” explained Kore, who recalled hybrid sorghum varieties were introduced in his region in the 1970s.
Farmer Sambhaji Shingade, 61, from Sangli’s Garjewadi village, recounted the start of the commercialization of farming. “Many multinational corporations bought seeds from poor farmers at a meager price, developed hybrid varieties, and started selling them to the same farmers at much costlier prices. We were robbed of our traditional wealthier seeds.”
Farmer Sakharam Gaikwad, who once cultivated millets, spoke of how farming was systematically destroyed over several decades under the guise of development / credit: Sanket Jain
The rapid commercialization didn’t happen in a day. “Every government has systematically destroyed farming,” Gaikwad said. “Farming now relies on multinational companies who make these hybrid seeds and fertilizers.”
Despite the benefits of growing traditional varieties, farmers have been forced to move toward commercial crops.
“Farmers are encouraged to grow sugarcane and are rewarded by assuring them that the sugar mills will buy it,” Gaikwad said. “On the other hand, farmers are rarely given subsidies for cultivating traditional varieties that keep everyone fit, and there’s no market for such crops, forcing farmers to move toward sugarcane.”
“Also, most millets cultivated today are genetically modified hybrid varieties that promise a higher yield, but aren’t climate resistant. So, preserving the traditional varieties becomes even more critical, as they will completely vanish in a few years,” warned Vijay Jawandhiya, an activist and farmers’ leader from Maharashtra.
Gaikwad added chemical fertilizers and pesticides are now a must.
“Over the years, more and more hybrid varieties were developed and as farmers got used to them and fertilizers, the prices [of hybrid seeds and chemical fertilizers] eventually skyrocketed, making farming unaffordable.”
Shivaji Kamble said his family has been cultivating the traditional finger millet variety for over 160 years / credit: Sanket Jain
Plentiful Water and Fertilizers
When irrigation facilities started reaching Gaikwad’s village in 1964, he said everyone thought their problems had ended. “Little did they know it was the beginning of the troubling times.”
With water becoming readily available, everyone shifted to sugarcane. “Back then, there was not a single sugar mill in the region,” he said. By 2020-21, India had 506 operating sugar mills. Moreover, sugarcane requires tremendous use of chemical fertilizers and pesticides. The amount used varies based on soil conditions and climatic changes, among other factors. Also, it takes 1,500 to 2,000 liters of water to produce a kilogram of sugar. An Indian government report warns, “Most of the country’s irrigation facilities are utilized by paddy and sugarcane, depleting water availability for other crops. Pressure on water due to sugarcane cultivation in states like Maharashtra has become a serious concern, calling for more efficient and sustainable water use through alternative cropping pattern.”
Despite its problems, farmers say they aren’t left with an option. “Cultivating the traditional variety is unaffordable. It takes a lot of time to grow, and even the production is less,” Gaikwad explained.
Today, Shivaji Kamble and his wife, Draupadi Kamble, remain the handful of farmers who have managed to preserve the traditional maize variety / credit: Sanket Jain
Traditional sorghum varieties don’t require chemical fertilizers and are resistant to extreme climate events like heat waves. In addition, they can grow in drought conditions and water-logged soils, withstand salinity and alkalinity, and they are resistant to pests. Saline soil has excessive amounts of soluble salts, which hamper plants’ ability to absorb water. Meanwhile, alkaline soil contains high levels of sodium, calcium and magnesium.
Most farmers face this dilemma of losing their hybrid crops to climate change disasters or reporting lesser produce with traditional crops.
Dongarsoni farmers found a workaround by growing a lot of grapes, which unfortunately require tremendous use of insecticides, herbicides, and other toxic pesticides. “The farmers here earn a lot of money from grapes by exporting them. So they can retain the traditional crops in their vacant land,” explained farmer Gulab Mullani, 41, who follows the same approach.
However, a significant challenge for farmers like Gaikwad, who long ago abandoned the crops, comes from birds and animals eating produce. “One farmer cannot report sustainable profits if other farmers predominantly cultivate cash crops. This is because the majority of the millet produce remains a feed for birds and wild boars,” Jawandiya explained. “When there are large patches of farmland with the same traditional crop, the loss caused by birds and animals isn’t felt much.”
Another reason for abandoning millet is its lower price and lack of a regulated market, often pushing farmers into losses. “With the rise of cash crops, the labor cost increased, but the prices of traditional grains haven’t increased much. Hence, agricultural laborers aren’t paid enough for harvesting millets, forcing farmers to shift to other crops,” Jawandhiya added.
Farmer Gulab Mullani holding a kar jondhala stalk, which grows up to 15 feet and is nutritious fodder for cattle / credit: Sanket Jain
Building Sustainable Food Systems with Millet
Millets, especially sorghum, were once a staple food in India and Africa. About 500 million people in more than 30 countries depend on sorghum as a staple food, according to the International Crop Research Institute for the Semi-Arid Tropics. The study found that over two-thirds of Indians consume foods deficient in protein and essential micronutrients, such as zinc, iron and vitamin A.
Cultivating indigenous millets has been lifesaving for drought-affected farmers like Kore. They help control blood sugar levels, are rich in iron, fiber, and proteins, and improve heart health, among other benefits, over the hybrid varieties. In addition, their pest-resistant ability, tolerance to higher temperatures, and need for minimal rainfall make them an environment-friendly crop.
Moreover, traditional millet varieties don’t require chemical fertilizers. “Even if you apply chemical fertilizers and pesticides, the crop will still grow in their natural timing only,” Kore said with a laugh, “so there’s no point wasting money.”
Gaikwad uses a simple observation to predict the rising cases of several lifestyle diseases. “Just look at what people eat.”
Earlier, eating flatbreads made of traditional sorghum, finger, and pearl millet was the norm. Finger millet, compared with other millets, remains a rich source of minerals and protein, as well as calcium. In addition, it has been used to raise iron levels in anemia patients.
Now, they are replaced with hybrid wheat or rice varieties. Today, 3.5 billion people globally are at risk of calcium deficiency, with more than 90 percent of them from Asia and Africa.
Plus, millet stalks remain an excellent cattle feed. “Many farmers have retained the traditional millets only for their cattle,” Gaikwad said. Cattle dung, a much cheaper source of organic fertilizer, keeps the soil nutrient-rich and helps build sustainable farming cycles.
“With millets gone, this entire cycle has collapsed,” Kore said.
Kar Jondhala (indigenous sorghum variety) is now grown only in the drought-prone regions of Maharashtra’s Sangli district / credit: Sanket Jain
Spike In Chemical Fertilizers
While the hybrid varieties promise a higher yield in lesser time, they require maintenance through the application of pesticides and chemical fertilizers. Kore added he has found it difficult to cultivate crops without using chemical fertilizers on the field where he grows hybrid varieties, commercial crops or grapes. “The soil is now used to chemicals and hybrid varieties. I think it will take several years to reverse this.”
His observation is a stark reality as globally, the consumption of nitrogen fertilizers reached 190.81 million metric tons in 2019, a 312 percent rise since 1965. Also, chemical pesticide usage has surged over 57 percent since 1990, as its consumption has now reached 2.7 million metric tons.
While this helps a crop survive to a certain extent, it has been found to provoke oxidative stress that causes Parkinson’s Disease, respiratory and reproductive tract disorders, Alzheimer’s Disease, different types of cancer, and much more, according to a 2018 study in the journal, Environmental Toxicology and Pharmacology.
Looking at the younger generation’s experience with chemical farming, Kore’s brother, Shivaji, 67, of Dongarsoni village, never cultivated the hybrid sorghum. “Of the three acres of land I own, I have reserved an acre only for kar jondhala,” he says.
Farmers Shakila and Gulab Mullani have been preserving the kar jondhala seeds for more than 30 years / credit: Sanket Jain
Preserving a Heritage
While kar jondhala fetches almost double the price of hybrid varieties, it has much less demand. “The younger generation doesn’t know its importance,” Kore said. He recalled the 1970s when traditional sorghum was treated as a currency. “People would exchange it for buying daily items.”
Farmers, like Kore, have now taken it upon themselves to help preserve this crop. In villages like Dongarsoni, farmers still use the traditional barter system to exchange heirloom seeds.
Gaikwad, however, said not all hope is lost. “It’s not that all the traditional varieties have completely disappeared. They are still there, but one will have to travel a lot to find them because very few farmers have preserved them.”
Farmers like Kore and Mullani have now taken it upon themselves to preserve the traditional millets. “I will keep cultivating traditional sorghum until the time I die,” Kore said, smiling as he gestured to his field.
Sanket Jain is an independent journalist based in the Kolhapur district of the western Indian state of Maharashtra. He was a 2019 People’s Archive of Rural India fellow, for which he documented vanishing art forms in the Indian countryside. He has written for Baffler, Progressive Magazine, Counterpunch, Byline Times, The National, Popula, Media Co-op, Indian Express and several other publications.
Pollution in Medellín, Colombia. The United Kingdom has red-listed seven countries in the Americas—including Colombia—which requires even vaccinated travelers to quarantine. This has been lambasted as a political move in light of the upcoming COP26 in Glasgow, Scotland / credit: Milo Miloezger on Unsplash
Early in October, the United Kingdom introduced new rules for international travel in light of the COVID-19 pandemic. A “red list” of 54 countries was announced that mandated quarantine for passengers from mostly Global South countries. A few days later, the red list was revised to retain seven countries—Colombia, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Haiti, Panama, Peru and Venezuela.
But how will these travel restrictions affect negotiations at the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC)’s 26th Conference of Parties, also known as COP26? This summit is scheduled to be held next month in Glasgow, Scotland, where delegates from more than 190 countries are convening to figure out how to meet the stipulations of the 2015 Paris Agreement.
However, people from the seven red-listed countries traveling to the United Kingdom must undergo a mandatory quarantine, even if they are vaccinated. And while the U.K. government has announced it will cover quarantine costs, these rules may be contributing to an already inequitable COP set-up. Previous COPs had ended in less-than-ideal outcomes over issues concerning equity.
“[The red list] evidences disparities between countries and the reality of vaccine inequality,” said Maria Alejandra Aguilar, associate lawyer in the climate justice division at Ambiente y Sociedad, an environmental non-governmental organization (NGO) in Colombia. Aguilar is an accredited observer for COP26 and despite her credentials, she worried about being able to travel to Glasgow. “The visa process was a nightmare for me and several delegates—even official ones,” she added, noting how her visa arrived on October 20, two days before her flight, even though she had applied for the visa on July 27.
Aguilar tweeted about her experience with the British Embassy in Colombia, noting how they held onto her passport for two months without an answer. Then on October 6, they asked her what COP26 is and what she intends to do in the United Kingdom.
I want to share the level of incompetence of the @GOVUK visas&immigration- I applied the 5th of August for a visa to attend @COP26 as accredited observer @UKinColombia 2 months without answer + withholding my passport, today this was their reply #COP26pic.twitter.com/JjFcwTwgxU
“I haven’t been able to understand why my country was on the red list, but the U.S. was never on the list, even though they had many COVID cases,” said Adrian Martínez, director and founder of La Ruta del Clima, a Costa Rican NGO focusing on climate governance processes and climate justice. As of publication, the United States had about 80,000 cases per day, whereas Costa Rica had around 600 cases per day. “We felt that we were being differentiated because of where we’re from,” he added.
Until a few days ago, most of Latin America was on the red list. Martínez said that is why countries like Mexico were considering sending only the core team of negotiators to Glasgow. He also added many NGOs in these countries did not try to obtain visas because they thought they would not be able to participate in COP26, given the restrictions.
If a country only sends a core team of negotiators, experts who routinely accompany negotiators to climate-change negotiations very likely will not be doing so because of the uncertainties that have arisen in the process, even with the revised red list. These countries also may reduce the number of negotiators they would send to Glasgow.
Martínez described the situation as a “distraction” from the prep work negotiators and other experts normally engaged during the weeks prior to previous COPs. “How to participate [at COP26] and who can get there has become the main issue,” he explained.
A COP26 spokesperson said ensuring the voices of those most affected by climate change are heard is a “priority for the COP26 Presidency.” The spokesperson also added financial support is available for delegates from developing countries for quarantine stays. But the spokesperson has yet to respond to what extent such financial support can remedy problems Global South representatives have faced in the last few months and will continue to face during negotiations. Meanwhile, the U.K. Department for Transport has yet to reply to this reporter. Questions also were sent to the UNFCCC. This article will be updated when responses are received.
“This closed, gatekeeping approach [to COPs] is political,” Martínez said. “It was supposed to be the most inclusive COP, but it has been the opposite. We had to complain and fight and persevere.”
Rishika Pardikar is a freelance journalist in Bangalore, India.
