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Climate litigation represents a frontier solution to change the dynamics of the fight against climate change. This Global Climate Litigation Report: 2023 Status Review shows that people are increasingly turning to the courts to combat the climate crisis. As of December 2022, there have been 2,180 climate-related cases filed in 65 jurisdictions, including international and regional courts, tribunals, quasi-judicial bodies, or other adjudicatory bodies, such as Special Procedures at the United Nations and arbitration tribunals. This represents a steady increase from 884 cases in 2017 and 1,550 cases in 2020. Children and youth, women’s groups, local communities, and Indigenous Peoples, among others, are taking a prominent role in bringing these cases and driving climate change governance reform in more and more countries around the world.

This report, which updates previous United Nations Environment Programme reports published in 2017 and 2020, provides an overview of the current state of climate change litigation and an update on global climate change litigation trends. It provides judges, lawyers, advocates, policymakers, researchers, environmental defenders, climate activists, human rights activists (including women’s rights activists), NGOs, businesses and the international community at large with an essential resource to understand the current state of global climate litigation, including descriptions of the key issues that courts have faced in the course of climate change cases.

This report further demonstrates the importance of an environmental rule of law in combating the triple planetary crises of climate change, biodiversity loss and pollution. Access to justice enables the protection of environmental law and human rights and promotes accountability in public institutions. The report was launched in conjunction with the anniversary of the United Nations General Assembly’s recognition of the human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment (A/RES/76/300), as the majority of cases brought before the courts demonstrate concrete links between human rights and climate change. The UNGA resolution, which recognises that climate change impacts have negative implications on the enjoyment of all human rights, is likely to drive further action on climate change in the future.

 

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How are these important functions of parliaments being reshaped in the post-2015 era of sustainable development? How can legislators and parliamentarians do their part to ensure that the SDGs and other post-2015 commitments are achieved by 2030 and beyond? The overarching purpose of this Guide is to provide formative answers to these questions that are practically useful in the daily work of legislators and legislative officials around the world.

This Guidebook, which is based on the outcome of a UNEP pilot project that was carried out in three South East Asian countries in 2009-2010 - Cambodia, Lao PDR and Vietnam - is intended to serve as a tool to help decision-makers and legal drafters to incorporate measures for adapting to the adverse impacts of climate change into their national sustainable development policies, plans and programmes by creating the necessary legal, regulatory and institutional framework for such action.

In order to follow and facilitate the HFC phase-down schedules contained in the Kigali Amendment, the Parties, including both developed and developing countries, will have to implement certain measures. This booklet contains a recommended set of legislative and policy options which the developing (Article 5) countries may wish to consider for implementation. It is intended to be a guide/tool for countries

Integrated water resource management (IWRM) incorporating an ecosystem approach is a key building block for achieving the water, sanitation and human settlement targets of the Millennium Development Goals. It is evident that there are inseparable and indisputable links between the protection and sustainable use of the natural environment, especially water resources, and the provision of environmentally sound sanitation services, the improvement of human settlements, public health and poverty reduction. This brings into focus the need for conservation and efficient use of available freshwater resources and making available best practice for widespread adoption and adaptation throughout the global community.

All Parties to the Montreal Protocol must eliminate the production and consumption of ozone depleting substances (ODS) according to specified phase-out schedules. Consumption is in this context defined as imports plus production minus exports. This resource module is intended to assist government officers in developing countries in their work to meet these commitments.

Over the last decade, laws codifying national and international responses to climate change have grown in number, specificity, and importance. As these laws have recognized new rights and created new duties, litigation seeking to challenge either their facial validity or their particular application has followed. So too has litigation aimed at pressing legislators and policymakers to be more ambitious and thorough in their approaches to climate change.

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With over 1,200 environmental courts and tribunals now operating worldwide at the national and state/provincial level, this guide shares concise, practical advice and best practices to make them more effective, updating the 2009 “Greening Justice” report by the University of Denver Environmental Courts and Tribunals Study and published by World Resources Institute.

The UNEP Governing Council adopted the Bali Guidelines in 2010 as a tool to assist countries in filling gaps in national and sub-national legislation in order to facilitate broad access to information, public participation and access to justice in environmental matters. In 2012 UNEP and UNITAR joined hands to promote the Bali Guidelines, including through a project to develop a Guide to the Guidelines implemented by the World Resource Institute (WRI). Drafted with assistance from a global Advisory Group, the Guide is intended to be a practical tool for the use of governments, major groups and stakeholders, legal professionals, implementing authorities and others engaged in the application of Rio Principle 10.

This report provides a global overview on the progress of countries in passing laws and regulations that limit the manufacture, import, sale, use and disposal of selected single-use plastics and microplastics, causing marine litter.