Day 5 of COP28 is themed around Just Transition.
December 5 is focused on Just Transition and Indigenous Peoples:
- The day will address universal energy access and the needs of workers across the energy sector transition and will have an additional special focus on cooling as a critical mitigation and adaptation factor.
- Indigenous Peoples Day will recognize the importance of Indigenous Peoples’ intergenerational knowledge, practices, and leadership in climate action and in stewarding planetary health, as well as mechanisms to improve their direct access to finance.
- The day will notably strengthen the role of Indigenous Peoples—and reinforce the urgency of a fully inclusive, all-of-society approach—in the just transition.
Always was, always will be Aboriginal land
CAHA recognises Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander People as the traditional custodians of the land we call Australia. Sovereignty of these lands has never been ceded. We commit to listening to and learning from Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people about how we can better reflect Indigenous ways of being and knowing in our work.
Discussion paper: Climate Change and Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Health
Lowitja Institute and the National Health Leadership Forum
November 2021
This discussion paper describes climate change in Australia and its impact on the health and wellbeing of Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander people. It highlights Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander-led initiatives in climate change adaptation and mitigation that strengthens wellbeing and benefits the global community.
Position paper: The need for an Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Coalition on Climate and Health
Lowitja Institute
November 2023
This recent paper evaluates the ‘healthiness’ of 58 countries’ NDCs. Australia was rated 0 out of 18 for a failure to mention health in any way. This demonstrates just how far we have to go in adopting a ‘health in all policies’ approach that recognises the benefits of action on climate and health.
Video: Climate Change Story by the Indigenous Desert Alliance
The Indigenous Desert Alliance has produced an animated film with the support of the Purple House Pintupi Luritja Language Group to tell a story about climate change and a community taking action to adapt to it. The key message is that climate change is part of the story now and we all need to come up with our own stories and ways to deal with it.
Action Plan: Kep Katitjin – Gabi Kaadadjan – Waterwise Perth
Danjoo Koorliny leaders, Bindjareb Elders and WA state departments
This action plan outlines the steps towards establishing world-leading waterwise communities for Boorloo (Perth) and Bindjareb (Peel) by 2030. Indigenous knowledge and wisdom is at the heart of this plan.
We know who is hit first and worst
No one is immune from the health impacts of climate change. However, the people whose health is being harmed first and worst by the climate crisis are the people who contribute least to its causes, and who are least able to protect themselves and their families against it: people in low-income and disadvantaged countries and communities.
Australia is an economic beneficiary of historical development powered by coal, oil and gas. We must now play a leadership role in transitioning the world away from fossil fuels—including our own resources.
The richest 10% are responsible for 50% of current emissions
The following table presents the average and minimum income per capita for each income group on a global basis, produced by the Stockholm Environment Institute using 2019 data.
This insight is one of many that users can glean using the SEI Emissions Inequality Dashboard allows users to explore inequalities in carbon emissions both within and between countries. Historical and projected consumption emissions are provided across an income distribution for 117 countries. Explore the dashboard
Report: Just Transition for Healthy People on a Healthy Planet
Health Care Without Harm
This report speaks to the need for an urgent, deeper conversation that weaves health into the Just Transition fabric, in a way that centers on protecting and improving people’s health in a post-fossil fuel society.
Report: If You Break It, Fix It
Oxfam and the University of New South Wales
This report argues that Australia must address the unfair ratio of higher spending on domestic climate action versus limited spending on global climate action. Currently, Australia spends six times as much on domestic action as it does on assisting developing countries with climate change.
To protect the rights of current and future generations
Children, and future children, reserve little to no power to contribute to the climate crisis. They are also the ones who will be left to suffer the worst of the consequences of decades of climate inaction. Climate change threatens children’s rights to education, health, safety, protection from violence, and an adequate standard of living, among others.
The burden expected to be shouldered by our future people is unprecedented, and will be unlike anything experienced by previous generations. The graphic below from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change's Sixth Assessment Report on Climate Change shows the predicted degree to which future generations will be impacted by warming.
This inequity is deepened by the higher climate-sensitivity observed in youth populations compared to adult populations. Children do not experience climate change the same way as adults do, as they are more vulnerable to the effects of extreme weather, toxic environmental hazards and diseases.
According to the World Health Organization, half of the world’s children live in extremely high-risk areas for climate change impacts
Policy brief: Climate Change, Health, & Intergenerational Equity
WHO Climate Change and Health Unit
This policy brief highlights the ways in which the stabilisation and reduction of greenhouse gas concentrations at levels consistent with the Paris Agreement temperature goal promotes health and wellbeing, particularly for children, adolescents, youth, and future generations.
Interactive Atlas: The Children’s Climate Risk Index
UNICEF
This interactive atlas allows you to see Children’s Climate Risk Index and its key components on a map, as well as the risk index for individual countries.
Report: The Climate Crisis is a Child Rights Crisis
UNICEF
This report introduces the the Children’s Climate Risk Index and provides an insight into the ways in which children and young people are uniquely affected by the climate crisis.
Submission: Climate Change Amendment (Duty of Care and Intergenerational Climate Equity) Bill 2023
Climate and Health Alliance
This submission to the Australian government for the consideration of the rights of current and future generations and promotion of intergenerational equity in government decision-making.
