This closed-door roundtable explores possible strategic shifts in the Indo-Pacific between now and 2024. Focusing on trade security, climate change disruptions and security cooperation, it aims to enhance the understanding of the regional goals of, and strategic relationships between, the key countries active in the region.

The workshop is part of a larger project funded by the Strategic Policy Division of the Australian Department of Defence. The project includes workshops in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, India and the Pacific Islands (Tonga).

Attendance at this event is by invitation only.

Air pollution has been classified as a cancer-causing agent with evidence showing an increased risk of lung cancer associated with increasing levels of exposure to outdoor air pollution and particulate matter.

Air pollution is also known to increase risks for other diseases, especially respiratory and heart diseases, and studies show that levels of exposure to air pollution have increased significantly in some parts of the world - mostly in rapidly industrializing countries with large populations.

In coordination with London Global Cancer Week partner organizations, this event outlines the evidence linking air pollution and cancer rates in London and other major cities.

Panellists provide a 360° picture of the impact of the rising incidence of cancer across the world, the challenges the cancer pandemic poses to the implementation of universal health coverage and the existing UK contribution to strengthening capacity in cancer management and research in developing countries.

One year ago, during the last annual Conference of Parties (COP) held in Katowice, the Polish government launched a Solidarity and Just Transition Declaration, signed by 56 governments including the UK, making the case for why the green transition must be just.

Three years earlier in 2015, the landmark Paris Agreement also included provisions for a just transition where it stated that the decarbonization process should be ‘Taking into account the imperatives of a just transition of the workforce and the creation of decent work and quality jobs in accordance with nationally defined development priorities’. In practice, however, the concept of a just transition has not yet been implemented and has not been sufficiently considered by governments or corporations around the world.

The social unrest that has erupted in Chile’s capital Santiago over the past month, which has forced the Chilean government to ask to move this year’s COP to Madrid, is a case in point. This discontent clearly shows that climate action cannot be separated from social justice concerns. There has not been a real commitment by governments to ensure a just transition based on social dialogue from the local to the national level. This was seen in France with the gilets jaunes protests in November 2018 – one month after President Emmanuel Macron ended the so-called ‘fortune tax’ and instead introduced taxes on diesel fuel as part of an effort to transition to green energy – and the current situation in Chile has some striking parallels. 

Sustainability transitions are a complex web of political choices and investment decisions which affect countries and societies in many different ways. Questions of social justice are everywhere, but in most cases, poorly understood by decision-makers. For example, although poverty has been reduced significantly over the last decade, Chile has one of the worst rates of inequality in Latin America and the highest Gini index in the OECD. The decisions taken in 2017 to power Metro de Santiago with solar photovoltaics and wind energy are commendable from a climate perspective, however, it led to students and young people protesting against rises in subway fares in October 2019.

They were joined by Chileans who are frustrated with rising living costs and by workers and trade unions struggling with low wages. As reported by the Chilean Human Rights Commission (INDH), so far more than 4,200 people have been arrested and more than 1,300 injured and hospitalized.

Climate negotiations beyond technicalities

This time there is also another important dimension to the protests: social unrest as a reaction to worsening inequality has the potential to derail multilateral cooperation on climate change and other global issues. Since tackling climate change is a race against the clock, the world faces the challenge of addressing both urgency and equity. The world cannot afford delays and needs to move fast but decision-makers need to take time for deliberation and civic participation to avoid rapid and ill-conceived transitions which eventually meet public resistance.

Many technical experts and negotiators, who often unintentionally divorce climate policy and technical discussions about emission reductions from social justice concerns, have been caught by surprise by the cancellation of the negotiations. For this year’s COP, one important focus of the official negotiations are the so-called 'Article 6 Rules' – the accounting mechanisms and modalities for a new form of international interaction on carbon markets and off-setting to ensure carbon markets can support countries in enhancing the ambitions of their stated climate action, known as Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). 

What is becoming much more obvious now is that just transitions are at least equally important for achieving NDCs and other long-term mitigation strategies.

In order to meet the 1.5 degree target, stated by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world will have to invest an average of around $3 trillion a year over the next three decades in transforming its energy supply systems. But how can we ensure that these investments benefit low-income communities? Will they further increase everyday living costs? The climate finance related discussions focussing on commercially-oriented investments for low-carbon energy systems in most cases only consider the aspect of affordability, but not the other important principles of alternative ‘just’ energy finance, such as good governance, due process, intra-generational equity, spatial equity and financial resilience. Investments to support just transitions need to ensure investments, not only for large energy infrastructure, but also in the jobs, skills and work vital to both adaptation and mitigation.

Just transitions for a circular economy

The just transition concept is also the entry point to broader discussions about inclusive economic transformations, questioning the dominant paradigm of consumerism and ending the wasteful use of critical resources. The current linear economic model of take-make-throw away – in Chile epitomized by the linear extractive model of the mining sector that has contributed to widening inequality – the linear extractive model is not only destructive on the natural environment but also destructive for social cohesion.

In Chile, the commodity boom in copper production – the country accounts for about 30 per cent of the world’s output – and more recently lithium – which is used in batteries for mobile phones, laptops and electric cars – have generated enormous prosperity in Chile. But the wealth has been unequally distributed and has not been used to lay the foundation for raising the overall level of incomes.

A socially embedded and inclusive circular economy can, therefore, be a way forward from the current situation the Latin American country finds itself in. The circular economy was intended to feature prominently during the 25th COP and Chile’s policies – from the Ministry of Environment and Chile's Production Development Corporation (CORFO) – have played an important role in supporting the development of a circular economy, launching in 2018, the first public circular economy programme in Latin America. 

The government’s support for start-up companies and entrepreneurs to develop inclusive circular economy business models is the right approach to addressing the issues of waste, employment, services for low-income communities and local economic development. These are solutions that need to be scaled up having the potential to reduce Chile’s economic reliance on the dominant extractive model.

As a global community, it is necessary to address the environmental and social objectives equally as not addressing social objectives will become an obstacle in achieving climate mitigation and solving other environmental issues. 

The Chilean protests are a wake-up call and present an opportunity for the global climate change community – which includes governments – to ensure just transitions are implemented in practice.

Earlier this month, Sheikh Tamim – the emir of Qatar – hailed the country’s success in overcoming the impacts of the embargo levied by the so-called Arab Quartet – Bahrain, Egypt, Saudi Arabia and the United Arab Emirates (UAE). Qatar will post a budget surplus for the first time in three years, and the country’s long-term plan for economic diversification has taken great strides, according to the emir. Key among the achievements cited was the advancement of Qatar’s domestic food industry.

When the blockade was introduced in June 2017, it threw the vulnerability of Qatar’s domestic food supply to outside interruption into sharp relief. Qatar is poorly suited to growing food. The desert country ranks as the most water-stressed in the world. As one of the hottest, most arid countries in the world, trade is critical to feeding the nation; over 90 per cent of its food supply is imported.

Most of Qatar’s cereal imports – including 80 per cent of its wheat supply – arrive by sea from exporters including India, Russia and Australia. Sitting on the eastern edge of the Persian Gulf, Qatar’s only maritime gateway to the world is the Strait of Hormuz. This narrow body of water can, as events this summer have shown, be disrupted by geopolitical events. But for 40 per cent of overall food imports, overland trade from Saudi Arabia was Qatar’s primary supply channel before June 2017 – particularly so for dairy products and fresh fruit and vegetables coming from the EU, Turkey and Jordan.

The abrupt closure of Saudi Arabia’s borders prompted significant private investment in Qatar’s own food industry; domestic production has reportedly increased four-fold since the blockade was introduced. Prior to the blockade, Qatar imported 85 per cent of its vegetables; it now hopes to produce 60 per cent within the next three years. Perhaps even more remarkably, the country is now self-sufficient in dairy, having previously relied on imports for 72 per cent of its supply.

This progress has come at a cost. Qatar’s booming domestic industry is highly resource-intensive. To fill the gap in the dairy sector, Baladna – the country’s principal dairy producer – imported around 18,000 Holstein dairy cows from the EU and US. The company is thriving; in June of this year, it made its first dairy exports.

But the desert is not a natural environment for these cows; they must be kept indoors, at temperatures around 15°C cooler than the outside air, and misted with water to prevent overheating. The cooling systems are a huge drain on local resources. Each dairy cow requires an average of 185 gallons of water a day, almost twice the volume used by the average Qatari household. The majority of this water comes from oil- or gas-powered desalination plants; the cooling systems themselves run on gas-fired electricity.

Qatar has traditionally invested in production overseas – particularly in Sudan and Tanzania – to secure its fodder supply, but the government has plans to become self-sufficient in fodder crops such as lucerne (alfalfa) and Rhodes grass. This will require irrigation on a vast scale. Qatar’s farmland is mostly located in the north of the country where it benefits from aquifers; fodder production already accounts for half of the groundwater extracted for use in agriculture.

Despite commitments made under the National Food Security Programme to improving the water efficiency of Qatar’s food production, the rate of draw-down of these aquifers exceeds their recharge rates. Overexploitation has resulted in saline intrusion, threatening their long-term viability. With 92 per cent of all extracted groundwater given to farmers free of charge, there is little incentive for economizing on its use.

Increasing production will also likely mean increasing fertilizer use; rates of fertilizer use in Qatar are among the highest in the world, second only to those in Singapore.

Both government and industry are taking small steps to ‘green’ the country’s food production. Certain local authorities plan to ban the use of groundwater for fodder production by 2025, requiring producers to use treated sewage water instead and reserving the use of groundwater for crop production.

A number of companies are also adopting so-called ‘circular’ practices to achieve more efficienct resource use; Agrico, a major vegetable producer, has expanded its organic hydroponics operations, a move the company reports has led to a 90 per cent reduction in water use. But, with a target to produce up to 50 per cent of Qatar’s fresh food supply domestically within just a few years, scattered examples of resource-saving strategies will not be enough to mitigate the rise in water demand.

As Qatar looks to continue growing its food industry in the wake of the blockade, it is from Saudi Arabia – ironic though it may be – that Qatar stands to learn important lessons.

Saudi Arabia’s scaling up of domestic wheat production – initially to achieve self-sufficiency and then to support a prosperous export industry – was ultimately a failed effort. The unsustainable extraction of groundwater – fuelled by generous subsidies for wheat producers and the nominal cost of diesel for pumping – brought the country’s water table to the brink of collapse, and the government was forced to make a dramatic U-turn, reducing then removing the subsidies and shrinking its wheat sector.

The UAE also provides an instructive example for how domestic food production may be supported – this time positive. This summer, the Department of Environment in Abu Dhabi announced its Recycled Water Policy, laying out a policy framework to promote and facilitate reused water across all major sectors, including agriculture.

Back in 2014, the Ministry of Climate Change and Environment set hydroponics as a key priority, launching a 100 million Emirati dirham fund to incentivize and support farmers establishing hydroponic farms. And the International Center for Biosaline Agriculture, based in Dubai and supported by the UAE government, undertakes pioneering research into sustainable food production in saline environments.

On the face of it, Qatar has indeed bounced back from the blockade. As and when cross-border trade is re-established with Saudi Arabia, Qatar will boast a more diverse – and more resilient – network of trade relationships than it did prior to June 2017.

In addition to investment in domestic food production, the blockade also provoked a rapid recalibration of Qatar’s trade relationships. Allies in the region – most notably Turkey and Iran – were quick to come to Qatar’s assistance, delivering fresh produce by air. Since then, Qatar has scaled up its trading relationship with both countries.

It has also leveraged its position as the world’s largest exporter of liquid natural gas to establish new maritime trade lines with major food exporters, including India. Should tensions spike again in the future, it will be in a stronger position to weather the storm.

But, in the absence of a commitment to support the widespread adoption of circular agricultural technologies and practices, Qatar’s commitment to increasing its self-sufficiency and expanding its domestic production could ultimately undermine its long-term food security.

Rising average temperatures and increasingly frequent extreme weather events – like the heatwave in 2010 when temperatures soared to over 50°C – will exacerbate already high resource stress in the country. Unsustainable exploitation of finite land, water and energy reserves will limit the country’s long-term capacity to produce food and weaken its ability to withstand future disruptions to regional and international supply channels.

As Qatar continues in its efforts to secure a reliable food supply, it would do well to heed the experience of its neighbours, be they friend or foe.

In the context of the feasibility of reducing greenhouse gas emissions to net zero, policymakers are beginning to pay more attention to options for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. A wide range of potential carbon dioxide removal (CDR) options are currently being discussed and modelled though the most prominent among them are bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS) and afforestation and reforestation.

There are many reasons to question the reliance on BECCS assumed in the models including the carbon balances achievable, its substantial needs for land, water and other inputs and technically and economically viable carbon capture and storage technologies.

This meeting will examine the potentials and challenges of BECCS in the context of other CDR and emissions abatement options. It will discuss the requisite policy and regulatory frameworks to minimize sustainability and socio-political risks of CDR approaches while also avoiding overshooting climate goals.

Attendance at this event is by invitation only.

This closed-door roundtable explores possible strategic shifts in the Indo-Pacific between now and 2024.

Focusing on trade security, climate change disruptions and security cooperation, it aims to enhance the understanding of the regional goals of, and strategic relationships between, the key countries active in the region.

The workshop is part of a larger project funded by the Strategic Policy Division of the Australian Department of Defence.

The project includes workshops in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, India and the Pacific Islands (Tonga).

December’s UN climate talks held in Madrid were aptly titled ‘Time for Action’. While little progress was made at the conference in establishing an international framework that would help to instigate this, there is still much scope for action in 2020. The need for this has become all too apparent as the impacts of climate change are increasingly seen around the world.

One of the key areas where progress can be made in 2020 is in increasing the ambition of nationally determined contributions (NDCs), these being governments’ plans to take action in response to climate change. To date, 184 countries have submitted NDCs, yet the commitments that have been made fall far short of what is needed to avert catastrophic climate change.

In 2020, however, many countries will be revising their NDCs, presenting an important opportunity to shift momentum; to date 79 countries have announced that they will be enhancing the ambition of their NDCs.

The forest sector is one area where more ambitious targets are likely to be set, and indeed, at the Climate Action Summit in September 2019, more than 20 countries made new commitments for the conservation, reforestation and restoration of their forests.

This will be essential. As is well documented, reducing deforestation is critical to reducing carbon emissions, while healthy and diverse forests are vital for adapting and increasing resilience to climate change.

However, while it is important that ambitious targets are set, this is relatively easy; the bigger challenge lies in ensuring that these are achievable.

This is all too apparent from experience thus far. In 2014, the New York Declaration on Forests set the goal to halve forest loss by 2020, and to end it by 2030. In addition, it included the goal to restore 150 million hectares of degraded landscapes and forestlands by 2020, and a further 200 million hectares by 2030.

The declaration has been endorsed by over 50 countries, as well as business and civil society organizations, yet the 2020 goals are far from being reached – in the six years since the declaration was launched, it has been found that forest loss increased rather than declined, and only about 27 million hectares of land have been restored.

What then is needed to ensure that the commitments being made by governments in their NDCs will actually be met? Three big changes are required.

Firstly, a shift in perspective is needed in many countries to a more forest-sensitive approach to development, one that gives adequate recognition to the full range of values provided by forests, rather than primarily focusing on their role as a global carbon sink. These include their importance for local and national economies, for livelihoods and the well-being of forest-dependent peoples, and for biodiversity and the regulation of local climate and water systems.

The focus on nature-based solutions at the international level offers potential to support this shift. However, it is critical that these are not seen as ‘niche’ approaches, and that countries identify what nature-based solutions mean for them, and how forests and tree-rich landscapes can best be integrated into their development strategies.

Fundamental to achieving this will be further improvements in governance, and this is the second change that is required. Legal and institutional reforms are needed in many countries as well as significant investments in human and technical resources. This will enable processes to be strengthened, or put in place, so that equitable strategies can be developed and implemented – strategies that reflect a balance of the needs and priorities of the full range of stakeholders, including local and global, rural and urban, women and men, young and old.

Financing will of course be critical for this, and the least developed countries in particular will be hindered in the actions they can take without additional finance. This is the third area of change that is needed, and it is to be hoped that the international community will make better progress on this in 2020. Forest and land-use options are often described as a cost-effective means of tackling climate change, as is noted in the Santiago Call for Action on Forests for example.

This is not to say that these will be easy or cheap – as Chatham House has documented, experience of forest governance reform has shown that it takes significant funding and time to bring about deep-rooted change. However, the huge potential benefits that can result, for the citizens of forest-rich countries as well as for the planet, mean that forests and sustainable land-use are a good investment.

Summary

• Current climate efforts are not progressing quickly enough to prevent the world from overshooting the global emissions targets set in the Paris Agreement; accordingly, attention is turning increasingly to options for removing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere – ‘carbon dioxide removal’ (CDR).
•  Alongside afforestation and reforestation, the main option under discussion is bioenergy with carbon capture and storage (BECCS): processes through which the carbon emissions from burning biomass for energy are captured before release into the atmosphere and stored in underground reservoirs.
• This pre-eminent status is not, however, based on a comprehensive analysis of the feasibility and impacts of BECCS. In reality, BECCS has many drawbacks.
• Models generally assume that biomass for energy is inherently carbon-neutral (and thus that BECCS, by capturing and storing the emissions from combustion, is carbon-negative), but in reality this is not a valid assumption.
• On top of this, the deployment of BECCS at the scales assumed in most models would consume land on a scale comparable to half that currently taken up by global cropland, entailing massive land-use change, potentially endangering food security and biodiversity. There is also significant doubt about the likely energy output of BECCS solutions.
• BECCS may still have some role to play in strategies for CDR, depending mainly on the feedstock used; but it should be evaluated on the same basis as other CDR options, such as nature-based solutions or direct air carbon capture and storage (DACCS). Analysis should take full account of carbon balances over time, the requirements of each CDR option in terms of demand for land, water and other inputs, and the consequences of that demand.
• There is an urgent need for policymakers to engage with these debates. The danger at the moment is that policymakers are ‘sleepwalking towards BECCS’ simply because most models incorporate it – or, almost as bad, it may be that they are simply ignoring the need for any meaningful action on CDR as a whole.

This roundtable explores possible strategic shifts in the Indo-Pacific between now and 2024. Focusing on trade security, climate change disruptions and security cooperation, it aims to enhance the understanding of the regional goals of, and strategic relationships between, the key countries active in the region.

The workshop is part of a larger project funded by the Strategic Policy Division of the Australian Department of Defence. The project includes workshops in the United States, the United Kingdom, France, Japan, India and the Pacific Islands (Tonga).
 

In this article, drawing on the work of the development sociologist Norman Long, I make the case for an actor-oriented approach to understanding the ‘turn to religion’ by global aid actors over the past couple of decades. I ask, is the ‘turn to religion’ evidence of the emergence of post-secular partnerships or are faith actors being instrumentalized to serve neo-liberal development goals? I argue that neither option captures the whole story and advocate that the study of religion and development needs to move beyond a binary between the ‘turn to religion’ as either evidence of post-secular partnerships or of the ‘instrumentalization’ of religion by the secular global aid business, and instead to think about how faith actors themselves encounter and shape development discourses and frameworks, translate them into relevant formats and strategically employ them. Alongside the adoption of an actor-orientated approach, I build on the work of Lewis and Mosse, Olivier de Sardan and Bierschenk to view international faith-based organizations (IFBOs) as development brokers and translators. This approach allows me to articulate the distinctive role that many members of IFBOs report they play as intermediaries who shift register between the secular development language and the faith-inspired language of their local faith partners. I take the engagement of faith actors with the new Sustainable Development Goals framework as a case-study to explore this.

COVID-19 is a sharp reminder of why trade and climate policy matters. How can governments maintain access to critical goods and services, and ensure global supply chains function in times of crisis?

The timing of many trade negotiations is now increasingly uncertain, as are the UK’s plans to host COP26 in November. Policy work continues, however, and the EU has released its draft negotiating text for the new UK-EU trade deal, which includes a sub-chapter specifically devoted to climate. 

This is a timely reminder both of the pressing need for the UK to integrate its trade and climate policymaking and to use the current crisis-induced breathing space in international negotiations - however limited - to catch up on both strategy and priorities on this critical policy intersection.

The UK government has moved fast to reset its external trade relations post-Brexit. In the past month it formally launched bilateral negotiations with the EU and took up a seat at the World Trade Organization (WTO) as an independent member. Until the COVID-19 crisis hit, negotiations were also poised to start with the US.

The UK is also in the climate spotlight as host of COP26, the most important international climate negotiation since Paris in 2015, which presents a vital opportunity for the government to show leadership by aligning its trade agenda with its climate and sustainability commitments in bold new ways.

Not just an empty aspiration

This would send a signal that ‘Global Britain’ is not just an empty aspiration, but a concrete commitment to lead.

Not only is concerted action on the climate crisis a central priority for UK citizens, a growing and increasingly vocal group of UK businesses committed to decarbonization are calling on the government to secure a more transparent and predictable international market place that supports climate action by business.

With COP26, the UK has a unique responsibility to push governments to ratchet up ambition in the national contributions to climate action – and to promote coherence between climate ambition and wider economic policymaking, including on trade. If Britain really wants to lead, here are some concrete actions it should take.

At the national level, the UK can pioneer new ways to put environmental sustainability – and climate action in particular - at the heart of its trade agenda. Achieving the government’s ambitious Clean Growth Strategy - which seeks to make the UK the global leader in a range of industries including electric cars and offshore wind – should be a central objective of UK trade policy.

The UK should re-orient trade policy frameworks to incentivize the shift toward a more circular and net zero global economy. And all elements of UK trade policy could be assessed against environmental objectives - for example, their contribution to phasing out fossil fuels, helping to reverse overexploitation of natural resources, and support for sustainable agriculture and biodiversity.

In its bilateral and regional trade negotiations, the UK can and should advance its environment, climate and trade goals in tandem, and implementation of the Paris Agreement must be a core objective of the UK trade strategy.

A core issue for the UK is how to ensure that efforts to decarbonise the economy are not undercut by imports from high-carbon producers. Here, a ‘border carbon adjustment (BCA)’ - effectively a tax on the climate pollution of imports - would support UK climate goals. The EU draft negotiating text released yesterday put the issue of BCAs front and centre, making crystal clear that the intersection of climate, environment and trade policy goals will be a central issue for UK-EU trade negotiations.

Even with the United States, a trade deal can and should still be seized as a way to incentivize the shift toward a net zero and more circular economy. At the multilateral level, as a new independent WTO member, the UK has an opportunity to help build a forward-looking climate and trade agenda.

The UK could help foster dialogue, research and action on a cluster of ‘climate and trade’ issues that warrant more focused attention at the WTO. These include the design of carbon pricing policies at the border that are transparent, fair and support a just transition; proposals for a climate waiver for WTO rules; and identification of ways multilateral trade cooperation could promote a zero carbon and more circular global economy.  

To help nudge multilateral discussion along, the UK could also ask to join a critical ‘path finder’ effort by six governments, led by New Zealand, to pursue an agreement on climate change, trade and sustainability (ACCTS). This group aims to find ways forward on three central trade and climate issues: removing fossil fuel subsidies, climate-related labelling, and promoting trade in climate-friendly goods and services.

At present, the complex challenges at the intersection of climate, trade and development policy are too often used to defer or side-step issues deemed ‘too hard’ or ‘too sensitive’ to tackle. The UK could help here by working to ensure multilateral climate and trade initiatives share adjustment burdens, recognise the historical responsibility of developed countries, and do not unfairly disadvantage developing countries - especially the least developed.

Many developing countries are keen to promote climate-friendly exports as part of wider export diversification strategies  and want to reap greater returns from greener global value chains. Further, small island states and least-developed countries – many of which are Commonwealth members – that are especially vulnerable to the impacts of climate change and natural disasters, need support to adapt in the face of trade shocks and to build climate-resilient, trade-related infrastructure and export sectors.

As an immediate next step, the UK should actively support the growing number of WTO members in favour of a WTO Ministerial Statement on environmental sustainability and trade. It should work with its key trading partners in the Commonwealth and beyond to ensure the agenda is inclusive, supports achievement of the UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) and helps developing countries benefit from a more environmentally sustainable global economy.

As the UK prepares to host COP26, negotiates deals with the EU and US, and prepares for its first WTO Ministerial meeting as an independent member, it must show it can lead the way nationally, bilaterally, and multilaterally. And to ensure the government acts, greater engagement from the UK’s business, civil society and research sectors is critical – we need all hands on deck to forge and promote concrete proposals for aligning UK trade policy with the climate ambition our world needs.

Summary

• Many social and political issues have so far been neglected in planning for the circular economy transition. This paper aims to redress this by considering how ‘just transition’ and social equity may be achieved through policy and practice.
• The prevailing economic model is linear, in that resources are extracted, transformed into products, used, and finally discarded. In contrast, the circular economy recognizes that natural resources are finite, and aims to keep the materials in products in circulation for as long as possible: reusing, repairing, remanufacturing, sharing and recycling. While the concept of the circular economy is largely focused on developing new technologies and businesses to enable keeping materials in circulation, it also includes the notions of ‘designing out’ waste, substituting renewable materials for non-renewable ones, and restoring natural systems.
• The UN 2030 Agenda demonstrates that environmental, social and economic sustainability objectives cannot be separated. As the links between the environmental issues of climate change, overconsumption of resources and waste generation, and social issues of inequality and the future of work become increasingly obvious, the urgency to connect environmental with social justice is gaining in significance. The language of ‘just transition’ – a transition that ensures environmental sustainability, decent work, social inclusion and poverty eradication – has started to penetrate debates and research on sustainability policy, particularly in the contexts of climate change and low-carbon energy transition.
• A just transition framework for the circular economy can identify opportunities that reduce waste and stimulate product innovation, while at the same time contributing positively to sustainable human development. And a just transition is needed to reduce inequalities within and between countries, and to ensure that the commitment of the UN Sustainable Development Goals to leave no one behind is fulfilled.
• It is important to identify the likely impacts on employment as a result of digitalization and industrial restructuring. Combining circular economy policies with social protection measures will be important in order to ensure that the burden of efforts to promote circularity will not fall on the poor through worsening working conditions and health impacts, reduced livelihoods, or job losses. Identifying potential winners and losers through participatory ‘roadmapping’ can help shape effective cooperation mechanisms and partnerships nationally and internationally.
• Many low- and middle-income countries that rely heavily on ‘linear’ sectors such as mining, manufacturing of non-repairable fast-moving consumer goods, textiles and agriculture, and the export of these commodities to higher-income countries, are likely to be negatively affected by the shift to circularity. These countries will need support from the international community through targeted assistance programmes if international trade in established commodities and manufactures declines in the medium to long term. 
• International cooperation to create effective and fair governance mechanisms, and policy coordination at regional, national and local levels will play an important role in shaping a just transition. Multilateral technical assistance programmes will need to be designed and implemented, in particular to support low- and middle-income countries.
• Governments, international development finance institutions and banks are among the bodies beginning to establish circular economy investment funds and programmes. Just transition principles are yet to be applied to many of these new finance mechanisms, and will need to be integrated into development finance to support the circular economy transition.
• New international cooperation programmes, and a global mechanism to mobilize dedicated support funds for countries in need, will be critical to successful implementation across global value chains. Transparent and accountable institutions will also be important in ensuring that just transition funds reach those affected as intended.

The world is currently witnessing how vulnerable existing production and consumption systems are, with the current global health crisis harshly exposing the magnitude of the risks associated with the global economy in its current form, grounded, as it is, in a linear system that uses a ‘take–make–throw away’ approach.

These ‘linear risks’ associated with the existing global supply chain system are extremely high for national economies overly dependent on natural resource extraction and exports of commodities like minerals and metals. Equally vulnerable are countries with large manufacturing sectors of ready-made garments and non-repairable consumer goods for western markets. Furthermore, workers and communities working in these sectors are vulnerable to these changes as a result of disruptive technologies and reduced demand.

In a recently published Chatham House research paper, ‘Promoting a Just Transition to an Inclusive Circular Economy’, we highlight why a circular economy approach presents the world with a solution to old and new global risks – from marine plastic pollution to climate change and resource scarcity.

Taking the long view

So far, action to transition to a circular economy has been slow compared to the current crisis which has mobilized rapid global action. For proponents of transitioning to a circular economy, this requires taking the long view. The pandemic has shown us that global emergencies can fast-forward processes that otherwise might take years, even decades, to play out or reverse achievements which have taken years to accomplish.

In this vein, there are three striking points of convergence between the COVID-19 pandemic and the need to transition to an inclusive circular economy.

Firstly, the current crisis is a stark reminder that the circular economy is not only necessary to ensure long-term resource security but also short-term supplies of important materials. In many cities across the US, the UK and Europe, councils have suspended recycling to focus on essential waste collection services. The UK Recycling Association, for example, has warned about carboard shortages due to disrupted recycling operations with possible shortages for food and medicine packaging on the horizon.

Similarly, in China, most recycling sites were shut during the country’s lockdown presenting implications for global recycling markets with additional concerns that there will be a fibre shortage across Europe and possibly around the world.

Furthermore, worldwide COVID-19 lockdowns are resulting in a resurgence in the use of single-use packaging creating a new wave of plastic waste especially from food deliveries – already seen in China – with illegal waste fly-tipping dramatically increasing in the UK since the lockdown.

In this vein, concerns over the current global health crisis is reversing previous positive trends where many cities had established recycling schemes and companies and consumers had switched to reusable alternatives.

Secondly, the need to improve the working conditions of the people working in the informal circular economy, such as waste pickers and recyclers, is imperative. Many waste materials and recyclables that are being handled and collected may be contaminated as a result of being mixed with medical waste.

Now, more than ever, key workers in waste management, collection and recycling require personal protective equipment and social protection to ensure their safety as well as the continuation of essential waste collection so as not to increase the potential for new risks associated with additional infectious diseases.

In India, almost 450 million workers including construction workers, street vendors and landless agricultural labourers, work in the informal sector. In the current climate, the poorest who are unable to work pose a great risk to the Indian economy which could find itself having to shut down.

Moreover, many informal workers live in make-shift settlements areas such as Asia’s largest slum, Dharavi in Mumbai, where health authorities are now facing serious challenges to contain the spread of the disease. Lack of access to handwashing and sanitation facilities, however, further increase these risks but circular, decentralized solutions could make important contributions to sustainable sanitation, health and improved community resilience.

Thirdly, it is anticipated that in the long term several global supply chains will be radically changed as a result of transformed demand patterns and the increase in circular practices such as urban mining for the recovery and recycling of metals or the reuse and recycling of textile fibres and localized additive manufacturing (e.g. 3D printing).

Many of these supply chains and trade flows have now been already severely disrupted due to the COVID-19 pandemic. For example, the global garment industry has been particularly hard-hit due to the closure of outlets amid falling demand for apparel.

It is important to note, workers at the bottom of these garment supply chains are among the most vulnerable and most affected by the crisis as global fashion brands, for example, have been cancelling orders – in the order of $6 billion in the case of Bangladesh alone. Only after intense negotiations are some brands assuming financial responsibility in the form of compensation wage funds to help suppliers in Myanmar, Cambodia and Bangladesh to pay workers during the ongoing crisis.

In addition, the current pandemic is damaging demand for raw materials thereby affecting mining countries. Demand for Africa’s commodities in China, for example, has declined significantly, with the impact on African economies expected to be serious, with 15 per cent of the world’s copper and 20 per cent of the world’s zinc mines currently going offline. 

A further threat is expected to come from falling commodity prices as a result of the curtailment of manufacturing activity in China particularly for crude oil, copper, iron ore and other industrial commodities which, in these cases, will have direct impacts on the Australian and Canadian mining sectors.

This is all being compounded by an associated decline in consumer demand worldwide. For example, many South African mining companies – leading producers of metals and minerals – have started closing their mining operations following the government’s announcement of a lockdown in order to prevent the transmission of the virus among miners who often work in confined spaces and in close proximity with one another. As workers are laid off due to COVID-19, there are indications that the mining industry will see fast-tracking towards automated mining operations. 

All of these linear risks that have been exposed through the COVID-19 pandemic reinforce the need for a just transition to a circular economy. But while the reduction in the consumption of resources is necessary to achieve sustainability, the social impacts on low- and middle- income countries and their workers requires international support mechanisms.

In addition, the current situation also highlights the need to find a new approach to globalized retail chains and a balance between local and global trade based on international cooperation across global value chains rather than implementation of trade protectionist measures.

In this vein, all of the recovery plans from the global COVID-19 pandemic need to be aligned with the principles of an inclusive circular economy in order to ensure both short-term and long-term resilience and preparedness for future challenges and disruptions.  

With the Asian Development Bank estimating that the COVID-19 outbreak’s global cost could reach $4.1 trillion and the OECD warning that the shock caused by the pandemic is already greater than the financial crisis of 2007, the global economic impact of the health emergency is not only vast but also unpredictable. The disruption to a number of industries and sectors including, but not limited to, the airline and energy industries, could result in long-term damage to global trade flows, supply and demand. But does the pandemic also present an opportunity to build sustainable economies that can cope with such threats?

This panel will explore the ways in which the coronavirus outbreak has highlighted vulnerabilities in global systems and what this might mean for a transition towards a sustainable economy. How do we explain the failure of businesses and governments to prepare for systemic shocks and the lack of resilience in global structures and models? How should governments prepare to reshape policy, business practices and societal behaviour to better tackle climate change while addressing the current emergency? And might the emergency offer opportunities to kick start a sustainable path towards a greener future?

This event is part of a fortnightly series of 'Business in Focus' webinars reflecting on the impact of COVID-19 on areas of particular professional interest for our corporate members and giving circles.

Not a corporate member? Find out more.

The pressure of the coronavirus pandemic is adding to a widely held misconception that trade in food products is bad for the environment due to the associated ‘food miles’ – the carbon footprint of agricultural products transported over long distances.

This concept, developed by large retailers a decade ago, is often invoked as a rationale for restricting trade and choosing locally-produced food over imports. Consuming local food may seem sensible at first glance as it reduces the carbon footprint of goods and generates local employment. 

However, this assumption ignores the emissions produced during the production, processing or storage stages which often dwarf transport emissions. Other avenues to address the climate change impact of trade are more promising.

Demystifying food emissions

In the US, for example, food items travel more than 8,000 km on average before reaching the consumer. Yet transport only accounts for 11 per cent of total emissions with 83 per cent – mostly nitrous oxide (N2O) and methane (CH4) emissions – occurring at the production stage.

US Department of Agriculture data on energy use in the American food system echoes this finding, showing that processing, packaging, and selling of food represent ten times the energy used to transport food.

In practice, it may be preferable from an environmental perspective to consume lamb, onion or dairy products transported by sea because the lower emissions generated at the production stage offset those resulting from transport. Similarly, growing tomatoes under heated greenhouses in Sweden is often more emissions-intensive than importing open-grown ones from Southern Europe.

Seasonality also matters. British apples placed in storage for ten months leads to twice the level of emissions as that of South American apples sea-freighted to the UK. And the type of transport is also important as, overall, maritime transport generates 25 to 250 times less emissions than trucks, and air freight generates on average five times more emissions than road transport.

Therefore, air-freighted Kenyan beans have a much larger carbon footprint than those produced in the UK, but crossing Europe by truck to import Italian wine might generate more emissions than transatlantic shipments.

Finally, one should take into account the last leg of transport. A consumer driving more than 10 km to purchase 1 kg of fresh produce will generate proportionately more greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions than air-freighting 1 kg of produce from Kenya.

Shifting consumption towards local foods may reduce GHG emissions in sectors with relatively low emissions intensities but, when non-carbon dioxide emissions are taken into account, this is more often the exception than the rule.

Under these circumstances, preventing trade is an inefficient and expensive way of reducing GHG emissions. Bureau et al. for example, calculate that a global tariff maintaining the volume of trade at current levels until 2030 may reduce global carbon dioxide emissions by 3.5 per cent. However, this would be roughly seven times less than the full implementation of the Paris Agreement and cost equivalent to the current GDP of Brazil or 1.8 per cent of world GDP.

By preventing an efficient use of resources, such restrictions would also undermine the role of trade in offsetting possible climate-induced production shortfalls in some parts of the world and allowing people to access food when they can’t produce it themselves.

Reducing the climate footprint of trade

This is not to say that nothing should be done to tackle transport emissions. The OECD estimates that international trade-related freight accounted for over 5 per cent of total global fuel emissions with shipping representing roughly half of it, trucks 40 per cent, air 6 per cent and rail 2 per cent. With the projected tripling of freight transport by 2050, emissions from shipping are expected to rise between 50 and 250 per cent.

Furthermore, because of their international nature, these emissions are not covered by the Paris Agreement. Instead the two UN agencies regulating these sectors – the International Civil Aviation Organization and the International Maritime Organization – are responsible for reducing these emissions and, so far, significant progress has proven elusive.

Regional or bilateral free trade agreements to further stimulate trade could address this problem by exploiting comparative advantages. Impact assessments of those agreements often point towards increases in GHG emissions due to a boost in trade flows. In the future, such agreements could incorporate – or develop in parallel – initiatives to ensure carbon neutrality by connecting carbon markets among contracting parties or by taxing international maritime and air transport emissions.

Such initiatives could be combined with providing additional preferences in the form of enhanced market access to low-carbon food and healthier food. The EU, as one of the chief proponents of bilateral and regional trade agreements and a leader in promoting a transition to a low-carbon economy could champion such an approach.

This article is part of a series from the Chatham House Global Trade Policy Forum, designed to promote research and policy recommendations on the future of global trade. It is adapted from the research paper, Delivering Sustainable Food and Land Use Systems: The Role of International Trade, authored by Christophe Bellmann, Bernice Lee and Jonathan Hepburn.

The Lancet Commission on Palliative Care and Pain Relief estimated that in 2015, 61 million people experienced serious health-related suffering (SHS) that could have been ameliorated by palliative care. A large proportion of this burden – more than 80 per cent – fell on low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) despite an essential package of palliative care and pain relief services being cost-effective and affordable. As the director general of the World Health Organization (WHO) argues, there cannot be UHC without palliative care and thus, closing this coverage gap should be a top priority for the global UHC movement.

The Centre on Global Health Security at Chatham House, building on the momentum of the Lancet Commission, is hosting a roundtable focused on the global unmet need for palliative care and effective pain relief. The primary purpose of this roundtable is to convene leading experts, palliative care service users and advocates with key figures from the UHC movement and global health to highlight the importance of prioritizing this vital part of the continuum of care in UHC reform processes. The roundtable will serve as a scholarly discourse in translating the recommendations of the Lancet Commission into concrete actions, focusing on the political and economic dimensions.

Chatham House, in partnership with the European Centre for Development Policy Management (ECDPM), convened leading experts and key stakeholders to consider how the system of global institutions that provide aid and finance, global public goods and technical assistance to low-income countries can be better aligned to support the realization of SDG 2 in the context of those countries’ own efforts with a focus on SDGs 2.3 and 2.4.

This meeting aimed to contribute to an outcome-oriented food and agricultural aid development system; create greater understanding of the comparative advantages of key institutions, areas of duplication or inefficiency and gaps; identify topics for further research and analysis; and identify key near-term political moments to focus the community and catalyze steps towards change.

The Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, chaired by Jim O’Neill, was commissioned by former UK prime minister, David Cameron, in July 2014. Supported by the UK government and the Wellcome Trust, the final report of the review was published in May 2016 and has had a global impact in terms of motivating political leaders and decision-makers to take more seriously the threat posed by antimicrobial resistance.

Yet there is now a perception that the political momentum to address the issue is waning and needs to be reinvigorated.

In a further report produced by Chatham House, the progress of the recommendations of the review is assessed and the key ways to move forward are identified.

Panellists at this event, where highlights of the report are presented, provide their assessment of the progress so far and discuss priorities for future action.

The report was funded by Wellcome.

England and Australia are considered standard-bearers of universal access to health services, with the former’s National Health Service (NHS) recognized as a global brand and the latter’s Medicare seen as a leader in the Asia-Pacific region. However, through the exclusion of migrant and refugee groups, each is failing to deliver true universality in their health services. These exclusions breach both their own national policies and of international commitments they have made.

While the marginalization of mobile populations is not a new phenomenon, in recent years there has been a global increase in anti-migrant rhetoric, and such health care exclusions reflect a global trend in which undocumented migrants, refugees and asylum seekers are denied rights.

They are also increasingly excluded in the interpretation of phrases such as ‘leave no one behind’ and ‘universal health coverage’, commonly used by UN bodies and member states, despite explicit language in UN declarations that commits countries to include mobile groups.

Giving all people – including undocumented migrants and asylum seekers – access to health care is essential not just for the health of the migrant groups but also the public health of the populations that host them. In a world with almost one billion people on the move, failing to take account of such mobility leaves services ill-equipped and will result in missed early and preventative treatment, an increased burden on services and a susceptibility to the spread of infectious disease.

England

While in the three other nations of the UK, the health services are accountable to the devolved government, the central UK government is responsible for the NHS in England, where there are considerably greater restrictions in access.

Undocumented migrants and refused asylum seekers are entitled to access all health care services if doctors deem it clinically urgent or immediately necessary to provide it. However, the Home Office’s ‘hostile environment’ policies towards undocumented migrants, implemented aggressively and without training for clinical staff, are leading to the inappropriate denial of urgent and clearly necessary care.

One example is the case of Elfreda Spencer, whose treatment for myeloma was delayed for one year, allowing the disease to progress, resulting in her death.

In England, these policies, which closely link health care and immigration enforcement, are also deterring people from seeking health care they are entitled to. For example, medical bills received by migrants contain threats to inform immigration enforcement of their details if balances are not cleared in a certain timeframe. Of particular concern, the NGO Maternity Action has demonstrated that such a link to immigration officials results in the deterrence of pregnant women from seeking care during their pregnancy.

Almost all leading medical organizations in the United Kingdom have raised concerns about these policies, highlighting the negative impact on public health and the lack of financial justification for their implementation. Many have highlighted that undocument migrants use just and estimated 0.3% of the NHS budget and have pointed to international evidence that suggests that restrictive health care policies may cost the system more.

Australia

In Australia, all people who seek refuge by boat are held, and have their cases processed offshore in Papua New Guinea (PNG) and Nauru, at a cost of almost A$5 billion between 2013 and 2017. Through this international agreement, in place since 2013, Australia has committed to arrange and pay for the care for the refugees, including health services ‘to a standard of care broadly comparable to that available to the general Australian community under the public health system’.

However, the standard of care made available to the refugees is far from comparable to that available to the general population in Australia. Findings against the current care provision contractor on PNG, Pacific International Hospital, which took over in the last year, are particularly damning.

For instance, an Australian coroner investigating the 2014 death from a treatable leg infection of an asylum seeker held in PNG concluded that the contractor lacked ‘necessary clinical skills’, and provided ‘inadequate’ care. The coroner’s report, issued in 2018, found the company had also, in other cases, denied care, withheld pain relief, distributed expired medication and had generally poor standards of care, with broken or missing equipment and medication, and services often closed when they were supposed to be open.

This has also been reiterated by the Royal Australasian College of Physicians, which has appealed to the Australian government to end its policies of offshore processing immediately, due to health implications for asylum seekers. This echoes concerns of the medical community around the government’s ongoing attempts to repeal the ‘Medivac’ legislation, which enables emergency medical evacuation from PNG and Nauru.

Bad policy

Both governments have signed up to UN Sustainable Development Goals commitment to ‘safe and orderly migration’, an essential component of which is access to health care. The vision for this was laid out in a global action plan on promoting the health of refugees and migrants, agreed by member states at the 2019 World Health Assembly.

However, rather than allow national policies to be informed by such international plans and the evidence put forward by leading health professionals and medical organizations, the unsubstantiated framing of migrants as a security risk and economic burden has curtailed migrant and refugee access to health care.

The inclusion of migrants and refugees within universal access to health services is not merely a matter of human rights. Despite being framed as a financial burden, ensuring access for all people may reduce costs on health services through prevention of costly later-stage medical complications, increased transmission of infections and inefficient administrative costs of determining eligibility.

Thailand provides an example of a middle-income country that recognized this, successfully including all migrants and refugees in its health reforms in 2002. Alongside entitling all residents to join the universal coverage scheme, the country also ensured that services were ‘migrant friendly’, including through the provision of translators. A key justification for the approach was the economic benefit of ensuring a healthy migrant population, including the undocumented population.

The denial of quality health services to refugees and undocumented migrants is a poor policy choice. Governments may find it tempting to gain political capital through excluding these groups, but providing adequate access to health services is part of both governments’ commitments made at the national and international levels. Not only are inclusive health services feasible to implement and good for the health of migrants and refugees, in the long term, they are safer for public health and may save money.

Air pollution has been classified as a cancer-causing agent with evidence showing an increased risk of lung cancer associated with increasing levels of exposure to outdoor air pollution and particulate matter.

Air pollution is also known to increase risks for other diseases, especially respiratory and heart diseases, and studies show that levels of exposure to air pollution have increased significantly in some parts of the world - mostly in rapidly industrializing countries with large populations.

In coordination with London Global Cancer Week partner organizations, this event outlines the evidence linking air pollution and cancer rates in London and other major cities.

Panellists provide a 360° picture of the impact of the rising incidence of cancer across the world, the challenges the cancer pandemic poses to the implementation of universal health coverage and the existing UK contribution to strengthening capacity in cancer management and research in developing countries.

African policymakers face a dilemma when it comes to COVID-19. The first hope is to prevent the virus from gaining a foothold at all, and many African states have significant experience of managing infectious disease outbreaks. The establishment of the Africa Centre for Disease Control highlights the hugely increased focus on public health in recent years.

But capacities to track, test and isolate vary wildly, notably between neighbours with porous and poorly controlled borders and, in most cases, sustained national-level disease control is difficult. Initial clusters of COVID-19 cases are already established in many places, but a lack of testing capacity makes it hard to know the full extent of transmission.

It is not obvious what African states should do as a response. Lack of information about COVID-19 means the proportion of asymptomatic or mild cases is not known, still less the ways in which this is influenced by human geography and demographics.

Africa is an overwhelmingly young continent with a median age under 20. But it also faces chronic malnutrition, which may weaken immune responses, and infectious diseases such as malaria, TB and HIV are widespread which could worsen the impact of COVID-19, particularly if treatment for these diseases is interrupted.

Complex and unknown

Ultimately, how all these factors interact with COVID-19 is complex and remains largely unknown. Africa may escape with a relatively light toll. Or it could be hit harder than anywhere else.

What is clear, however, is that cost of simply following the rest of the world into lockdown could be high. Africa is relatively rural but has higher populations living in informal settlements than anywhere in the world. Many live in cramped and overcrowded accommodation without clean water or reliable electricity, making handwashing a challenge and working from home impossible.

And the benefits appear limited. The goal of lockdowns in most places is not to eliminate the virus but to accept the economic and social costs as a price worth paying in order to ‘flatten the curve’ of infection and protect healthcare systems from being overwhelmed. But this logic does not hold when many of Africa’s healthcare systems are barely coping with pre-coronavirus levels of disease.

Africa suffers in comparison to much of the rest of the world in terms of access to quality and affordable healthcare, critical care beds and specialist personnel. For example, in 2017, Nigeria had just 120 ICU beds for a country of 200 million, equating to 0.07 per 100,000 inhabitants compared to 12.5 per 100,000 in Italy and 3.6 per 100,000 in China.

The pandemic’s ruinous economic impacts could also be more acute for Africa than anywhere else. The continent is highly vulnerable to potential drops in output and relies heavily on demand from China and Europe. Many states are already facing sharply falling natural resource revenues, and investment, tourism and remittances will suffer - all on top of a high existing debt burden.

Analysis by the World Bank shows that Africa will likely face its first recession in 25 years, with the continental economy contracting by up to 5.1% in 2020. Africa will have scant financial ammunition to use in the fight against COVID-19 with currencies weakening, food prices rising, local agri-food supply chains disrupted and food imports likely to decrease as well. A food security emergency appears a strong possibility.

So, although several states have imposed national lockdowns and others closed major urban centres, lockdowns are difficult to manage and sustain, especially in places where the daily hustle of the informal sector or subsistence agriculture are the only means of survival and where the state has neither the trust of the population nor the capacity to replace lost earnings or meet basic needs.

Of course, this is not simply a binary choice between lockdown or no lockdown - a range of intermediate options exist, such as some restriction on movement, curfews, shutting places of worship, banning only large gatherings, or closing pubs, schools and borders.

A significant number of African states have so far taken this middle path. This will not prevent the virus from spreading nor, in all probability, be enough to ensure adequate healthcare for all Africans infected with COVID-19. But it may help slow the spread and buy invaluable time for African states and partners to prepare.

How this time is used is therefore of paramount importance. Popular trust in the state is low in many African countries so strategies must empower communities, not alienate them. Africa’s experience of previous epidemics and long traditions of collective resilience and community-based crisis response - which persist in many places – are significant strengths.

The right messages must be carried by the right messengers, and policies - including cash transfers and food distribution - implemented sensitively. If not, or if responses become militarized, public consent is unlikely to be sustained for long.