Liberia- 1st- Environment & climate change

By Daniel Morris | 31. October 2025

CHAPTER TWO: SITUATIONAL ANALYSIS:

2.3.4. Environment

Liberia has a strong legal framework for the protection of endangered and rare species, fresh water, and high forest habitats. The Liberian National Biodiversity Conservation Strategy and Action Plan (2020-2025), and the Environmental Protection and Management Act of 2002, detailed the categories of species and the specific need for protection. Penalties for contravention of such laws include fines and/or terms of imprisonment. For example, anyone who commits an offense related to the Environmental Impact Assessment Law in Liberia is liable upon conviction to imprisonment for a period not exceeding 5 years or to a fine not exceeding USD$10,000 or both. These legal frameworks provide avenues for seeking redress in relation to issues of environmental and business and human rights protection.

There are general and specific provisions for the protection of the ecosystems and habitats within current Liberian laws. The requirement to conduct environmental assessments prior to the commencement of development activities is to prevent/mitigate adverse impacts on the specified ecosystems and habitats. National zoning includes protection of high forest areas and important forest corridors, leading to some provisions for where agricultural and forestry activities are developed. Legal provisions for the protection of riparian buffers, steep slopes and extraction and use of water in forests, exist in the current laws. However, these provisions require clarification for agricultural developments. Provisions for the protection of vulnerable soils are still in development. Protections in agricultural developments rely indirectly on the general provisions under environmental impact assessments exercised by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and based on the Environmental Protection and Management Law (EPML)

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The adverse effects of environmental pollution and degradation are threatening lives everywhere. Pollution and environmental degradation constitute a human rights violation in alignment with the UN General Assembly’s recognition of the right to a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment.

Among the chief perpetrators involved in environmental misuse and despoiling the fragile balance in nature are businesses such as logging, manufacturing, commercial agriculture, overfishing, mining, sand/mineral extraction. When such businesses and others remain unregulated, their operations contribute enormously to chronic or long-term illnesses and deaths. International instruments such as the Universal Declaration of Human rights and the African Charter on Human and Peoples Rights clearly express the rights of people to a clean and healthy environment.

The NAPBHR consultations identified the following concerns related to environmental protection:

  1. Encroachment of human settlements into areas of biodiversity, such as mangroves and waterways, has the tendency to harm the fragility of these areas and thereby eventually affect the nature of the human food chain.
  2. Contracting sacred lands out to concessionaires for business operations without communities’ FPIC [free, prior, and informed consent].
  3. Slum settlements round concession areas, and where concession workers largely dwell, lack adequate sanitary facilities and workers depend on open defecation that leads to contagious disease outbreaks, stunting in young children, and other diseases.
  4. Careless discharge of sewage and solid and hazardous wastes in drainages and natural water bodies by businesses.
  5. Many Liberians depend on charcoal and other forms of biomass for cooking and heating, but felling of trees for charcoal production is leading to deforestation that accelerate climate change.
  6. Air and water pollution that results in lack of access to safe and clean drinking water.
  7. Deforestation and related loss of biodiversity.
  8. River sand mining, soil erosion and degradation of soil threaten civil infrastructure and harm marine life.
  9. Environmental degradation by artisanal and small-scale mining (ASM) interests.
  10. Lack of renewable energy strategies in addressing long-term provision of clean energy.
  11. Awarding large-scale land-based and long-tenure concession agreements that undermine community self-sufficiency and close access to their way of life.

CHAPTER THREE: POLICY ACTIONS

3.1. Land and Natural Resources
To address the human rights concerns related to land and natural resources, the government of Liberia intends to do the following:

 a) The State’s Duty to Protect the right to land and natural resources.

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iv. Ensure the conduct of Human Rights Conflict and Environmental Impact Assessment when land is being acquired for development or business purposes.

v. Improve robust legislative oversights as well as its social contract side of effective propeople representation. All multimillion-dollar contracts particularly in the areas of land purchase or lease for mineral and forest resource extraction, as well as for purposes of agricultural plantation formation, shall take a “bottom-to-top” approach, wherein the local inhabitants of counties, districts, and communities, shall be meaningfully consulted. […]  

3.4. Environment and Natural Resources

The following policy action shall be undertaken to address human rights issues related to the environment.

a) Under the State Duty to Protect the Environment, the government commits to the following:

i. Hold public hearings on the Human Rights Conflict and Environmental Impact Assessment conducted when land is conceded for development or business purposes.

ii. Mandate adequate environmental standards at workplaces and closely monitor changes in environmental quality data.

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v. The government shall ensure the conduct of Human Rights, Conflict and Environmental Impact Assessment when land is being acquired for development or business purposes.

vi. The government shall ensure the protection of rights to a clean and safe environment, along with the environmental impact assessment, to avoid human rights violations to occur. Adequate environmental standards at workplaces shall be strongly mandated and changes in environmental quality data shall be closely monitored.

vii. For environmental hazards and workplace safety standards, there shall be periodic monitoring and inspection of company premises, operations, and surroundings of manufacturing, construction, and extractive industries, among others, to ascertain compliance with environmental standards.

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b) Under Corporate Responsibility to Respect

Regarding the right to a clean and healthy environment, the following action shall be undertaken:

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ii. Every company shall have a clear, simple, and understandable human rights policy within its value chain that reflects its commitment to promoting human rights in its operations. In specific regard to environmental protection, a given business’ particular policy shall highlight these key concerns: (a) Strategy of a sustainable partnership with their host community that demonstrates how to avoid land, water, and air pollution, and listed steps to be taken when land, water, and air pollution occurs; (b) Framework of collaboration with host communities, specifying methodology and timeline for regular environmental protection sensitization involving the community and other stakeholders.

c) Access to Remedy for Environmental Abuses

i. Enforce compliance with Environmental and Social Impact Assessment (ESIA)

ii. Review and strengthen the polluter-pay principles. iii. Suspend concessions operations and ensure remedial actions for polluters.