USA – Environment & climate change

Section III: Additional National Action Plan Commitments

Environment, Climate and Just Transitions

“[…] The following commitments are intended to address environmental impacts of business activity and work toward just transitions that addresses displacement, respect for human rights, and access to meaningful livelihoods.

Table 6: Environment, Climate and Just Transitions Commitments

• DFC will update its ESPP by clarifying its clients’ responsibilities in assessing supply chains with high risks of child labor and forced labor, significant health and safety issues, or significant conversion of critical forest areas or critical natural habitat in order to promote due diligence. Through this update, clients will better understand DFC expectations with respect to identifying and managing risks in their supply chains, and DFC will be better positioned to assess supply chain risks to mitigate harm.
• DFC will enhance stakeholder engagement by enabling robust and diverse public comment on proposed policy changes to its ESPP. To ensure that the ESPP revision process is inclusive of a diverse set of stakeholders and interests, DFC will continue to provide sufficient notice and opportunities for public comment on changes to its ESPP.
• DRL, through the Office of Global Programs and Initiatives, will award grants for work related to just transitions, focusing on the nexus of climate and labor rights. Climate change has affected labor rights worldwide, including through the loss of agricultural land, pollution, heat, and reduced occupational safety and health standards. The grants will be aimed at supporting projects that address the nexus of climate and labor rights such as programs to assist workers to adapt and to learn new skills needed as companies adopt greener technology to address climate issues and carbon emissions.
• USTR will advance environmental sustainability at home and abroad by prioritizing trade policies that are resilient, sustainable, and inclusive in the implementation of its framework to advance environmental sustainability. USTR will leverage trade policy tools and associated cooperation to advance environmental sustainability and support mitigating the impact of the climate crisis on underserved and overburdened communities, including by pressing trade partners to continually reassess domestic policies to ensure they provide for high levels of environmental protection.
• State, in partnership with the U.S. Department of Agricultures’ Forest Service, will implement a program in Free Trade Agreement (FTA) partner countries to increase capacity at seed banks and nurseries to promote women’s leadership and expertise. This project, Safeguarding the Future: Promoting Gender Equity and Equality and Climate Action Through Seed Banks and Nurseries, will provide opportunities for women through training, education, and networking. The project will enhance the implementation of climate adaptation measures through nature-based solutions and further women’s technical knowledge and transferable skills to provide them advancement opportunities in existing seed banks or nurseries and/or help them to start their own enterprises.
• State, through its embassies and its Bureau of Oceans and International Environmental and Scientific Affairs’ (OES’) Office of Environmental Quality (ENV), will engage in outreach aimed at increasing civic participation in the environmental submissions mechanisms established by FTAs and operated in connection with FTAs’ secretariats on environmental enforcement matters. State’s ENV and its embassies located in relevant FTA partner countries – Colombia, Costa Rica, El Salvador, Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, Panama, Peru, and the Dominican Republic – will find innovative ways to disseminate information on existing environmental submissions mechanisms and will explore opportunities to build capacity in underserved communities (e.g., rural regions, ethnic minorities, communities with low and no Internet connectivity) so they are aware these mechanisms exist and understand their use. The secretariats and related submissions processes promote the effective enforcement of environmental laws, provide an opportunity for civic participation in environmental decision-making, and promote transparency in environmental governance.
• USAID will elevate the role of workers, unions, and community leaders in just transition initiatives and work with partners to ensure labor organizations, trade unions, and impacted communities meaningfully participate in energy transition planning. USAID will support partners to pursue ambitious and equitable mitigation efforts to advance just transitions that will have economic, health, ecological, and social benefits. Such mitigation efforts will use an inclusive approach that empowers a broad range of stakeholders, including the labor movement and marginalized and underrepresented groups, to ensure shared and sustained outcomes as well as limit any negative impacts.
• OES, through its informal interagency working group to reduce violence against environmental defenders, will hold a series of meetings to identify and disseminate good business and investment practices that can reduce and, ideally, prevent violence against environmental defenders. These meetings will include relevant stakeholders including members from civil society organizations and businesses. The identified good business and investment practices will ultimately be shared within the USG.
• HHS’s Office on Trafficking in Persons (OTIP) in the Administration for Children and Families (ACF) will develop a microlearning module tailored for ACF grant recipients, which provides information about administrative flexibilities available to respond and recover from climate-mediated events and other natural disasters. The microlearning will also give considerations for implementing programs through an environmental justice lens (e.g. developing a meaningful, demonstrable, and ethical outreach plan to address the impact of climate change on trafficking risk and vulnerability within underserved communities).
• OTIP will refresh SOAR Disaster Management: Preventing and Responding to Human Trafficking for the broader anti-trafficking field based on emergent insights. This online training module equips disaster management professionals with the information and resources they need to prevent, identify, and respond to human trafficking during and after disasters or emergencies, including mitigating forced labor during recovery and reconstruction efforts.” (p.33-36)