We know that most of our governments are not
particularly keen on reaching an ambitious climate goal at the COPS 21
conference starting in Paris to-day. It looks as if once again the conference
will fail to save humanity from the hardships of climate change. As they have
also failed at the Copenhagen Conference in 2009. As they have failed with
their ‘war on terrorism’. As they have failed with the ‘the war on poverty’. As
they have failed with the financial crisis of 2008 …
It is true that all these different and fragmented
goals are not easy to reach, particularly if climate and economic interests
have to balanced, and if in the end financial interests are dominant …
Why do we accept this fragmented way of looking
at things? We know that everything is linked to everything else, and if it is
true that it can hinder to look at particularly urgent matters if we only adopt
a birds’ eye view on problems, it can also help to get priorities right.
Climate justice is often and rightly presented as
being a fundamental matter of social justice. Advocates of this thesis then go on to explain how
it is poor people that will be the first victims of climate change, while
experts will try to distribute the ecological efforts as equitably as possible
over different populations.
One could also take the opposite view. Instead of trying
to find out what and how ecological measures have to be taken to be socially
just, one could also wonder what social measures have to be taken to have
positive ecological results.
I want to argue that the answer might be: social
commons. If framed correctly, they might help to design a policy that cares
for people and for the planet, they might even contribute to change our
economic system. And could they not also help to eradicate terrorism?
Let me try to briefly explain.
Basically, social commons are a democratic and
participative way of organizing social protection. It will be decided on,
conceptualized, implemented and monitored by a political community, at
different levels, with the help of a partner state.
Social protection has to take care of people’s social
needs, which means that very rapidly an equitable implementation of social and
economic rights will be faced with economic problems. How to put into place a
preventive health care system if we allow Coca Cola to produce unhealthy
products, or if we allow Monsanto to produce dangerous pesticides?
The same happens to environmental concerns: how to
achieve a healthy planet if we allow Exxon to pollute the Amazon, or if we
allow rich countries to deforest or introduce monocultures?
Social policies and environmental policies both need
the economic system to change.
But there is more.
Social protection can never be complete if some
environmental rights are not included in the social and economic rights.
Think of the right to water. Or the right to land for farmers.
In other words, reflecting on social policies rapidly
brings you to the necessary environmental rights and the need for systemic
change.
And there still is more. Because we could and should
finally take into account the important lessons of feminist economic theory
that put care in the centre of our concerns. When we do, we see that care, as
well as nature have been externalized by the dominant economic system. Both
have to be brought into a new economic thinking.
In other words: if we start with care, than we see
that the economy, in the first place, has to take care of people’s needs, by
producing the products they need for a healthy life, so that social protection
can take care of their and society’s social needs, whereas environmental policies
have to take care of the planet and of the people.
Social movements have been saying for some time that
climate justice requires the economic system to change. They are right. But do
we have to wait for this or can we start with environmental – and social –
policies in order to change the economic system? I think the second answer is
right and urgent.
We have indeed to start with environmental and with
social policies, not only because there is an urgent need to save humanity from
climate change and to solve people’s problems of health, employment and wages,
housing, etc., but also because it seems to be the most rapid way to tackle the
economy.
Taking feminist economy seriously, putting care at the
centre, the social commons can contribute to systemic change, they can promote
a healthy environment. In fact, social commons promote the sustainability of
life of people, of society and of the planet.
The concept of the commons has re-emerged through the
environmental movements and has then been adopted by social justice movements.
In fact, it opens the way for rapidly promoting climate justice, social justice
and, in the end, also economic justice. Why not try it?
I also mentioned terrorism. While military action
might be necessary to stop the brutal fighting in the Middle East, it is very
clear that a lasting solution can only mean to restore all civil, political,
social, economic and cultural rights, in the North as well as in the South.
Work should urgently be undertaken to promote equality and social convergence.
Globalisation can become a positive force if it stops to promote social dumping
and inequalities. Modernity can be once again an emancipatory force if we undo
its eurocentric and anthropocentric focus. We urgently need progressive
alternatives, other than radical islam. Without serious care for the
environment, without stopping climate change, we can only promote more
conflicts. As the ILO said in 1919: peace is not possible without social
justice. Today we should add: it is not possible without climate justice.
Climate justice, social justice and economic justice
go hand in hand. We should
promote them together, and the social commons offer a perfect entry point to
start the urgent work.
Local Farmers blame rising temperatures on Boko Haram bombs
War propaganda by the Boko Haram terror organization in Nigeria may be producing an usual result with increasing number of local populations convinced that extreme weather conditions experienced in some parts of the country were as a result of bombs set off in the battle between the Nigerian military and the Islamist sect.
Of recent, subsistence farmers in Borno, Yobe, Kebbi, Zamfara and Sokoto States have reportedly lamented rising temperatures, blaming the phenomenon on the frequent bomb explosions arising from the war against terror.
But speaking at a forum on climate change at the Ekiti State University, an environmentalist, Emmanuel Oladapo, described as untrue the notion that wars and bombings carried out against the Boko Haram terror group was responsible for the rising temperatures in the country. He stresses that economic activities were the major cause of extreme weather conditions or the prevailing climatic change.
Speaking further, he said there was no scientific claim identifying bombing as the cause of global warming, adding that the global environment was large enough to accommodate the impact of bombs.
“Economic activities are major contributors to the frequency of the earth’s adjustment and agriculture is not left out on its effect."
According to Oladapo, the country loses between 10 and 20 percent of agricultural produce to climate change. He explained that plants and animals alike were affected mostly by the changes in weather conditions, adding that crops could die as a result of flooding.
“There are two areas that climate can affect agriculture and they are the soil in terms of the temperature and crops in terms of humidity. When the weather is too hot, animals like cattle, sheep and goats will be exposed to stress and possibly abortions. Then, when the rainfall is too much, it may result in flooding and killing the crops and plants because the temperature and humidity conditions have suitable levels for plants and animals,” he said.
Oladapo told local farmers that the choice of crops grown in a given locality should be dictated by the weather conditions of that area. His advice followed a pledge of commitment to Nigeria's agric revolution by the National President of the Seed Entrepreneurs Association of Nigeria (SSEDAN) Mr. Richard Olafare.
Olafare, who is a member of the board of African Seed Association, said that significant progress had been made in the Nigerian seed industry, noting that based on recent efforts to build capacity of seed farmers, adoption rates for seeds moved from 10 to 25 per cent within three years while seed production grew from 4,000 MT in 2011 to 8,000 MT of maize and 12,000MT of rice in 2012.
Climate Change fuels religious conflicts in Nigeria
The Chairman of CAN in the South-East geopolitical zone, Most. Reverend David Eberechukwu, said in the statement that herdsmen were already causing grievous harm to their Christian host communities and that creating such fields would amount to legitimizing terror and empowering Moslem herdsmen to further visit aggressions on southern farmers whose farmlands are routinely invaded with crops destroyed by herdsmen armed with automatic weapons.
Reverend Eberechukwu noted that, "currently, the situation has become unbearable and we have seen Fulani herdsmen invading and terrorizing defenseless Christian farming communities.
“Those agitating for the creation of grazing fields in the south should desist from such agenda and instead seek creative ways to solve this climate change problem that has damaged the once peaceful co-existence between Christians and Moslems."
In the wake of climate change and desertification in the semi-arid northern region, grazing fields in that part of the country are now without grasses, forcing an exodus of herdsmen and their cattle to the South in search of water and pasture. At first, all the cattle ate were grasses but later they were increasingly driven through farmlands by their shepherds. Reports became rife of entire cassava farms, yam and corn fields eaten up by rampaging livestock. No compensation was ever recorded just as little remorse was ever shown by the itinerant herdsmen.
From Delta State to Anambra, Rivers to Imo, and from Ogun to Edo, Oyo to Ondo State all in the South, newspaper accounts abound of bloody clashes between armed herdsmen and farming communities. In the Middle Belt region, particularly Benue, Nasarawa and Plateau States, scores of villages have been attacked and razed down. In 2014 at least 36 farmers were massacred and 7 villages destroyed by herdsmen in an attack on Agatu local government area of Benue State. The killings had occurred barely two days after some herdsmen struck at Ikpele and Okpopolo communities in the state, killing seven farmers and displacing over 6,000 inhabitants.
Last October hundreds of women from four local government areas in Enugu State staged a protest urging government to halt attacks by Fulani herdsmen who they said molest, maim, rape and destroy their farmland and livestocks.
The women from the Anglican Diocese of Enugu North comprising Enugu-North, Enugu-East, Udi and Ezeagu council areas, lamented that the activities of herdsmen remained unchecked by the Federal Police and military even as many farming communities live in perpetual danger.
Three attempts have been made so far in the Nigeria's National Assembly to pass a bill for the creation of the National Grazing Routes and Reserve Commission. The bill seeks the acquisition of lands across the 36 states of Nigeria for the purpose of providing pastures for herdsmen and their cattle. The move has severally been resisted by the Christian South who instead advocate the building of ranches in the north and the employing of irrigation and other climate-mitigation measures to make useful the vast and abundant land in the north.
By Emmanuel Mayah
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