22 May, 2015Climate change is a difficult and urgent challenge. Either a Just Transition to a socially and environmentally sustainable economy is achieved; or there will be a last-minute scramble for water, fertile land, and other resources.
Climate justice will require government commitments to sustainable industrial policies and sound social programs. The labour movement will put pressure on national leaders to deliver a fair, ambitious and binding global climate policy in the public interest. This is about preventing climate catastrophe, but also about the greening of millions of existing jobs and the creation of millions of new, sustainable, jobs while managing the transition period fairly.
Governments are discussing early drafts of a climate deal to be adopted in December at the 21st Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP21). It is crucial to start a path towards de-carbonising the economy in 2015 if global warming is to be limited to 2 Cº above pre-industrial levels.
Working closely with the ITUC, IndustriALL affiliates are asked to put their weight behind a week of action, during the first week of June, to lobby governments to commit to a deal in Paris at COP21
At its recent meeting, 19-21 May in Stockholm, Sweden, IndustriALL Global Union's Executive Committee members re-affirmed IndustriALL's committment to fighting for climate justice.
IndustriALL general secretary Jyrki Raina says:
Climate change threatens everything the labour movement stands for: fairness; social justice; decent work. The science is unequivocal. The need for action to limit climate disruption – no longer prevent, but limit – is clear, and urgent.