Declaration *
Moroccan youth committed to fight climate change
Rabat
Saturday 30 October 2021

 

We, Moroccan youth and civil society dynamics active in the environmental, sustainable development and human rights fields;

Following our participation in the youth meeting organized by the National Human Rights Council (CNDH) at the headquarters of the Rabat Driss Benzekri Institute for Human Rights in Rabat, Kingdom of Morocco;

Stressing the importance of our meeting, held on the eve of the COP26 which is seen as a last chance to prevent the catastrophic consequences of climate change:

Fully aware of the challenges and threats posed by climate change and the urgent need to mobilize youth as a major contributor to climate action and as a lever for change that would contribute to tackling climate change, protecting biodiversity, and accelerating efforts to achieve sustainable development goals and the African Development Agenda 2063;

Fully aware of urgent need for action, especially within a context marked by the exacerbation of climate change repercussions, including floods, forest fires and severe drought seasons in both rich and poor countries alike, which clearly revealed that commitments taken are not enough to limit global warming at 1.5 degrees Celsius;

Mindful of the need to increase mobilization to induce countries and governments to implement courageous and balanced commitments aimed at reducing use of coal and fossil fuels, ending illegal logging, financing energy transition efforts, increasing climate finance, and committing to provide the aid that was promised by industrialized countries to countries most affected by climate change;

Strongly believing that climate change impacts are posing major challenges with regard to the effective enjoyment of human rights, especially for young people, as they are the generation that will suffer from all the repercussions of climate change;

Believing that human rights must be placed at the center of public policies in the field of climate change, in order to ensure sustainability of results;

Inspired by international conventions and agreements on the environment, especially the Paris Agreement, which affirms the importance of human rights and states that parties, when taking measures and initiatives to tackle climate change, should respect, promote and take into account their human rights obligations, such as the right to health, migrants, children and persons with disabilities rights, the right to development, as well the needs of people in vulnerable situations, gender equality, women’s empowerment, intergenerational equity and other rights;

Guided by the recent resolution 48/13 of the United Nations Human Rights Council, which recognizes, for the first time, that having a clean, healthy and sustainable environment is indeed a human right, and calls on states to work together with all stakeholders to effectively implement this right;

Emphasizing the urgency of climate action, especially in light of the renewed and intensified crises facing humanity, such as the current Covid-19 crisis, which impose to objectively examine realities in order to imagine solutions, approaches and mechanisms to fight against their impacts;

Recognizing the urgent and immediate need to improve youth’s role as change makers, and taking into account the fact that the various dimensions of crises necessarily include a complex environmental dimension which is intertwined with development;

We reaffirm our common will to work together with all concerned stakeholders to:

Advocacy:

Strengthen advocacy to build youth’s capacities in mitigation and adaptation to the effects of climate change by investing in environmental education for younger generations;

Entrench environmental rights, raise awareness about them, and develop educational approaches to enhance individuals and societies behavior, in order to establish a paradigm shift that would ensure the sustainability of the results;

Inclusion and integration:

Ensure youth involvement and inclusion in debates on environmental issues at the national, regional and international levels;

Encourage the creation of youth platforms to communicate and exchange views, experiences and best practices; examine challenges and access information and data that will allow them to improve their understanding of the challenges and threats.

Enhance youth’s participation in monitoring public environmental and sustainable development policies;

Activate and institutionalize consultation and dialogue mechanisms between decision-makers and youth and work to implement the outcome on the dialogues;

Training and capacity building

Provide young people, especially those in vulnerable situations, with the necessary knowledge and skills to mitigate the effects of climate change and contribute to building a secure and sustainable future;

Strengthen the capacities in the field of environmental rights of all relevant actors involved in managing public affairs;

Disseminate human rights culture, especially in its environmental components, within the education systems,

Work diligently to create more comprehensive initiatives to disseminate human rights culture;

Funding and financial resources

Provide support for youth environmental and development projects and increase their access to funding;

Allocate adequate funding resources to strengthen policies and programs aimed at mitigating the effects of climate change, and giving priority to actions and initiatives designed to improve the conditions of groups in vulnerable situations especially in facing economic and social impacts of climate change.

Rabat, October 30th, 2021

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*Adopted at a national gathering, held by Morocco's National Human Rights Institution, at its Rabat Institute -Driss Benzekri- for Human Rights