Climate change has unequal effects on people in different parts of the world. Small Island Developing States face real and existential threats to their land and way of life on account of a crisis in which they have had little or no role to play, and with limited opportunity to take corrective action (Burkett 2015). Countries in Asia continue to be plastic havens for Europe, which for years has exploited weaker regulation in these regions. This has turned lands and oceans in Asia into toxic wastelands, while European countries continue to consume resources in an irresponsible and unabated fashion (Ellis-Petersen 2019). In 2023, we see the continued exploitation of critical minerals in the Democratic Republic of Congo, where there is a mineral race between the United States, Europe, and China (Kara 2023). This continued extraction has resulted in violence, war, and poverty and is often argued to be the result of a ‘failed state’ or ‘poor governance’ (Peša 2022).

However, this only tells a partial story. The existence of such extraction is on account of the ways in which people and communities have been marginalized as a result of a wide variety of economic, political, social, and structural factors on a global scale (Harlan et al. 2015). In fact, as Sultana argues, the root cause of much of the climate emergency that we are experiencing is on account of historical as well as ongoing exploitation of formerly colonized lands (Sultana 2022).

Introduction

Global companies develop as internationally integrated entities, but they are not subject to a common regulatory framework. Despite being among the main contributors to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, these companies do not have their activities regulated in relation to climate issues either (RUGGIE 2014, 13). Although they contribute to the causes of global warming (IPCC 2007, 449), they are not obliged to assume their own share of responsibility for GHG emissions, nor are they held responsible for the consequences and impacts of climate change. In July 2022, the United Nations (UN) General Assembly declared that the right to a safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment is a human right (UN 2022). This resolution also recognized that climate change poses serious threats to the ability of present and future generations to effectively enjoy all human rights.

Addressing the business responsibility to respect human rights, the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) unanimously endorsed the United Nations Guiding Principles (UNGPs) in June 2011. Although it does not specifically address climate issues, the UNGPs states that businesses have a responsibility to respect internationally recognized human rights, which includes not violating human rights and addressing any negative impacts their activities may cause (UN 2011). However, these documents are voluntary and do not provide any sanctions for parties who do not respect their terms and principles.

Introduction

Climate litigation has been defined as the set of judicial, administrative, or extrajudicial actions that are directly or indirectly related to the reduction of greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (mitigation), the reduction of vulnerability to the effects of climate change (adaptation), the repair of damages suffered as a result of climate change (loss and damage), and the management of climate risks (risks) (Moreira 2021). As a subject of academic inquiry, it is a prominent field of study in numerous countries within the Global North, although it is a relatively recent and emerging area of study in Brazil.

According to Setzer and Vanhala (2019), there is an imbalance in academic production on this topic in the North and South countries. Nevertheless, comparative studies such as that of Peel and Lin (2008) reveal differences and similarities, as well as cooperative practices and reciprocal influence. The comprehension of the existing differences and similarities between countries of the Global North and South in the formulation and development of cases of climate litigation, as well as among countries of the Global South, is fundamental for the understanding of this phenomenon that has grown regularly and continuously. This theoretical and analytical approach becomes even more relevant when climate litigation is conceived as a potential instrument for implementing climate justice.

Introduction

Thirty-four years elapsed between climatologist James Hansen's 1988 testimony to the United States Congress, alerting the world ‘with 99 percent confidence’ that global warming was underway, and the 2022 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report pleading that ‘It's “now or never”’ for nations to act to stave off the worst effects of climate change (U.S. Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources 1988; IPCC 2023). United Nations (UN) Secretary-General Antonio Guterres succinctly captured the severity of the emergency in declaring:

The ‘litany of broken climate promises’ and ‘empty pledges’ refers to the shortcomings of the most significant international climate efforts to date, including the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and its annual Conference of the Parties (COP) meetings, the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, and the 2015 Paris Agreement, which all have failed to achieve ‘stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system’ (UNFCCC 1992).

Everyone is familiar with algorithms and social media surveillance. What about farmer surveillance? The new ‘agricultural revolution’ is currently unfolding: drones, sensors, artificial intelligence (AI), and robots are put to the service of agriculture, fundamentally changing the way food is produced. This model of production is being disseminated rapidly, with states already adopting digital agriculture (or related) policies.

While agriculture specialists and social scientists have researched the benefits as well as the risks that digital agriculture presents, a legal analysis is missing, especially on the topic of the risks to human rights. In this chapter, I will be highlighting the projected effects of the spread of this technology, paying attention to the power imbalances, and potential threats to human rights and questioning the role of agricultural technology (AgTech) providers. First, I will be mentioning the benefits of digital agriculture, turning then to criticism of this technology, including, inter alia, issues of market concentration and climate justice. Second, I will be linking the criticism identified to risks to human rights, specifically the right to food. Finally, I will be contemplating whether a solution engaging the human rights obligations of AgTech providers based on business and human rights law is possible.

The Benefits and Risks of Digital Agriculture

First, it should be acknowledged that the development of digital agriculture fits into the existing model of technological and commercialized innovation (El Bilali 2018, 212). Namely, for years, private companies have been focusing their research and development efforts on intensifying agriculture, focusing on productivity and crops for developed countries (Stads et al. 2023, 126).

Introduction

Haiti, 2004; USA, 2005; Myanmar, 2008; Pakistan, 2010; Thailand, 2011; Philippines, 2013; Brazil, 2014; Caribbean, 2017; Tonga, 2018; India, 2018; Mozambique, Zimbabwe, and Malawi, 2019; Australia, 2019–2020; Germany, 2021; Pakistan, 2022; Europe and the United Kingdom (UK), 2022; China, 2022; the United States (US), 2023; Libya, 2023; Kenya and Tanzania, 2024; Brazil, 2024; Poland, 2024; Bangladesh, 2024.

In recent decades, different regions of the world have experienced disasters that are increasingly attributable to the climate crisis (cf. IPCC 2021).1 These disasters, though differing in scale and geographical location, share common characteristics. In all these cases, those affected are at varying degrees of risk, both globally and in the place where the disaster occurred.2 In all of these cases, the slippery slope of vulnerability correlates closely with prior marginalization based on race, gender, class, education, and other factors (cf. Méjean et al 2024; Cappelli, Costantini, and Consoli 2021; Belkhir and Charlemaine 2007; Giroux 2006). These disasters are not only ‘non-natural’ because they occur in the context of anthropogenic climate change, but also because they overlap with politically determined preconditions (cf. Dawson 2010, 317). As the human rights activist and actor Danny Glover graphically illustrated in the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina (cited in Akuno 2006, 34),

Introduction

The climate crisis demands that we confront the economic models and modes of production that have led us to this precipice of destruction. The concept of climate justice takes into account ‘a variety of interrelated concerns – for the inequitable impact [the climate crisis] has on a range of already vulnerable communities, for participation and procedural justice, for the basic functioning and provision of needs in vulnerable communities, including ecological communities … [for] inclusion, transparency, compensation, and sustainability’ (Schlosberg and Collins 2015).

Applying a climate justice lens therefore requires us to look at the myriad impacts that extractive economic models have on the climate, the environment, and communities’ rights, safety, and wellbeing.

While much of the critique of extractive development has been (appropriately) focused on the extraction of fossil fuels, it is essential to also consider agriculture. In its current extractivist and industrial form, agriculture accounts for an estimated 22 per cent to 23 per cent of global greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions (IPCC 2023, IPCC 2019). Industrial agriculture is also a significant contributor to the interrelated ecological crises of soil depletion, loss of biodiversity, loss of pollination, and destruction of the global water supply (Shiva 2016). Furthermore, as demonstrated in the case studies explored in this chapter, extractivist agriculture has been rooted in cycles of land grabbing and violence against local communities.

As Oxfam (2016) explains, ‘large-scale monoculture investments seek fertile land with good transport connections. In many places, this means displacing peasant, indigenous and Afro-descendant communities, depriving them of their traditional livelihoods.’

Introduction

For at least two centuries, major development has integrated the island of Borneo into the international market upon which a contested socio-ecological process set forth. Evidence reveals that the increasingly global market, operating through colonial contexts, infiltrated Borneo's economy by exploiting forest products, mineral resources, and essential commodities (Phillips 2016). At issue is the suppression of ‘native’ life by controlling the population, the imposition of economic monopoly, and the exclusion of these resources. This brutal marginalization is still ongoing and marks a colonial legacy, suppressing the rights of indigenous communities.

For example, the current extractivist and modern plantation models have been shown to be racially discriminatory, as evidenced by colonial agrarian policies that have disregarded the rights of indigenous peoples and sought to assert European control over their traditional territories (McCarthy and Camb 2009). The ideas presented in this chapter are informed by my research on indigenous climate justice adaptation in Borneo. As marginalization intersects with other environmental crises occurring at the local level, this chapter focuses on how the spiritual and disenchanted perspectives of the Dayak people remain relevant to ongoing crises and injustices within the context of climate change and the global political–economic system. The United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs has indicated that indigenous communities exhibit a minimal level of responsibility for climate change, while simultaneously experiencing the most severe consequences of its associated hazards (United Nations Department of Economic and Social Affairs n.d.).

Introduction

The United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), signed in 1992, brings together countries in a worldwide commitment to contain global warming. With the Paris Agreement, signed in 2015, this commitment is renewed and takes on an emergency character, challenging the legal field to think of strategies that establish, in the connection of national and international spaces, the duty to act to guarantee the continuity of all forms of life on the planet. The transformations required on an emergency basis to contain the advance of global warming are structural and lead to the need to rethink the entire production process. The context used in this chapter portrays Brazilian rural development in the face of the climate emergency.

In agricultural production, there is a clear contradiction between the emergence of climate change and the continued exploitation of export-oriented monocultures, known as agribusiness. The history of the word ‘agribusiness’ began in the 1940s at the Harvard Business School, with Donald K. Davis and the intention of creating a disciplinary area of studies on agriculture and business, based on liberalism and aimed at reducing the role of the state in regulation and opening up to private initiative (Pompeia 2021, 43–46). The expression appeared in the Brazilian public arena between the 1950s and 1960s (Pompeia 2021, 87). This period was marked by the debate between conservative and progressive forces about development and was interrupted by the military coup of 1964 (Pompeia 2021, 90).

Introduction

There is a slow, albeit steady, evolution towards the significance and development of economic, social, and cultural rights (ESCRs), moving from international to regional and national systems. Constitutionally elevating ESCRs to fundamental human rights places substantive meaning on the notion of indivisibility and justiciability of all human rights. Climate change poses a threat to this elevated set of human rights, disproportionately impacting the historically marginalized and underserved communities on a global scale. Moreso, progress towards sustainable development for the Global South has been negatively impacted by climate change disasters – severe weather conditions such as droughts and floods have become more frequent and destructive. Consequently, the financing gap and general capacity of the Global North and Global South countries to progressively realize ESCRs is ever widening. It is a major concern that the climate emergency the world is confronted with is a problem to which the Global South has played a minimal role contributing. Rapid industrialization, wealth creation, and improved living standards in the Global North have been spurred by a tainted history of unsustainable natural resource extraction and unsustainable industrial practices much to the detriment of the Global South, which has given rise to the notion of climate justice.

Climate justice is not an exclusively environmental concern but also has implications for the implementation and protection of fundamental civil and political rights, as well as ESCRs. On 28 July 2022, the United Nations General Assembly (UNGA) through resolution A/RES/76/300 confirmed the United Nations Human Rights Council (UNHRC) resolution recognizing for the first time that access to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment is a human right.

Introducing our interlocutors and our research

Our methodological approach was based on semi-structured interviews conducted between October 2022 and February 2023. These interviews involved indigenous, Afro-descendant, and Campesinx leaders from academia, labour unions, and social movements. We conducted the interviews in person through video calls, email, and phone. Due to the diversity of the participants, the interviews were performed in Spanish, Portuguese, and English. We had the support of native and bilingual speakers to review the translations1 and shared the final version of the document with the interviewees.

The research highlights the perspectives of several influential voices, including Ana Lucía Ixchiu Hernández, a K’iche’ indigenous social leader and renowned activist for climate and cultural rights in Guatemala; Jen Deerinwater, an award-winning journalist and community organizer from the Cherokee Nation of Oklahoma in the United States (US); Eliana Asprilla, an Afro-descendant environmental engineer specializing in urban and management planning from Colombia; Ana Lilia Felix, an academic who aligns with the Zapatista movement's ‘Sixth Declaration of the Lacandona Jungle’ in Mexico; and Maria Estélia de Araújo and Luciomar Monteiro, members of the Landless Workers’ Movement (MST) and the Catholic Church's Land Pastoral Commission (CPT) in Brazil. For the interviewees’ biographical information and guiding questions, please refer to Appendix 7A in this chapter.

In terms of our selection criteria for interviewees, we employed a non-random sampling approach, specifically purposive sampling. This selection was based on the significant roles that these activists play in the social and environmental justice arenas within both their individual countries and the broader region.

Introduction

Linkages between environmental risks and racial discrimination have long been areas of research and activism in the domestic sphere. The term ‘environmental racism’, coined by Rev. Dr Benjamin F. Chavis Jr and Robert D. Bullard in the 1980s, refers to racial discrimination embedded into the process of environmental decision-making, whether by a conscious design or institutional neglect (Bullard 1993, 17). The results are that communities of colour are disproportionately exposed to environmental issues (Bullard 1990, 1993; Schlosberg and Collins 2014). However, an unresolved theoretical issue in this conversation is applying such framework in the global order, particularly considering Global South countries1 in the realm of international negotiations on climate change. Such an application builds on scientific evidence that communities most at risk have emitted the least greenhouse gases (GHGs) and also have fewer resources to deal with climate change, and that climate change has generated and perpetuated vulnerabilities (IPCC 2022, 9–11). This is deeply intertwined with the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and respective capabilities (CBDR&RC principle), since it acknowledges that Global North countries should bear the higher costs of mitigation and adaptation to climate change, as well as recent discussions on climate justice and human rights – particularly considering the economic, social, and cultural (ESC) rights. However, the current understanding and operationalization of the CBDR&RC principle does not enhance climate justice and human rights, because it does not address the underlying root causes of climate change (see the third section).