Pioneering IUCN judicial training programme co-developed with Conservation-Litigation.org aims to strengthen environmental justice in the Asia Pacific region
The world-leading, free online curriculum – developed by UNEP, IUCN’s World Commission on Environmental Law Conservation-Litigation.org and legal experts from across Asia-Pacific – draws on legal analyses and case studies from countries across the region region to further promote the protection of the environment and natural resources through improved implementation, adjudication and enforcement of environmental law.
As legal actions to protect and remedy biodiversity become increasingly important to secure justice for nature – including through lawsuits by plaintiffs supported by Conservation-Litigation-org – judges and practitioners globally are faced with new types of cases, concepts and science that they are unlikely to have seen before.
This is an important and exciting opportunity to inform legal responses to environmental harm. The training helps judges, public prosecutors and other legal practitioners engage the breadth of legal tools available to them, and to understand the legal and scientific concepts that underpin environmental cases – especially cases focused on securing remedies.
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The world’s nature is under threat: biodiversity loss and ecosystem collapse are now the most rapidly deteriorating global risks, often driven by illegal deforestation, wildlife trade, pollution, development and mining that undermine our natural environment, with catastrophic consequences.
Yet with greater urgency comes greater awareness, and with this, a call to action. As we have seen in recent years with the climate movement, NGOs, government agencies and citizens are now turning their attention to legal strategies that can hold offenders more accountable, and can secure remedies for nature that has been harmed.
Although related legislation exists in many countries across the Asia-Pacific region, such cases are still comparatively rare, practitioners are often uncertain about how to use them and, crucially, related provisions and concepts are not yet well covered by most law schools. This new resource represents a major opportunity to inform practitioners about the legal tools available to them, and the core legal and scientific concepts that underpin remedy-based responses to environmental harm.
Following the success of the “Introduction to Environment and Climate Law for Pacific Lawyers and Judges” – an introductory course on environmental and climate law for lawyers and judges in the Pacific islands region developed by UNEP, the Fiji Environmental Law Association and IUCN, the new “Intermediate Course on Environmental Adjudication: Upholding Environmental Justice in Asia Pacific” aims to respond to the needs of legal professionals, particularly judges, from Asia and the Pacific to promote the protection of the environment and natural resources in the region through improved implementation, adjudication and enforcement of environmental law.
Conservation-Litigation.org provided key content on Lessons 7 and 8 of the 10-part programme, which is also available free online to the public.
What is Environmental Harm and how is it remedied?
Liability and granting remedies for environmental harm
The content of the two modules draws directly on the legal analyses developed by the Conservation-Litigation.org team in multiple jurisdictions, to explain core concepts that judges and other legal practitioners need to engage when hearing cases of environmental harm and considering how it can be remedied. This includes concepts, introduction to key laws from across the region, and practical case examples from across Asia-Pacific.
“This is a rapidly evolving field, and many of these topics are not currently well covered by law school curricula in most countries around the world” adds Maribel Rodriguez, Co-Executive Director of Conservation-Litigation.org who spearheaded the legal analyses used to support the modules’ development. “Being able to contribute to this world-leading training programme is a huge opportunity to shape future legal responses to environmental harm in the Asia Pacific — the largest and fastest growing region in the world — and potentially set globally important precedents.”
“Our analyses show that the laws to protect and restore nature already exist in many jurisdictions,” explains Dr. Jacob Phelps. “The challenge is that practitioners around the world readily admit that they are often unfamiliar with the legal provisions and science that underpin these opportunities. There is clear scope to broaden our legal approaches so that cases and court orders can deliver verdicts with power to better hold offenders accountable and help remedy the environment when it has been harmed. If we want judges to be able to engage with the concepts and science to order meaningful remedial actions, we have a duty to help prepare them.”
While primarily aimed at practicing lawyers and judges in the Asia Pacific region, the course is a useful resource for students of all kinds and is available free of charge on the United Nations Information Portal on Multilateral Environmental Agreements (InforMEA), a publicly accessible e-learning platform dedicated to building knowledge and greater understanding of International Environmental Law.