By Claudia Ituarte-Lima and Julieta Levin
Human rights and climate financing are inseparable – and Global North and Global South countries should treat them as such. From 7-10 April 2025, Saint Kitts and Nevis hosted the Third Forum on Human Rights Defenders in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean (LAC) – an example of Caribbean small island States’ agency on environmental diplomacy.
Agenda items of this Forum ranged from reviewing and monitoring progress in the implementation of the Escazú Agreement’s Regional Action Plan on Human Rights defenders in Environmental Matters to recognizing women’s political leadership. This Forum, together with the Regional Action Plan and a voluntary fund for implementation, are part of the institutional innovations under the Regional Agreement on Access to Information, Public Participation and Justice in Environmental Matters in Latin America and the Caribbean(the Escazú Agreement) that can help advance just transitions.
The urgent need to transition from a fossil fuels-based economy to a green economy has been well-documented by scientists across disciplines and international organizations, as well as local and Indigenous communities. Yet, for a transition to low-carbon and environmentally sustainable economies and societies to be just, the process must be fair and address broad systemic issues, taking into account financial and political constraints and obstacles faced by ground-up efforts including those of defenders.
Integrating a preventive approach rooted in human rights in any transition is key to ensuring that a transition is just and tackles root causes of unsustainability such as inequality. Wealthier nations in the Global North, historically the largest contributors to the climate crisis, have left countries in the Global South disproportionately burdened by climate change impacts despite their limited role in causing the crisis. To be just, transitions require the equitable distribution of potential benefits and unavoidable losses incurred during climate- and biodiversity-related transitions. However, tackling these changes requires substantial funding.
In this article, we focus on Caribbean small island States where climate financing is limited and where economies are heavily dependent on fossil fuels, tourism, and agriculture. Caribbean small islands nations also suffer some of the most severe consequences of climate change, including rising sea levels, droughts, and cyclones. Haiti, for instance, has limited economic resources and is profoundly susceptible to high temperatures, hurricanes, heavy rainfalls, and other climate hazards. These challenges are compounded by existing socioeconomic vulnerabilities, institutional fragility, and widespread conflict and violence, contributing to further instability. These factors ultimately undermine countries’ access to, and the effective use of, climate finance.
Implementing international cooperation duties through climate financing for just transitions
Multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs), such as the UNFCCC, the Paris Agreement on climate change, and the Convention on Biological Diversity (CBD), specify relevant cooperation obligations that apply between high-income countries (HICs) and Caribbean States in the context of climate financing.
The Loss and Damage Fund, established at UNFCCC COP 27 in 2022 and fully operationalized at COP 29 in 2024, to assist vulnerable countries in addressing the irreversible impacts of climate change, presents another critical avenue for climate justice. However, current pledges cover only USD 720 million of the estimated USD 200 billion – 400 billion needed annually by developing countries to address losses and damages. Scaling up contributions to climate financing to Caribbean small island States is essential to bridge the financial gap so these countries have the resources necessary to rebuild and adapt in the face of climate-induced disasters.
Human rights obligations in the climate financing context: A compass for navigating towards positive outcomes for people and nature
In order to ensure that climate financing mechanisms are drivers of positive change for people and nature, they must be human rights compliant, as well as conflict- and gender-sensitive. It is also critical to ensure that climate financing: addresses the underlying drivers of instability; and is long-term and flexible, allowing adaptation to evolving needs and conditions. Engaging a diverse range of rights-holders to ensure transparency, equity, and alignment with local priorities is also needed.
Having a robust legal framework that is aligned with human rights and implemented in practice is vital for climate finance to effectively contribute to just transitions. Key elements of this legal framework are the international and regional human rights and environmental treaties to which Caribbean States and HICs are parties, including those that specify the content of the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment and international cooperation obligations. For example, the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights protects rights particularly affected by climate change, including the rights to an adequate standard of living, health, water, food, and sanitation, while the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights recognizes procedural rights such as freedom of opinion and expression and the right to peaceful assembly and association. These rights are essential to creating an enabling environment for defenders to catalyze pathways to just transitions and nurturing peace with nature.
The Framework Principles on Environment and Human Rights and the Core Human Rights Principle for Private Conservation Organizations and Funders also specify how countries financing transitions can be compliant with human rights in mobilizing resources to tackle climate change and biodiversity degradation. Human rights-compliant climate financing could go directly to defenders to invest in their own underfunded initiatives. Doing so is interconnected with “greening” the exercise of economic, social, and cultural rights not only of defenders but of the broader population that benefits from their place-based climate mitigation and adaptation initiatives.
In contrast to the wide ratification of MEAs and international human rights treaties by Caribbean island States, only six out of thirteen Caribbean countries are parties to regional treaties such as the American Convention on Human Rights and none of these countries have ratified the San Salvador Protocol. While six Caribbean nations are parties to the Escazú Agreement, all Caribbean nations are parties to the Revised Treaty of Chaguaramas (2001). The Revised Treaty, like the Escazú Agreement, includes provisions on environment protection, as well as access to participation, information, and justice in environmental matters.
Marine biodiversity is one of the riches of Caribbean island States, yet its degradation is exacerbated by climate change affecting these countries disproportionately. The Convention for the Protection and Development of the Marine Environment of the Wider Caribbean Region (Cartagena Convention) and its three protocols – on oil spills, specially protected areas and wildlife, and land-based sources of marine pollution – are part of the Caribbean-specific instruments to address these challenges. Twelve out of 13 Caribbean islands are parties to the Cartagena Convention and the Oil Spills Protocol, with Haiti as the only exception. Eight Caribbean island States have ratified the other two protocols.
Within the region, the Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre functions as a coordinating institution for climate change actions across the region while the Port of Spain Accord on the Management and Conservation of the Caribbean Environment (1989) and the Port of Spain Consensus of the Caribbean Regional Economic Conference (1991) adopted by Caribbean Community (CARICOM) ministries responsible for environmental issues, reinforce commitments to environmental governance.
Looking ahead
Across the Caribbean small island States, there is a growing recognition of the right to a healthy environment, reinforced by legal frameworks that promote access to information, public participation, and justice in climate and biodiversity matters. These frameworks offer vital tools to ensure that climate finance is not only effectively deployed but also aligned with human rights and environmental commitments made by Caribbean small island States and their international partners.
Investing in integrated approaches that address both marine biodiversity loss and climate change offers a strategic opportunity to avoid trade-offs and achieve more sustainable, socially just outcomes. Climate finance directed through a prevention lens can enhance resilience while supporting long-term ecological and community well-being.
Caribbean regional legal and policy instruments can also pave the way for all Caribbean nations to join the Escazú Agreement as well as other regional human rights treaties that apply in the climate financing context, helping create a robust legal and policy framework for achieving positive social and environmental outcomes. This would significantly strengthen their collective influence in regional dialogues. It would also enhance their ability to benefit from cross-regional cooperation, ensuring that the unique challenges and opportunities facing island States are properly recognized. For instance, the European Parliament’s 2021 call for EU member States to support the implementation of the Escazú Agreement and Global North countries’ climate financing can support Caribbean-led initiatives and foster synergies between the Escazú Agreement’s principles and domestic legal and institutional advances.
Embedding human rights and environmental justice into the heart of climate finance is not optional – it is essential and an obligation under international law. In an era marked by escalating climate threats, violence, and global instability, the Escazú Agreement Defenders Forum offers a hopeful example of community-driven environmental democracy. It is imperative that funding follows this leadership from the ground-up.
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Dr. Claudia Ituarte-Lima ([emailprotected]) is a thematic leader on human rights and environment and senior researcher at the Raoul Wallenberg Institute of Human Rights and Humanitarian Law (RWI). She is also Director of the Global Network for Human Rights and Environment.
Julieta Levin is an LL.M. Candidate at New York University School of Law and a Human Rights Scholar at the Prevention Project.
The authors thank Mikhal Sachar for valuable comments provided on an earlier version of this article. The article is an outcome of the Prevention Project, housed at the Center for Human Rights and Global Justice of the School of Law at New York University, done in collaboration with RWI.
