The Human Right to Renewable Energy

an article by Tony Dominski

The World Renewable Energy Assembly (WREA) 2005 in Bonn/Germany has ended with the adoption of the final communiqué entitled "The Human Right to Renewable Energy". The communiqué asserted that energy is the prerequisite of every life, and that the availability of energy is a fundamental and indivisible human right.

The communiqué stated that this human right can only be delivered by renewable energy sources. Fossil and nuclear energy sources are near depletion and incur high environmental costs such as global warming,

The WREA was very optimistic about the development of renewable energy including solar, wind, wave power, wood and alcohol. Renewable energies are steadily getting cheaper due to continual improvement and economies of scale. The WREA called for the immediate development of local energy sources instead of waiting for international agreements.

More than 450 representatives from politics and parliaments, from science and industry as well as NGOs met in Bonn from November 26th to 30th, 2005, following an invitation of the World Council for Renewable Energy (WCRE). The meeting was organized by EUROSOLAR.

As a WREA participant, the German government called for a “A Renewable Energy Proliferation Protocol” to be added to the Nuclear Non-Proliferation Treaty. The government had previously volunteered to promote an International Renewable Energy agency (IRENA).

What is striking in the WREA statement is the revolutionary convergence of the ideas of human rights, nuclear non-proliferation and sustainable energy production. Implementation of these ideas would make energy more accessible to Third World households. For example, present solar home technologies can efficiently harness sunlight for heating, hot water, cooking and to generate electricity.

Contact Information: World Council for Renewable Energy (WCRE); c/o EUROSOLAR e.V.; Kaiser-Friedrich-Strasse 11; D-53113 Bonn; Phone +49-228-362373; Fax +49-228-361213 info@wcre.org; http://www.wcre.org

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Meeting the food security challenge through organic agriculture.

States should integrate organic agriculture objectives within national priorities, FAO says.

Rome, 3 May – “Organic agriculture is no longer a phenomenon in developed countries only, as it is commercially practiced in 120 countries, representing 31 million hectares and a market of US$ 40 billion in 2006,” FAO underlines in a paper Organic Agriculture and Food Security presented here at an International Conference on Organic Agriculture and Food Security (3-5 May 2007).

The paper identifies the strengths and weaknesses of organic agriculture with regards to its contribution to food security. analyzes attributes of organic supply chains against the Right to Food framework and proposes policy and research actions for improving the performance of organic agriculture at the national, international and institutional levels.

“The strongest feature of organic agriculture is its reliance on fossil-fuel independent and locally-available production assets. working with natural processes increases cost-effectiveness and resilience of agro-ecosystems to climatic stress,” the paper says.

“By managing biodiversity in time (rotations) and space (mixed cropping), organic farmers use their labour and environmental services to intensify production in a sustainable way. Organic agriculture also breaks the vicious circle of indebtedness for agricultural inputs which causes an alarming rate of farmers’ suicides.”

The paper recognizes that “most certified organic food production in developing countries goes to export” and adds that “when certified cash crops are linked with agro-ecological improvements and accrued income for poor farmers, this leads to improved food self-reliance and revitalization of small holder agriculture.” (…) Organic Agriculture website: http://www.fao.org/organicag/

http://www.fao.org/newsroom/

This report was posted on December 18, 2005.

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