Organised by the Western Sydney University School of Law in collaboration with Griffith University's Tropical Primary Forests and Climate Change project, Cardiff School of Law & Politics School and Sabin Center for Climate Change Law at the Columbia Law School, join us for a webinar shedding light on how legislation, domestic and international litigation, market-based mechanisms, and private sector initiatives may contribute to protecting the Amazon. This will be also an opportunity to discuss the outcomes of COP 26 that may be relevant to the Amazon.

The Amazon is being led to the 'point of no return'

The recent Amazon fires of 2019 and 2020 have heightened attention on the region and brought the question of Amazon conservation to the forefront of international debate. The crucial role of primary forests, such as the Amazon, in preventing catastrophic biodiversity loss and climate change is largely recognized in the scientific literature and in policy forums. The latest IPCC report, described by the UN Secretary General as a ‘red code for humanity,’ is a call for deep reductions in GHG emissions and the protection of carbon sinks. However, the trends in agriculture and livestock expansion, fires, drought, logging, and mining are leading the Amazon to the ‘point of no return’, as warned by scientists and as recognised by a recent motion passed in the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) World Congress in Marseille in 2021.

Special Issue on 'The Amazon Rainforest'

This webinar discusses our recent Special Issue on ‘The Amazon Rainforest’ which was prepared through a collaboration of academics from around the world and published by the Review of European, Comparative and International Environmental Law (RECIEL).

Speakers

Professor Brendan Mackey - Director of the Griffith Climate Action Beacon and Griffith Climate Change Response Program, Griffith University

Professor Harro van Asselt - RECIEL Chief Editor, Stockholm Environment Institute (SEI) Oxford/University of Eastern Finland

Dr Ricardo Pereira - Cardiff Law & Politics School

Dr Beatriz Garcia - Western Sydney University, School of Law

Professor Christina Voigt - University of Oslo/IUCN World Commission on Environmental Law (WCEL) Chair

Dr Erika Berenguer - Senior Research Associate/ Ecosystems Lab, University of Oxford

Angela Andrade - Climate Change and Biodiversity Policy Director Conservation International Colombia, Chair IUCN Commission on Ecosystem Management

Professor Tim Stephens - Professor of International Law, The University of Sydney

Dr Justine Bendel - University of Exeter Law School and Centre for International Sustainable Development Law

Dr Joana Setzer - Assistant Professorial Research Fellow at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change and the Environment, London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE)

Prof Delton Winter de Carvalho - Universidade do Vale do Rio dos Sinos School of Law (UNISINOS), Brazil; Environmental lawyer and founder of the law firm ‘Environmental Law Advocacy'

Maria Antonia Tigre - Sabin Center for Climate Change at the Columbia Law School and Director of Latin America for the Global Network of Human Rights and the Environment (GNHRE)

Dr Maria Augusta Paim - Loughborough University and CEENRG - Cambridge Centre for Environment, Energy and Natural Resources Governance

Lawrence Rimmer - Forests Alive working on Griffith University Tropical Primary Forests and Climate Change project

Dr Leticia Canal Vieira - University of Bologna and PhD from Griffith University

Amazon - primary forest