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The role sustainable lifestyles can play in achieving a paradigm shift towards sustainability is acknowledged in both the Sustainable Development Goals and the Paris Agreement of 2015. They are essential complements to technology and policy solutions, which alone cannot bring the necessary changes. Sustainable lifestyles are emerging in entirely different socio-economic and cultural circumstances in India and Germany. This paper contains first findings from a joint project on sustainable lifestyles conducted by Germanwatch and Climate Action Network South Asia (CANSA) India.

The Green Climate Fund (GCF) has the ambition to become the most important multilateral instrument in climate finance. Africa has become a focus region for the GCF early on. As it is unlikely that the intended paradigm shift towards low-carbon emissions and climate-resilient economies and societies (GCF founding mandate) can be achieved without broad civil society (CS) engagement, it is essential to scale-up existing civil society capacities to advocate for ambitious proposals, bring on-the-ground expertise to the table, help embed GCF-funded activities in a broader societal support for transformation and increase accountability of national authorities.

The Green Climate Fund has made significant progress in terms of supporting low-carbon and climate resilient development in developing countries. Yet the Fund still has to work on some of the gaps and challenges that have manifested throughout the first phase of operationalization. An overview of the key tasks for 2018.

Europe Beyond Coal groups and other NGOs, including Germanwatch, have called on the Mayor of Rotterdam, Mr Ahmed Aboutaleb; the CEO of Rotterdam Port, Mr Allard Castelein; and the Rotterdam City Council, to phase-out coal transshipments.

On 13 February 2018, the Hungarian government tabled to Parliament a proposed legislative pack of three laws, commonly referred to as “Stop Soros”. The newly proposed legislation would further restrict Hungarian civil society ability to carry out their work. These come in a context of already shrinking space for civil society in Hungary and contravene Hungary’s obligations under international law to protect the right to freedom of association, expression and movement.

We welcome the recommendations of the EU Commission’s High Level Expert Group on Sustainable Finance (HLEG). The HLEG’s final report represents hitherto the most comprehensive plan to systematically integrate sustainability aspects into the financial system of the European Union.

We are looking forward to the big events coming up in 2018. It will start with a meeting of the German group in April, the UNFCCC SB in May with a meeting of the ECL International Advisory Board and our big second exchange in Tanzania in June.

We are sorry that we are kind of late for our first ECL-News for Module 6. Right now, we thought it would be better to summarize the news for Module 6 and 7. We will keep our news quite short; because we think, you have a lot of good stuff to read right now about the African renewable initiative.

Germanwatch provides unauthorised English translations of the most important court documents of the Huaraz case. Moreover, court documents of the defendants party have been summarized and translated into English. Recent documents will be uploaded on a current basis.

This document describes, amongst other things, the legal basis for Saúl Luciano Lliuya’s claim, his exact reasoning, the first-instance decision, the clear votum of the higher regional court in Hamm and the consequential indicative ruling and decision to take evidence. You can also find additional information regarding the role of climate models and science in this interesting background document.

At the UN Climate Change Conference in Marrakech in 2001 (COP7), the international community agreed to establish a climate adaptation fund, which was then launched in 2007. The Adaptation Fund celebrated its tenth anniversary at the 2017 Climate Change Conference (COP23), which was held in Bonn under the Fijian presidency – a good time to reflect on past successes and future developments.