NAIROBI, Kenya – The United Nations Environment Assembly (UNEA), the world’s highest-level decision-making body on environmental issues, is addressing the urgent triple planetary crisis of climate change, biodiversity loss, and pollution and waste. The assembly, which convened more than 7,000 delegates from 180 UN Member States, including Ministers of Environment and other leaders, began its sixth session on February 26 and will conclude on March 1 at the UNEP Headquarters in Gigiri, Nairobi.
According to Kenya News Agency, Climate Change, and Forestry for the Republic of Kenya, Soipan Tuya, significant progress has been made in combating these global challenges, citing the adoption of frameworks on chemicals, pollution, and waste, and the resolution to end plastic pollution. Tuya emphasized the assembly’s role in accelerating the implementation of the UN 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development, highlighting the increasing global economic inequality and the persistent reality of poverty in developing regions, including Africa.
UNEA-6, themed around “effective, inclusive, and sustainable multilateral actions” to combat the environmental crises, is set to negotiate 19 resolutions aimed at fostering ambitious multilateral environmental action. Leila Benali, President of UNEA-6 and Minister of Energy Transition and Sustainable Development for the Kingdom of Morocco, outlined the assembly’s focus on nature-based solutions, hazardous pesticides, land degradation, drought, and the environmental impacts of minerals and metals.
Benali stressed the importance of strengthening environmental multilateralism to achieve climate justice, sound management of chemicals, and address solar radiation modification, among other issues. She called for a commitment to inclusive, networked, and effective multilateralism that includes voices beyond governments, such as youth, indigenous peoples, and local communities, with a focus on gender and human rights.
Inger Andersen, Executive Director of UNEP, underscored the critical timing of UNEA-6 in the context of accelerating the UN 2030 Agenda. Andersen highlighted the significance of cooperation with multilateral environmental agreements (MEAs) as essential instruments of international environmental governance and law. She urged for political differences to be set aside in favor of a united approach to securing a sustainable and safe future for the planet.
The assembly’s discussions and negotiated resolutions are expected to lay the groundwork for future global and regional coordinated efforts by the United Nations, Member States, and partners to deliver high-impact planetary action, setting a comprehensive environmental agenda for addressing the world’s most pressing challenges.