David Waskow is Oxfam America’s climate change program director.

In a year of crippling droughts around the world—from West Africa to the US Midwest—the outcome at the major UN climate negotiation in Doha, Qatar, was itself an unfortunate drought of climate action.

This was a paradoxical COP—both a stepping stone and a cliff-hanger—with developing countries hanging from the finance cliff by their fingertips.  Even though several European countries pledged climate finance for the upcoming 2013-15 period, developed countries were unwilling to commit collectively to any funding level for the upcoming period or clarity about how they’ll ramp up toward the international goal of mobilizing $100 billion a year by 2020.

The United States, arguing that it was constrained by the fiscal cliff budget negotiations, refused even to commit to maintain the funding level of the past three years of ‘fast start’ climate finance agreed during the Copenhagen climate summit in 2009. All the final text says is that developed countries are “encouraged” to maintain fast start levels. Meanwhile, there was little done at Doha to further reduce greenhouse gas emissions.

Qumrunnessa Nazly from Bangladesh held an empty basket amidst a field of dead corn set in front of the glittering Doha skyline to demonstrate the grave impact of a changing climate on food supply and food prices, and the crucial importance of the UN climate change negotiations in providing a solution. Richard Casson/Oxfam.

A few limited but hopeful elements in the Doha outcome: an agreement to convene a high-level dialogue on climate finance at the next COP in 2013; an agreement to work this coming year to develop an international mechanism to address “loss and damage,” the effects of climate change that cannot be adapted to; formal agreement on how some countries, particularly the European Union and Australia, will continue the Kyoto Protocol until 2020; and agreement on the process for negotiating the planned 2015 comprehensive climate agreement that will take effect in 2020.

The US made a verbal commitment to work for climate finance in Congress this coming year and try to continue the finance at current levels. (Todd Stern, the US special climate envoy said that “we have every intention to continue to press forward with funding of that same kind of level, to the greatest extent that we can.”)

But beyond the minimalist outcomes agreed in the texts, one of the most noteworthy outcomes at Doha was the growing strength, breadth, and depth of engagement and collaboration by civil society organizations. A press conference last week demonstrated this growing collaboration:  Oxfam, WWF, Greenpeace, Friends of the Earth, Christian Aid, and ActionAid, with the chairs of the Least Developed Country and Africa negotiating groups, stood together to say that the climate talks were failing to produce meaningful change and that governments needed to shift gears dramatically.  Representing a range of perspectives, their joint statement was not just a marriage of tactical convenience—it demonstrates a real confluence around jointly shared objectives of equity and sustainability, with climate issues a central, though hardly the sole, issue.

Perhaps most important, advocates are shifting focus toward the national and local levels and bridging or even bypassing the old divides between development and environmental agendas. There’s a strong belief that this increased energy and action will eventually also flow upward back into the global level process. And home-grown advocacy on climate change is already blossoming in many developing countries. This came home for me while working with developing country partners from Nepal, Philippines, Uganda, and Zambia, partners in a new initiative to press for adaptation finance that’s accountable at the local level. They have been building strong civil society networks over the past several years and are pressing effectively for national level policy change, as well as engaging the international process.  For these groups and many others in developing countries, building advocacy from the ground up and seeing past environment-development divides are self-evident truths.

The pump is primed to water our advocacy from these sources. But there’s also an immediate question about the focus of our advocacy agenda in the US—especially on the climate finance front in coming months. We must work for robust levels of climate funding at least at the level of the past several years, joined to a public recommitment by the administration to the President’s Global Climate Change Initiative.  And we must seize opportunities to push forward on innovative sources of finance, such as a mechanism for international aviation that can limit emissions while producing financial resources.

Doha was parched—but there are oases on the horizon that we can and must move towards.

This update by David Waskow, climate change program director, comes from Doha the morning of December 7, 2012.

We’re heading into the final hours of what has been a paradoxical COP. On the one hand, it’s a transitional COP, a stepping stone for the process launched last year that’s supposed to lead to a comprehensive climate agreement in 2015. On the other hand, it’s a cliffhanger COP because the thee year Fast Start climate finance period that developed countries agreed to in Copenhagen in 2009 is coming to an end in several weeks and developing countries are uncertain about what happens next with finance to help them build climate resilience. As Oxfam has said, we’re facing a climate fiscal cliff.

The result has been a disappointing COP so far—with only limited  progress on the new agreement, along with a serious stalemate on the finance issues. Developing countries are seeking a Doha decision that developed countries will maintain their fast start finance levels and begin to ramp up the funding levels. But despite some pledges of finance by several European counties, there has been very little progress on agreeing to finance commitments here.

As a result, the lack of finance assurances may stymie movement toward the 2015 deal because developing countries want more assurances on finance before they move fully forward. The final hours will be telling. Among other things, will the US agree to maintain the fast start levels of finance over the next three years (essentially $10 billion per year from all developed countries)?

The US did take one important step here in Doha—to recognize the importance of opening a dialogue on some key issues of equity in the negotiations, especially around the level of emissions reductions that different countries would undertake. There does have to be a serious conversation about this, and hopefully the US will engage.

Many negotiators from other countries came to Doha more optimistic about a US administration that had just won reelection. Many are again skeptical as the US continues to stick with positions from before. We’ve been stressing the opportunity the President has to act more assertiveness internationally after his reelection and significantly increased climate awareness after Sandy and this past summer’s drought. The final hours of the negotiations will provide telling answers as to how that will play out.

When Hurricane Isaac took another punch at the Gulf Coast in late August, it exposed yet again how imperative it is to invest in restoring the region’s battered environment and the economy. Oxfam America has been engaging leaders in the private sector in planning how to make best use of the billions of dollars coming to the region as a result of the RESTORE the Gulf States Act. The Act will send 80% of Clean Water Act fines back to the Gulf—from $5 to $21 billion.

This past Tuesday, Oxfam America and The Nature Conservancy were joined in Washington, DC by Atkins, a global engineering firm, and Calvert Investments for meetings with several federal agencies that will be implementing the Act.

Why would an engineering company like Atkins and an investment firm like Calvert be interested in how monies on the Gulf get spent?

As an investor in companies in the Gulf, Calvert wants to be sure that their holdings are not at risk as a result of climate hazards. As Rebecca Henson, Calvert’s Senior Sustainability Analyst told staffers at the Environmental Protection Agency, “Calvert Investments wants to support the companies in which it has holdings in their determination to be more resilient when faced with the next storm. These funds have the potential to decrease the region’s vulnerability and increase its resiliency by restoring the coastline and creating real economic development.”

Atkins Senior Vice President Doug Robison told staffers at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration that “coastal restoration projects have the opportunity to wrap together both ends of the socioeconomic spectrum as it relates to jobs. It will put to work scientists and engineers together with construction and monitoring crews. This is a growing industry sector and a once in a lifetime opportunity to invest in the Gulf economically and environmentally.”

This week President Obama signed an Executive Order creating the Gulf Coast Ecosystem Restoration Council which is mandated by the RESTORE Act to create a comprehensive restoration plan. That plan has the potential to protect the precarious coastal communities that have been victim to one storm after another through ecosystem restoration. But it also has the potential to revitalize the Gulf’s economy by working with the Gulf States to ready a local workforce to take on the jobs created through projects the Council will administer. Let’s hope they don’t pass on this opportunity.

Last week Oxfam, The Nature Conservancy, and Coast Builders Coalition hosted a forum, Rebuilding Our Economy, Restoring Our Environment in Thibodaux, Louisiana—ground zero for some of the most severe climate hazards that Louisiana has experienced. The forum brought together a diverse set of stakeholders from the private sector, government, workforce agencies, conservation and environmental organizations and community groups to promote workforce development and training in coastal restoration projects.

Over 50 companies representing engineering, construction, environmental consulting and dredging firms came to the forum to hear from the Louisiana Economic Development and Workforce agencies, the Louisiana Community and Technical Colleges along with a presentation from Louisiana’s Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority. What became clear throughout the day was that these folks needed to talk to one another much more. With Louisiana losing 16 square miles of coastline per year, coastal communities are on the front lines every day. Before their communities literally wash away, we will need to see these stakeholders coming together more often to collaborate on the best ways to save coastal Louisiana while making sure that local communities are more resilient for the next storm.

A few steps forward in this effort were already made and announced at the forum. Bryan Moore from the Louisiana Workforce Agency told the audience that he would dedicate a staff person specifically towards the coastal restoration industry to collaborate with the industry and other stakeholders to ready a local labor force with the appropriate skill sets needed for costal restoration projects. Good for industry but better yet for those communities that have seen their livelihoods in the fishing industry damaged by the BP oil spill. Derrick Manns, Vice President of the Louisiana Community and Technical College system said he would work on bring training programs into the communities where out of work fishermen and unemployed workers live.

Last month, Congress passed the bi-partisan bill known as the RESTORE the Gulf States Act. This law will send 80% of Clean Water Act fines back to the Gulf to restore and rebuild the region’s battered economy and environment. The sum of fines could be anywhere from 5-20 billion which presents a real opportunity for the Gulf states that could be squandered if the monies are not used as means of investment in those communities that have been hit the hardest by climate hazards. As Reverend Edwards from the Zion Travelers Cooperative Center put it at the forum, “Louisiana has seen big money before, like after Katrina, but it never gets into the communities, we need it to get into the communities if we are ever going to see things change.”

At the forum, Oxfam America and The Nature Conservancy presented a new report entitled “Rebuilding Our Economy, Restoring Our Environment: How the Emerging Restoration Economy Offers New and Expanded Opportunities for Gulf Coast Businesses and Communities.” The report notes the importance of the Gulf Coast to the country’s environment and economy and explores the potential of the new restoration economy to employ people, revitalize the economy, and repair vital ecosystems.

Both the report and the forum are a result of a new partnership by Oxfam American and The Nature Conservancy. This partnership is predicated on the idea that what is good for the environment is good for communities. Particularly in the Gulf, where people’s livelihoods are so intertwined with the Gulf’s rich natural resources, the environment must be preserved and restored if those livelihoods are to remain sustainable. We chose to partner with The Nature Conservancy because their goals and capacities lie in helping to restore the Gulf’s degraded ecosystems for the benefit of nature and people. The Conservancy has been part of the gulf Coast community for more than 35 years and with partners, has helped to protect or restore more than 3 million acres in the five Gulf States. Since 1994, Oxfam has been committed to working in the Gulf Coast—a region where the people are uniquely linked to the environment, and thus particularly sensitive to disruptions. “Our partnership with Oxfam has broadened our thinking about our goals in the Gulf. It’s extremely rewarding to know that our joint efforts will not only improve our coastal environments but also help ensure that our unique culture and way of life are preserved for generations to come,” said Cindy Brown, Director of TNC’s Gulf of Mexico Program.

As restoration continues in the Gulf of Mexico, there is still much work to be done; restoring the Gulf will not be easy or quick, but it can be done. And to be successful, restoration must focus as much on the needs of and benefits to people as it does to the lands and waters. To that end, Oxfam is proud to partner with The Nature Conservancy to promote restoration in the Gulf of Mexico. But for coastal communities to survive it’s going to take a lot more than two non-governmental organizations working together… business, communities and government agencies will have to have lots more conversations but the forum was a great start.

What if world leaders had an opportunity to set the world on track towards a sustainable future, uniting development and environment efforts, but nobody really knew it? That’s the situation Secretary Clinton is facing as she sets out to lead the US delegation at the Rio+20 Summit next week.

While the world still produces more than enough food to feed everyone, there are more hungry people today than twenty years ago. Photo: Sokunthea Chor/Oxfam America

Since the Rio ‘Earth Summit’ in 1992, progress towards achieving sustainable global development without exceeding ecological limits has stalled. While the world still produces more than enough food to feed everyone, there are more hungry people today than twenty years ago. Eighty percent of people live in areas with high levels of threats to water security, including 3.4 billion people in the most severe threat category. Globally, greenhouse gas emissions increased by 36 percent between 1992 and 2008, from around 22 to just over 30 gigatonnes.

It is vital that governments, and the US, in particular, demonstrate resolve at Rio+20 to get things back on track. While we know that binding agreements won’t be achieved or new significant sources of financing agreed to, governments can make progress towards addressing a series of critical development and environmental priorities. Here are three concrete outcomes that Secretary Clinton could help achieve at the summit:

1. Commit to establish a single set of ‘global development goals’ to guide development efforts of all countries in the post-2015 period that brings together environmental and social themes. These would build off the current UN Millennium Development Goals (MDGs).

2. Develop high-level, time-bound goals towards achieving a sustainable, resilient, and equitable food system that provides sufficient, nutritious food for all through fair shares of limited natural resources, including land and water, along with a safe climate.

3. Provide concrete pledges of technical and financial support to developing countries to deliver sustainable energy access that puts poor people first and help cut greenhouse gas pollution, and a rapid phase-out of environmentally and socially harmful energy subsidies.

Oxfam is part of a large and growing movement of inspired citizens who are choosing to build an economy that serves the people and preserves the environment. We need the US government to support and lead the way towards this vision by re-focusing economic development so that poverty can be eradicated and economic growth no longer depends on rising volumes of natural resources.

On behalf of the Obama administration, Secretary Clinton can help jumpstart this shift and provide the leadership needed to secure broad-based international consensus around this agenda in Rio. Maybe if she does, more people will start to take notice.

Victoria Marzilli is Oxfam America’s new media specialist. This blog was originally published on the Oxfam International’s GROW blog channel.

What is the G20?

The G20—or group of 20—started as a group of finance ministers and central bank governors from 20 major economies (it’s actually 19 countries, plus the European Union) that gather annually to discuss key issues in the global economy. Since 2008, the G20 has met at the head of state level. Collectively, the G20 economies account for two thirds of the world population and more than 80 percent of the gross world product (GWP). The G20 has declared itself to be the world’s premier forum for economic development, setting high expectations.

Since 2008, there have been important commitments on development made at the G20 Summit, and it’s up to us to hold our leaders accountable. In 2009, the G20 launched a framework for “strong, sustainable and balanced growth.” To pull this off, they said they would clamp down on tax havens, meet their aid commitments, and make sure the world’s poorest people got food, fuel, and finance. But so far, there has been precious little action.

What’s on the agenda?

This year, the G20 Summit is being hosted by the Mexican government in Los Cabos, Mexico on June 18 and 19. As the chair of the summit, they’ve outlined an ambitious agenda to catalyze the discussion:

1. Economic stabilization and structural reforms as foundations for growth and employment;

2. Strengthening the financial system and fostering financial inclusion to promote economic growth;

3. Improving the international financial architecture in an interconnected world;

4. Enhancing food security and addressing commodity price volatility;

5. Promoting sustainable development, green growth, and the fight against climate change.

Overwhelmed already? It’s no question that G20 leaders are facing tough challenges, along with everyone affected by the global economic crisis. But the people hit hardest are those caught in the cycle of hunger and poverty. Right now, one in seven people go to bed hungry every night; that’s nearly one billion people worldwide. And as global markets spiral and our climate becomes more erratic, food prices are along for the ride, preventing millions from escaping poverty.

It’s critical that we take advantage of this opportunity to instill fair and sustainable development practices, and respond swiftly to the crises that affect us now.

What can we do?

While our policy team is working behind the scenes to advocate for G20 policies that work towards ending poverty and hunger, we really need you to help us out. Tweet your message to the G20 with #tweetG20. We’ll bring your tweets to the Summit in Los Cabos! Choose one of our tweets from the list below, or write your own!

Tweet #tweetG20: Tonight, 1 in 7 people will go to bed hungry. #G20 must act now to fix the broken food system.

Tweet #tweetG20: Brazil lowered #hunger rates by one third from 2000 to 2007; #G20 countries can & should make ending hunger a priority.

Tweet #tweetG20: In 14 of 18 #G20 countries, inequality is on the rise.

Tweet #tweetG20: More than half of the 1.3 billion people who live on less than $1.25/day are in #G20 countries.

Tweet #tweetG20: #G20 must invest in farmers: agriculture generates 15% of exports and employs 70% of West African workers. #Sahel2012

We can all make a difference. Add your voice today.

This blog was written by climate change program director David Waskow.

Hurricanes season is upon us (it officially starts tomorrow, June 1). In vulnerable communities in places like Haiti and Central America, everyone knows it’s a time when the consequences of extreme storms can be devastating.

But it’s also a moment when businesses should be thinking about the risks they face from those extreme weather events—and from the climate change that is making those extremes more intense and more frequent. Business supply chains and operations are already being affected—including in some of the hard-hit communities around the globe that businesses depend on for their supplies and operations.

Along the coast of El Salvador, families take steps to cope with climate change. Luis Galdámez/Oxfam America.

That’s why Oxfam America, together with Ceres and Calvert Investments, released a guide today for companies and investors laying out what businesses should disclose about the physical climate risks they face and what they’re doing to manage them.

The guide builds on the guidance that the SEC released in 2010, which advised companies to disclose material risks from climate change impacts in their securities filings—from extreme weather events to increasing water scarcity and rising sea levels. There are also voluntary modes of disclosure, such as the Carbon Disclosure Project, through which companies can provide information about climate impacts they face. The new guide describes the types of impacts being faced in a set of seven key industries and outlines practicable, actionable steps that companies should take to report on physical climate risks and manage them.

In many cases, the climate impacts on business supply chains and operations are often intertwined with local communities–from facilities and employees to services and supplies. Companies need to understand—and be transparent about—the ways in which climate change is likely to affect them—not only so they can be prepared but also to ensure that the communities that they rely on are also prepared (and in order to avoid practices that undermine the climate resilience of communities).

Last year’s flooding in Thailand and Cambodia offers a dramatic and disturbing example of the way in which extreme weather events can cause extensive damage both to communities and business supply chains. More than 160 companies in Thailand’s textile industry were harmed in the floods and about a quarter of the country’s garment production was stopped in its tracks. It also was reported in the Financial Times that Dell’s share price fell by 5% at one point because of the impact from the flooding.

Of course, this is just the tip of the proverbial melting iceberg of the kind of impacts that climate change will bring. So as the changing climate bears down on us, we hope that this new guide lays the ground for businesses to acknowledge the risks that both they and communities face and to tackle this growing challenge.

Politico ran a story last week highlighting what they called the “rebranding” of global warming. Organizers and pollsters from across the country have concluded that the terms “global warming” and “climate change” have been politicized. The case pollsters and communicators make is that campaigners working on these issues need to know their audience – they need to get savvy and avoid the polarizing politics of climate change.

But the key question needs to be: what are the implications of this approach? Are organizations working on issues related to climate change sacrificing the long-term fight for short-term wins? (By the way, the group of organizations in the climate community continues to expand despite the political setbacks of recent years. The most recent members of the US Climate Action Network are the NAACP, Population Action International, and the Humane Society.) Are we perpetuating the myth that there is a debate out there about the science?

The pollsters and communicators are only getting half the story right. Yes, we need to know our audience, but we also need to know and cultivate our messengers and I don’t see that happening at levels necessary to combat catastrophic climate change. A clean air campaign focused on healthy air makes sense to defend and promote EPA carbon pollution standards—it will deliver near-term wins that are critical for the US to meet our international climate commitments— but it will not set the stage for transformational change and that is what is needed to address this issue head on.

Sustained and adequate investments need to be made in movement building organizations (e.g., 350.org) that are unafraid to talk climate change and that are unequivocally talking about the implications of climate change on communities, especially those most vulnerable who lack the resources to prepare for and respond to climate shocks. New leaders need to be cultivated (see Climate Reality Project) who are willing to get real with the American public (and those people are most likely not scientists).

We need to spend more time, energy, and money rebuilding this movement and speaking the truth to those who will listen. In the words of KC Golden, a leader in the national climate movement at Climate Solutions: “If we won’t tell more than a small fraction of the truth, how can we expect our leaders to have the political space to act on the truth? How can we even believe in ourselves enough to have any power? We can’t just be an Etch a Sketch, running from jobs to health to whatever we think will get us a little bump in the polls.” Amen to that.