Chile and Spain strengthen their national climate change laws

The EUROCLIMA+ programme , through FIIAPP, has held the webinar “Climate Change Laws in Chile and Spain:Visions of their Participatory Processes”. The meeting, which analysed the participatory processes carried out by Chile and Spain in the consultations conducted on their respective climate change bills, was attended by more than 200 people from Latin America and Europe.

The respective houses of representatives in Chile and Spain are in the process of discussing their first climate change bills that recognize carbon neutrality by 2050. EUROCLIMA+, a European Union-financed programme, has supported, through FIIAPP, the process of building the first draft of the climate change framework law in Chile.

The trans-Andean country has developed its Draft Framework Law on Climate Change with a broad and extensive participatory process to collect the observations of citizens and, based on this, identify the content that should be present in the law. 1800 people took part in this process, which took place between July 2018 and January 2019.

In their presentations, the representatives from the Chilean Ministry of the Environment highlighted the need to incorporate the principles of equity and transversality as fundamental elements of citizen participation. In addition, they stressed the importance of climate change laws as key tools to drive the implementation of the Paris agreement, which includes decarbonisation goals.

In the case of Spain, the draft Climate Change and Energy Transition Law (PLCCTE) is the regulatory and institutional framework to facilitate and guide the decarbonisation of the Spanish economy by 2050. The PLCCTE has been submitted for public consultation and hearing and has been modified during this process. Helena Fabra, the representative of the Spanish Office for Climate Change (OECC), talked about its development, highlighting the pioneering move in Spain, both nationally and at sector level, to include the participatory dimension in its design: “It has been possible to conduct a broad public consultation with citizens, including individuals, companies, NGOs and public officials.”

About EUROCLIMA+

EUROCLIMA+ is a programme funded by the European Union to promote environmentally sustainable and climate-resilient development in 18 Latin American countries, especially for the benefit of the most vulnerable populations. The programme is implemented through the synergic work of seven agencies: Spanish Agency for International Development Cooperation (AECID), French Development Agency (AFD), Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), Deutsche GesellschaftfürInternationaleZusammenarbeit (GIZ) GmbH, Expertise France (EF), FIIAPP and UN Environment Programme.