South Asia: Business' impact on human rights in transboundary river systems needs addressing; five areas of action developed
"Rethinking business and human rights in transboundary river governance in South Asia", 15 June 2020
While the need for recognising and upholding human rights in transboundary river governance systems has been highlighted, ways businesses impact human rights in these systems is least explored...
As part of our on-going TROSA initiative, we recently conducted a regional analysis of water, business and human rights in the basins we work. Based on the findings, we suggest the following five areas of action and encourage governments and businesses to integrate and build more business and human rights elements in transboundary river governance in South Asia:
1. Improve businesses’ awareness and engagement on human rights in transboundary water issues
To ensure more participation, buy-in and leadership of the businesses and private investors, it is important to improve understanding and awareness on various international human rights standards and emerging initiatives on responsible business, particularly those related to the environment such as land use and water.
2. Integrate more human rights-based approach (HRBAs) and gender equality in regulatory frameworks such as Environment Impact Assessment (EIA) and Strategic Environment Assessment (SEA)
Infrastructure developers, investors and regulators should work together to revise some of the existing EIA guidelines to include more human rights-based and gender equality dimensions.