ID: 1742
Presenting Author: Nataly Sarmiento
Session: 638 - Five years of the Escazú Agreement – Delivering on its promise?
Status: pending
Explores how the Escazú Agreement’s promise is strengthened by embedding environmental access rights within enhanced due diligence by companies operating in conflict-affected and shrinking civic space
Five years after entering into force, the Escazú Agreement embodies both regional aspiration and systemic fragility. While it has advanced discourse on environmental democracy, its implementation reveals the tension between normative ambition and political reality. Across Latin America, shifting political landscapes and the global backlash against human rights and DEIA agendas have eroded institutional commitment to participation, justice, and protection.
From a business and human rights perspective, Escazú offers an underexplored bridge between access rights and enhanced human rights due diligence in conflict-affected or high-risk environments. Yet companies and regulators often approach these obligations in isolation, failing to translate the Agreement’s principles into operational safeguards for environmental defenders or meaningful participation of rightsholders.
This presentation, grounded in case material from Colombia and Central America, argues that Escazú’s true transformative power lies in reframing corporate due diligence as a mechanism for preventive protection—aligning civic space, environmental governance, and corporate accountability. It also reflects on the paradox of progress amid regression: how the current political moment challenges not only state compliance but also business responsibility to respect those defending the environment. Ultimately, the paper contends that Escazú can still deliver on its promise—but only if its procedural rights are internalized as due diligence imperatives within both public and private decision-making.
Regional Representative for Latin America at the Danish Institute for Human Rights, Nataly Sarmiento leads initiatives linking human rights, environmental governance, and sustainable developme