An Asean plan for corporate citizenship?

THIS month, 196 State parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) met in Paris to agree upon a historic agreement to combat climate change. The Paris Agreement is designed to limit global warming to less than two degrees centigrade. It sends a clear signal to the fossil fuel industry: their unchecked expansion must end.

The handwriting has been on the wall for a while. Ahead of the Paris conference, The Guardian reported in September that "institutions worth US$2.6 trillion have now pulled investments out of fossil fuels". Although it has its fair share of critics, the Paris Agreement is revolutionary and has widespread acceptance. It expressly acknowledges that countries should respect and promote human rights in addressing climate change. Of course, uncertainty is associated with each link of the causal chain of climate change and transboundary pollution. But the agreement reiterates the importance of the precautionary principle enshrined in the UNFCCC decades ago, which states that uncertainty is not a reason for inaction.

Around the world, legislators have introduced bills urging countries to divest from fossil fuels. Closer to home, the Philippine Human Rights Commission will investigate the climate change impacts of more than 50 of the biggest fossil fuel companies. It accepted a petition, filed by Greenpeace Southeast Asia, requesting investigations of these companies for human rights violations resulting from impacts of climate change, and to recommend legislation that will provide for accountability mechanisms relating to human rights and the environment.