Rights of Nature, Rights of Humanity
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Climate change
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Water
The rights of nature was a relevant topic during the 2025 IUCN World Conservation Congress in Abu Dhabi, which brought together decision-makers from governments, civil society, Indigenous Peoples’ organisations, academia, and business to shape the course of global environmental action for the years ahead. Among the motions adopted was Motion 067: Living in harmony with rivers through the rights of nature and ecocentric law. This resolution strengthens the growing global momentum to recognise rivers, wetlands, and other ecosystems as rights-bearing entities.
The motion strengthens global efforts to advance the Rights of Nature by focusing specifically on rivers and wetlands, recognising them as living systems essential to sustaining life. It calls on governments, IUCN Members, and Commissions to promote the protection and restoration of rivers and wetlands through cross-border cooperation, knowledge sharing, and alignment with other rights-based initiatives.
A motion shaped by interdependence
Rivers, lakes, and other wetlands sustain every aspect of life, from the water we drink to the climate we depend on. Yet, freshwater ecosystems continue to decline at a faster rate than any other biome, with an 83% decline in freshwater species populations since 1970, and nearly one-third of the world’s wetlands lost.
Every degraded river translates into unsafe drinking water, failed crops, displacement, and a deepening inequality. Environmental collapse and humanitarian suffering are always interdependent.
Motion 067 calls for stronger protection of rivers as ecosystems and affirms that rivers, and by extension, all freshwater systems, hold inherent rights to flow freely, be free from pollution, and sustain life. It encourages states to establish legal frameworks and mechanisms that give rivers a formal voice and ensure that Indigenous Peoples, local communities, youth, and women play a central role in governance.
It also explicitly references the rights of wetlands, advancing the work of the Rights of Wetlands programme led by Wetlands International Eastern Africa (WIEA) and supported by the Darwin Initiative. Through this initiative (submitted to the UN Water Action Agenda), efforts are underway to put the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Wetlands into practice, guided by the idea that wetlands are not just resources to be used, but living systems with the right to exist, regenerate, and thrive. Together, these efforts contribute to the kind of transformative change guided by IPBES, where nature is not managed as a resource, but respected as a living system.
A growing movement across the world
Among the outcomes, five other resolutions that were adopted also acknowledge the rights of nature. Motion 054, Operationalising the rights of nature and evaluating their implementation in territories, stands out as a turning point. The motion calls on governments to recognise nature’s rights in law and to apply them across protected and conserved areas. The motion also urges that Indigenous Peoples and local communities be at the centre of these efforts.
Other motions that also stood out as a voice of nature included the Recognition of the rights of Antarctica (Motion 055), advancing an ethical human–ocean relationship (Motion 056), and a call for recognising the crime of ecocide to protect nature (Motion 061). Each of these motions recognises what Indigenous communities have always known and advocated – that the well-being of people and planet are inseparable.
Motion 067 lays valuable groundwork for a resolution on the Rights of Wetlands, which is expected to be brought by Sri Lanka to the Convention on Wetlands COP16 in Panama in 2028, as another step towards recognising wetlands as living systems whose well-being ensures our own.
The motion turns principle into action, calling for stronger protection and restoration of rivers and wetlands through cooperation, fair governance, and recognition of nature’s own rights. It encourages collaboration across borders, alignment between rights-based efforts, and greater inclusion of Indigenous Peoples, local communities, youth, and women in shaping how rivers are cared for.
A deeper meaning to “all life matters”
From nature’s perspective, all life does matter. But it’s on us to live as if we truly understand what that means — to extend empathy to all living beings, acknowledging the communities on the margins and every being whose right to thrive has been forgotten.
We must not forget nor let this momentum overshadow the humanitarian crises that continue to unfold across the world. From war to hunger, from displacement to loss, human suffering remains immense. The Rights of Nature should serve as a reminder of shared fragility that all life is connected, and that true progress can be realised only when truly every life is treated as if it matters.