In the News: Farhana Sultana

"The most important action the Biden administration can do is to undertake all its policies and actions through a climate justice lens...and approach action with equity, accountability and justice in mind," says Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and the environment.

"This was a climate election since a large majority of voters noted that they were concerned with climate breakdown," says Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and the environment. "Biden has a climate plan and a mandate and he has promised to listen to scientists…which is vastly different from the last four years of war on science." 

Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and the environment, participated in "Intersectionality and Climate justice: Towards an Emancipatory Climate Research Agenda," an event organized by the Centre for Climate Justice at Glasgow Caledonian University. The international webinar brought together critical scholars interested in climate justice and intersectionality with the aim of exploring common threads between the two concepts.

Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and the environment, says "a divestment from fossil fuels signals a commitment to ending climate breakdown, to have climate justice, and to think about equitable and just transitions toward regenerative economies and societies that move away from fossil fuels."

"Our challenge is to use the insights and critical reflections of our moment to create critical, anti-racist and inclusive studying spaces, in ways that resist the neoliberal tendency towards policy standardisation and replicable models, and the job cuts that often come with it," writes Associate Professor of Geography and the Environment Farhana Sultana and her co-authors.

"We need to democratize how water is managed and governed," says Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography. "So that all voices are heard and much more ethical practices around water are pursued." Sultana was recently a guest on Princeton Environmental Institute's All for Earth podcast. Fundamentally, we need to "ensure that principles of equity collaboration and inclusivity are central to all of this," she adds. "Because we need to really have a better understanding of how water is very much a moral issue. And as a result that will help us think about much better transformations that are equitable and inclusive. In order to fight for water justice for all." 

Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography and research director for environmental collaboration and conflicts, has been awarded the 2019 Glenda Laws Award, which recognizes outstanding contributions to geographic research on social issues. 

Looking back on how scientists responded to climate change over the past 30 years, Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography, says "a positive outcome is that today a number of young people understand and care about the impacts of climate change…with a greater focus on issues of equity and justice."

Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography, examines a multitude of social issues related to access to clean water, including health, education, environmental justice and gender equality. Due to her decades-long research into water access, Sultana was invited to speak at The Human Right to Water workshop hosted by the Pontifical Academy of Sciences in Vatican City.

The essays, edited by Farhana Sultana, associate professor of geography, highlight the links between bio-physical and socio-cultural processes, making connections between local and global scales, and focusing on the everyday practices of eating and drinking, essential for human survival.