The Price of Food: Evaluating the effectiveness of the international human rights framework in regulating the impacts of agribusinesses on the right to food amidst the climate crisis

Abstract: This thesis is concerned with the relationship between agribusinesses and the right to food and examines how the international framework of human rights law regulates the impacts of the industry’s activities on this right. Considering the contemporary challenges that climate change poses to the right to food, this thesis also looks into the role agribusinesses have played in fueling the climate crisis and how that also affects the right to food. This thesis thus examines the adequacy of the international human rights framework in regulating agribusinesses, who are non-state actors, and in protecting the right to food against the industry’s direct impacts on the right and its contribution to climate change. After examining research and publications on the subjects of climate change and the agribusiness industry, the thesis dives into the topic of the international framework of the right to food, evaluating how existing international legal instruments and mechanisms operate to protect this right when it comes to acts perpetrated by non-actors and the principles behind the concept of non-state actors obligations. The conclusion is that the international framework of the right to food (and of human rights as a whole) must evolve a step further and change its approach to non-state actors’ obligations. This thesis also discusses possible avenues of change for the international framework of human rights and addresses the feasibility of these proposals as well as the potential challenges of their implementation.