Transnational Corporations – Duty Bearers of Obligations to Respect Right to Food and Right to Environment as Human Rights: From Utopia to Reality?

Abstract

Summary Human rights promotion and protection is no more the issue of States only. Other non-states actors are directly or indirectly involved in this area. This is even more right for so called rights of second or third generation where States´ activities are interconnected with economic and social stakeholders. Especially, the right to food and right to environment are at stake when speaking about business activities of transnational corporations. The present article discusses the role transnational corporations play in the implementation of right to food and right to environment. Authors first addresses basic interconnections between TNCs´ business activities and right to food and right to environment (1); second they theoretically approach TNCs´ obligation to respect human rights (2), before developing general issues of right to food and right to healthy environment (3). Finally, they pinpoint scenarios of TNCs as duty-bearers with respect to right to food and right to environment.