ClientEarth has appointed Joyce Melcar Tan to run the climate law non-profit’s energy transition and nature programmes in Japan and Southeast Asia.
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She takes on the role of associate director for Japan and Southeast Asia, and replaces Peter Barnett, who moves on from the organisation after more than six years.
Tan will be based in London, although ClientEarth said the mid- to long-term plan was for the organisation’s Asia-focused executives to be based in Asia.
ClientEarth launched in Asia in 2016 with an office in Beijing focused on training China’s Ministry of Ecology and Environment and the Supreme People’s Court in better environmental law practices.
The organisation, which now has a team of 30 legal experts in Beijing, Tokyo and Southeast Asia, has taken a “tailored approach” to the region, focusing on building legal frameworks to address climate change rather than take legal action against big polluters, as it has done in the West.
Tan joined ClientEarth in 2020 as the first lawyer in its Japan and Southeast Asia regional team, working to strengthen corporate climate governance, financial and energy regulation and environmental rule of law across the region.
Over her career, Tan has worked for Philippine law firm SyCipLaw, consulted for the Asian Development Bank and worked in environmental law research for the Center for Law, Justice and Society in Colombia. She has advised government officials negotiating at the COP21 and COP22 climate talks on climate finance and capacity building.
Last year, a study by Columbia University’s Sabin Center for Climate Change Law found that legal claims made against carbon polluters are rapidly increasing as climate impacts worsen, with climate-vulnerable nations in the Global South accounting for a small but growing proportion of climate lawsuits globally.
