UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres | Credit: earthconsciousmagazine.comBy Taro Ichikawa
Courtesy IDN-InDepth NewsAnalysis
BANGKOK (IDN) - One would think that the triple disaster in Japan, unleashed by the 9 magnitude earthquake, and unprecedented flooding and mudslides in the south of Thailand would motivate government officials from around the world to agree on concrete and binding steps to halt global warming that would endanger all life on planet Earth.
But the reality emerging from the UN Climate Change conference in Bangkok, the capital of Thailand, is far removed from compelling logic. In fact, going by cold logic, there is no link between impending global warming and the devastation and human suffering that has resulted from the earthquake, tsunami and the nuclear crisis embodied by Fukushima. Earthquakes are after all not unusual in Japan.
And, there is no irrefutable scientific evidence either that exceptional flooding and mudslides in Thailand are fallout of a creeping global warming.
Whatever the validity of such arguments, the Fukushima atomic Frankenstein has one distinct message for humankind: don't wait for catastrophes to happen before you believe they could happen, follow your common sense and take necessary measures to stave off disasters.
Following this common sense, Thailand's Natural Resources and Environment Minister Suwit Khunkitti argued on April 5, 2011 that the Kyoto Protocol -- agreed in the former imperial capital of Japan -- legally binds industrialised nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, and their support must continue.
"We need to extend the enforcement of the Kyoto Protocol until we have a new mechanism to reduce greenhouse gases," he said addressing the first formal round of climate change negotiations in 2011.
"We support extension of the Kyoto Protocol because we have no confidence in rich nations signing up for a second commitment period," he added.
The second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol sets binding greenhouse gas emission targets on rich nations from 2013 to 2018. The uncertainty of industrialised nations supporting the second commitment will affect the mechanism to reduce emissions, Suwit said.
Presently, Japan and Russia are turning a cold shoulder to extending the Kyoto Protocol, while the Group of 77 developing countries and China have expressed strong support for its extension.
"If the Kyoto Protocol expires, industrialised nations will no longer take responsibility for reducing greenhousegas emissions," a G77 source told the Bangkok 'Nation'.
The Kyoto Protocol obliges industrial nations to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by 30 per cent since it was agreed in 1997.
Suwit also called for rich nations to support financial resources and technology transfer to developing nations to fight global warming -- but, the source said, so far there had been no progress from developed nations in helping developing countries.
Representatives from Japan have insisted strongly that their country will not support an extension of the Kyoto Protocol. However, they said Japan would continue its role in tackling climate change and make all possible contributions.
Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), urged the Bangkok meet "to push ahead to complete the work the governments had agreed to in Cancun (end of 2010), and to chart a way forward that will ensure renewed success in Durban" that will host the next global conference end of the year.
Figueres argued that "if they move forward in the continued spirit of flexibility and compromise that inspired them in Cancun, I am confident that they will be able to make significant new progress this year."
In Cancun, governments set a timetable to launch new institutions and sources of funding and technology to help developing countries deal comprehensively and sustainably with climate change. "This is exactly the concrete work that needs to be rapidly advanced," said Figueres.
In Cancun, governments also expressly agreed that the global average temperature rise should not exceed two degrees. But their work to create the long-term political certainty that would drive the higher emission cuts required to meet this temperature goal is not yet complete.
Countries have formally put forward their national plans to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, but the sum of these efforts still falls short of the required, long-term effort, said the UNFCCC executive secretary.
The sum of national promises so far equals only 60 percent of what science says is required to have a medium chance of staying below the two degree goal, she said. Moreover, a coordinated system to manage and deploy enough resources to protect the poor and vulnerable from existing climate change is not yet adequate.
So, said Figueres, during this year, governments have two main tasks to address these shortfalls:
First, they need to resolve fundamental issues over the future of the Kyoto Protocol -- the only existing agreement where almost all industrialised countries agreed internationally-binding commitments to reduce emissions over time.
The first period of these commitments under the protocol expires at the end of 2012 and governments have to face the fact that a gap in this effort looks increasingly impossible to avoid.
In 2011, they need to figure out how to address this issue and how to take it forward in a collective and inclusive way. Resolving this will create a firmer foundation for an even greater collective ambition to cut emissions,
Second, governments need to complete their agreed work to ensure the broader global climate regime which Cancun designed is functioning and effective in 2012. That means delivering agreed actions and institutions on time to ensure the deadlines set out in the Cancun Agreements are met.
Noeleen Heyzer, executive secretary of the UN Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), said climate change was no longer a distant threat. It was a reality and a sign of what lies ahead.
Disasters related to weather and climate are occurring in Asia-Pacific with increasing frequency. The human toll is immense -- more than any other region. In fact, Asia has accounted for 80 per cent of the world's deaths caused by natural disaster in the past decade.
"Action on climate change therefore cannot wait, and people are calling for action now. We need a new sense of urgency and responsibility," she said. "It is our responsibility to not only protect our people and our economy today, but also to prepare for future economies."
"We must be responsible in how we use the Earth's resources. The gifts which we take for granted are not guaranteed," she added.
Developed nations' pledges of emission cut and climate change finance were inadequate in saving the world from global warming, experts said on April 5. They also claimed that some of the monetary assistance promised by major industrialised countries for developing nations was actually a means to finance the former group to achieve their emission cut target.
