House expected to discuss Kyoto Protocol ratification
Tony Hotland, The Jakarta Post, Jakarta
After having the draft for ratification of the Kyoto Protocol on her desk for more than a year, President Megawati Soekarnoputri has finally assigned the Office of the State Minister of the Environment to discuss the draft with the House of Representatives for enactment into law.
"The assignment letter was signed on April 1, and we hope that we can seize this opportunity to finally ratify the protocol because this is a very essential issue," State Minister of the Environment Nabiel Makarim said on Tuesday.
Now that the President has opened the way for ratification, Nabiel expected that the draft would be ratified by the current members of the House's Commission VIII for environmental, science and technology affairs.
"This is a very important issue. If we don't complete the ratification quickly, we could miss out on many beneficial opportunities to compete with other countries," he added.
The House is currently in recess, and is slated to commence on April 19 with its next plenary session.
Nabiel was referring to the chance of benefiting from the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) in the protocol that provides financial benefits from industrialized countries for developing nations willing to curb carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.
The CDM is basically a practice of carbon trading, in which industrialized countries finance projects built in developing nations that help reduce CO2 to slow down the greenhouse effect. These donating countries will then be granted leeway on the amount of their own greenhouse gas emissions.
A country can be involved in the mechanism only after it ratifies the Kyoto Protocol.
Under the CDM, Indonesia, which is projected to produce up to 300 million tons of CO2 in five years, would qualify for project funds of close to US$1.26 billion.
"Besides which, we can benefit from reforestation projects," Nabiel affirmed.
Reforestation is one of the types of projects that can be implemented under the CDM. Others are the utilization of renewable energy, replacement of fossil fuels with renewable sources and waste management.
Indonesia's annual deforestation rate is estimated at around 3.8 million hectares per year, contributing to over 25 percent of the world's annual total deforestation rate of about 15 million hectares.
Fellow Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) member countries Singapore and Brunei Darussalam have ratified the Kyoto Protocol.
The Kyoto Protocol, which was conceived in 1997, binds industrialized countries to reducing their greenhouse gas emission levels to 5.2 percent below 1990 levels during the period from 2008 to 2012.
The protocol is yet to come into force internationally, pending Russia's ratification.