United Nations climate conference gears up and `get serious'

Stevie Emilia, The Jakarta Post, New Delhi

India said on Wednesday that poor countries battling to feed their starving populace should not be set the same targets as rich nations for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

In a speech marking the opening of the ministerial section of the high-powered UN climate conference here, Indian Prime Minister Atal Behari Vajpayee said: "Developing countries do not have adequate resources to meet their basic human needs. Climate change mitigation will bring additional strain to the already fragile economies of the developing countries and will affect our efforts to achieve higher GDP growth rates to eradicate poverty speedily."

Vajpayee also expressed India's strong commitment to the goals of sustainable development, citing his country has one of the most active renewable energy programs in the world.

But he pointed out that his country's contribution, just like all developing countries, to greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere is very little compared to industrialized countries. "Tragically, however, developing countries will bear a disproportionate burden of the adverse impacts of climate change."

Although 96 countries have ratified the Kyoto Protocol, their emissions only represent 37.4 percent of the emissions of Annex I countries in 1990. With the U.S. refusing to ratify the protocol, which binds industrialized countries to cut greenhouse gas emissions, Russia and Canada's ratification will play a key role to make the protocol come into effect next year.

Around the world, people are already confronted by the negative consequences of development patterns that do not adhere to sustainability principles.

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC) Executive Secretary Joke Waller-Hunter warned that in recent months, the world has seen an unprecedented number of extreme weather events like floods in China and Europe and droughts in Africa and Asia.

"These events provide a dramatic backdrop to our conference. They are consistent with model projections by the scientific community," she said.

Under the new segment, three closed high-level round table meetings are scheduled to last until late Thursday with the general theme on implementation of the Convention and the Kyoto Protocol.

In the 10-day conference, Indonesia is represented by a 17- member delegation comprising officials from related ministries, members of associations, NGOs and a forestry expert. Minister of the Environment Nabiel Makarim was represented by his deputy on environment conservation, Liana Bratasida.

However, Liana said she found no significant progress in the ongoing negotiations as some issues still had to be brought to the next climate conference.

She also saw no real efforts from industrialized countries to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. Even in conducting clean development mechanism (CDM) pilot projects in developing countries, industrialized countries were still trying to find loopholes for their own interests.

"But let's see in the last few days," Liana said. "Right now everything is still in process," she said adding that even now there's still no consensus on the proposed draft of the Delhi Declaration.