U.S., Russia pushed to cut emission levels

Stevie Emilia, The Jakarta Post, Milan, Italy

With developed countries reluctant to ratify an agreement to cut carbon dioxide emissions, hopes still remained for their change of heart as some 4,000 participants gathered here to put pressure on the major states.

As Russia continues to delay its ratification and the United States has openly refused to ratify, the treaty, known as the Kyoto Protocol, is again at stake at the ongoing 9th Session of the Conference of the Parties to the Climate Change Convention.

The Protocol is subject to ratification and will enter into force 90 days after the date on which it is signed by no less than 55 parties to the Convention -- including industrialized countries that represent at least 55 percent of the total carbon dioxide emissions in 1990.

According to Deputy Minister for Environmental Preservation Liana Bratasida, who heads Indonesia's 18-member delegation to the 12-day conference, the Protocol offers a common ground upon which to deal with issues of climatic change, as it prepares frameworks and policies to address the problems, which is particularly relevant for an archipelagic country like Indonesia.

"Think about our small islands that will vanish if the climate change gets worse," she told The Jakarta Post on Monday.

Liana was preparing for the conference's two-day high-level session, which starts on Wednesday at the Fiera Milano Congress Center. Some 80 ministers from around the world are expected to attend the session, to be addressed by Italian Prime Minister Silvio Berlusconi.

"Around the world, people have started to experience the impacts of global warming and if the Kyoto fails, in my opinion, it will be a disaster," Liana said.

"And it's sad if (it fails) just because developed countries refuse or delay the ratification -- all the efforts we've been making for years will have been a waste of time and money."

The international community adopted the Climate Change Convention during the 1992 Earth Summit, aiming to stabilize atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases at safe levels.

In 1997, the Parties to the Convention agreed that by consensus that developed countries should make legally binding commitments to reduce their collective greenhouse gases by at least 5 percent from that of the 1990 level by the 2008-2012 period.

Moekti H. Soejachmoen, deputy director of the Pelangi Research Institute that focuses on energy, forestry, transportation, air pollution and climate change issues, expressed his faith that the Protocol will come into force after Russia's presidential election next year.

If Russia fails to ratify the Protocol, Moekti said it would be a great waste, since the Protocol was 90 percent ready and only waiting to come into force.

She said she felt confident of the Protocol, as several clean development mechanism (CDM) projects on energy had already commenced and details on forestry CDM were being negotiated.

"So far, from the first day of the conference, from the ongoing process, in seems many people still believe the Protocol will eventually come into force," Moekti said.

Under the CDM of the Kyoto Protocol, developed countries are allowed to meet part of their carbon emission reduction commitments by carrying out reforestation and clean energy projects in developing countries.

The mechanism has been designed with a dual goal: To achieve cost-effective greenhouse gas mitigation for industrialized countries and to promote sustainable development in developing countries.

In return for investing in a sustainable development project that cuts or avoids emissions in a developing country, companies will earn certified emission reductions that developed countries may use to meet their Kyoto commitments.