Will the Kyoto Protocol ever take effect?

Stevie Emilia, The Jakarta Post, New Delhi

The Delhi Ministerial Declaration on Climate Change and Sustainable Development was adopted on Friday by ministers and senior officials from some 170 countries. It is seen as a step closer to the implementation of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol on climate change.

Still, the declaration leaves one question unanswered: Will the landmark protocol eventually take effect when the world's biggest polluter, the U.S., openly refuses to ratify, pinning hopes on Russia and Canada?

The protocol is expected to go into force 90 days after it has been ratified by at least 55 parties to the convention, including developed countries accounting for at least 55 percent of the total carbon dioxide emissions in 1990 from the industrialized group.

Under the protocol, industrialized countries will reduce their combined greenhouse gas emissions by at least 5 percent of the level in 1990 by the years 2008 to 2012. This legally binding commitment promises to produce a historic reversal of the upward trend in emissions that started in these countries some 150 years back.

So far, 96 parties have ratified it, including developed countries accounting for 37.4 percent of CO2 emissions. Poland and the Republic of Korea announced their ratification at the Delhi conference.

"The Delhi Declaration will provide a new direction to our approach to climate change issues," the president of the eighth climate conference, T.R. Baalu, who is also the Indian Minister of Environment, said after the declaration.

But not everybody is happy with the declaration.

A member of the Indonesian delegation, Agus Pratama Sari, who is also the executive director of an independent research organization on forestry and climate, Pelangi, found it "weak" and containing a lot of buzz words. He said there were no clear implementation guidelines and some problems would still have to be worked out at the next climate conference next year in Italy. He said the declaration mostly satisfied developed countries since it failed to clearly spell out their obligations to cut down on greenhouse gas emissions.

"And it should have named countries which should immediately ratify the protocol," he said.

The declaration, however, only says that "parties that have ratified the Kyoto Protocol strongly urge the parties that have not already done so to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in a timely manner".

World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF) International was disappointed by the lack of urgency in addressing the dangerous impact from climate changes, such as the increased intensity of extreme weather events, coral bleaching and the rise in sea level.

"WWF welcomes Canada's further moves toward ratification and calls on Russia to ratify as soon as possible so that the Protocol can become international law," said Jennifer Morgan, the director of WWF's climate change program.

The group also accused the United States, which sent a delegation to the conference, and Saudi Arabia of trying to undermine the conference's process, saying that the two worked together in a series of well-coordinated steps to cast doubts on the widely accepted scientific findings and polarizing the North/South debate by actively provoking confusion and dissent.

Despite uncertainty whether the Protocol will come into effect as expected next year, the conference was successful in making the protocol's clean development mechanism fully operational. The mechanism will channel private-sector investment into emission- reduction projects in developing countries. In this way, it is hoped to promote sustainable development in these countries while offering industrialized governments credit against their Kyoto targets. The first projects are likely to be approved during the first quarter of 2003.

The conference also concluded three years of work on the procedures for reporting and reviewing emissions data from developed countries. The result is an unprecedented international system for ensuring that national data on greenhouse gas emissions are comparable and credible. This is vital for safeguarding the integrity of the Kyoto agreement and promoting compliance with its emissions targets. The parties improved the guidelines for reporting by non-annex I parties of the convention. These guidelines should substantially improve the quality of reports and be a means of assisting non-annex I parties in identifying important needs under the convention.

It stresses that in addition to mitigation, a high priority needs to be given to adapting to the adverse impact of climate changes. The declaration reiterates the importance of carrying out all existing international commitments under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC).

The declaration further promotes less polluting energy and other innovative technologies. It urges governments to promote technological advances through research and development, to substantially increase renewable energy resources and to promote the transfer of technologies that can help reduce greenhouse gas emissions in major economic sectors, including through the public sector and market-oriented approaches.

The UNFCC Executive Secretary Joke Waller-Hunter said that the conference had achieved its main goals of further strengthening the international collaboration on climate change while meeting the requirements of sustainable development.

"Now the spotlight must focus on action to accelerate the transition to climate-friendly economies. Industrialized countries have only 10 years to meet their Kyoto emissions targets and the evidence today is that most of them still have a great deal of work to do to reduce their greenhouse gases," Waller-Hunter said.

In the conference, delegates also agreed on improved guidelines for national communications from developing countries. Governments issue these communications on a regular basis in order to share information with others about their climate change policies and activities.