UN conference

Bali roadmap on climate change

The main goal of Bali conference was to start negotiations on a new international climate change agreement. It was not expected to achieve a decisive climate deal, but to lay the foundations. The so-called "Bali roadmap", a single document containing all the ambitious demands made by both developed and developing countries, is considered as a breakthrough on climate change by most of the delegates


By MARIA ENCINAR
from La Coruna, SPAIN


United Nations hosted a climate change conference in Bali from December 3rd to 14th 2007. Representatives from over 180 nations, together with observers from intergovernmental organizations and NGO's, assembled to negotiate a new agreement to succeed the Kyoto protocol, which expires in 2012.

The Kyoto protocol is an international agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions that cause climate change. In 1997 a total of 174 countries ratified the pact at UN Conference in Kyoto to reduce the emissions to at least 5% below 1990 levels by 2008-12.

The main goal of Bali conference was to start negotiations on a new international climate change agreement. It was not expected to achieve a decisive climate deal, but to lay the foundations. The so-called "Bali roadmap", a single document containing all the ambitious demands made by both developed and developing countries, is considered as a breakthrough on climate change by most of the delegates.

It was not an easy task. United States' turn at the end of the last day caused panic. "We are not prepared to accept this formulation" they said. First silence, then boos and hisses. But delegations carried on accepting the draft until the representative from Papua Nueva Guinea, Kevin Conrad, dare to say what no-one did before: "There is an old saying, if you are not going to lead, you should get out of the way and so I say to the United States: we ask for your leadership but if you are not going to lead, leave it to us. Get out of the way." Shortly after, Paula Dobriansky, chief US negotiator, replied: "We have listened very closely to many of our colleagues […], we will go forward and join the consensus".

And so the deal was sealed, in spite of the determination not to firm anything of US and Canada, for ideological reasons, and Japan because it is already struggling to carry out its Kyoto target; and developing nations, in particular China and India, stuck with their deep-seated refusal to accept limits on emissions, despite predictions that they will soon become the dominant sources of climate-warming gases.

The decision includes a tight agenda for the key issues to be negotiated by late 2009, before Copenhagen conference. Indonesian Environment Minister and President of the conference, Rachmat Witoelar said: "We now have a "Bali roadmap", we have an agenda and we have a deadline. "But we also have a huge task ahead of us and time to reach agreement is extremely short, so we need to move quickly," he added.

According to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), some of these actions to be taken are: adaptation to the negative consequences of climate change, such as droughts and floods; measures to reduce greenhouse gas emissions; ways to extend the use of climate-friendly technologies and finance both adaptation and mitigation process.

While a new global deal is envisaged for 2012, countries also agreed on a number of measures that need to be taken immediately to further enforce the existing commitments of Parties to the UNFCCC. These topics are remarkably important for developing countries. They agreed on a system that would compensate developing countries for protecting their rain forests, a plan that environmentalists described as an innovative effort to lessen global warming.

After former US vice president's speech, Al Gore, on Thursday the mood changed. The Nobel Peace Prize winner said: "I'm not an official of the US and I am not bound by diplomatic niceties. My own country, the US is principally responsible for blocking the process here in Bali". And the crowd went crazy.

Gore knew there was only one day left and he thought he had the solution: "Those of you who applauded can do one of two things here - you can feel anger and frustration and direct it at US, or you can decide to move forward and do all the difficult work that needs to be done and save a large open blank space in your document and put a footnote by it [which read] 'this document is incomplete but we are going to move forward anyway on the hope that that blank will be filled in'."


(Published: 10.01.2008.)

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