Durban delivers unexpected breakthrough

A marathon United Nations climate conference in Durban on Sunday approved a road map toward an accord which, for the first time, will bring all major emitters of greenhouse gases under a single legal roof – signalling unexpected success for the South African-led summit. If approved as scheduled in 2015, the pact will be operational from 2020 and become the prime weapon in the fight against climate change.

The deal was reached after nearly 14 days of talks under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The result came despite pessimism until late in the process, and efforts by some delegates to shift the blame for what seemed, at that stage, certain failure on the part of South Africa’s leaders at the conference.

The world forum launched a "Green Climate Fund" to help channel up to $100 billion per year in aid to poor, vulnerable countries by 2020 – an initiative born under the 2009 Copenhagen Summit. (Source: www.news24.com, 11 December 2011)
Approval came after two and a half days of round-the-clock wrangling among 194 nations.
Even by UNFCCC standards, the meeting broke the record for going into overtime.
The talks should have ended on Friday, but wrapped up at dawn on Sunday – with exhaustion and frayed nerves apparent among delegates.

Breakthrough

UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon hailed the "significant" breakthrough that produced a road map toward an accord to join all major greenhouse-gas emitters.

"The secretary-general welcomes the package of decisions known as the Durban Platform that was reached by the 194 parties to the Climate Change Convention in Durban today," he said in a statement to AFP.

Ban added that the agreement "will guide global efforts to address the causes and impacts of climate change".

"The Durban Platform represents a significant and forward agreement that defines how the international community will address climate change in the coming years," the UN leader said.

The breakthrough will be greeted with a mixture of cynicism and cautious optimism. The real value lies in the commitment to extend a helping hand via the Green Climate Fund to poor countries, as well as in getting the global community on board.

But an accord is as strong as its weakest link, and pivotal would be the use of technology and mechanisms to give feedback through the media on annual levels of greenhouse gas emissions from powerhouses such as China, the United States and India in the next nine years.

The watchdog role of the media and Greenpeace International, as well as the commitment by the European Union and the UN, could strengthen the entire process – or scuttle it, if they do not exert enough pressure.

Threatened failure

The COP 17 summit in Durban seemed certain to fail after India threatened to walk out.

The emerging major power was protesting against EU plans to force all countries to cut carbon emissions as part of a legally binding treaty.

As the talks ran over into the second night, it seemed the exhausted delegates would have to give up and go home empty-handed.

But, in a highly unusual form of on-the-hoof diplomacy, the warring female ministers were forced to go into a public huddle to find a resolution.

The “10 minutes to save the world” resulted in a form of words with which both parties could live, and relieved applause from the other 190 countries, reported Britain’s The Telegraph.

The new deal means that, for the first time, every country in the world is committed to cutting carbon – although the legal wording remains vague and the treaty will not come into force until 2020.

Non-governmental organisations point out that the "Durban road map" is still too weak to stop temperatures rising above the "danger point" of 2°C because it does not set tough targets for emissions cuts or a quick enough timetable.

However, Chris Huhne, the UK energy and climate change secretary, who played a key role in the talks, insisted it was a “huge step forward” – particularly after the failure of the last high-profile UN attempt at a deal in Copenhagen in 2009.

He pointed out that the world’s three biggest polluters – the US, China and India – who account for almost half the world’s emissions, are now committed to cutting carbon. (Source: The Telegraph, 11 December 2011)

“What we have done today is a great success for European diplomacy. We have managed to put this on the map and take the major emitters – the US, India and China – to a road map that will secure an overarching deal.”

In particular, the inclusion of the US, which has resisted any previous attempts to be part of a global deal, is a significant move.

Todd Stern, the US climate envoy, said every country made compromises.

"This is a very significant package. None of us likes everything in it. Believe me, there is plenty the United States is not thrilled about," he added.

South African assessment

Maite Nkoana-Mashabane, the president of the conference and South Africa’s minister of International Relations and Co-operation, said the longest UN climate change meeting in history had been a roller coaster.

“We have saved Planet Earth for the future of our children and our great-grandchildren to come. We have made history,” she said.

"The Durban Platform for Enhanced Action is carefully worded to ensure all countries are comfortable with the legal form.”

It commits all parties to “a protocol, another legal instrument or an agreed outcome with legal force”, which will be decided in 2015 and come into force in 2020.

In the interim, between now and 2020, only Europe and a handful of rich countries are legally bound to cut carbon emissions through a second commitment period of the Kyoto Protocol.

The deal further includes plans to set up a Green Climate Fund which, from 2020, will channel around $100bn per year toward helping countries adapt to climate change.

The UK has already committed £3.4bn to fight climate change and will be expected to donate around £1bn a year to the new fund once it is set up.

There are further plans to pay poor countries not to chop down trees in an attempt to stop deforestation; and plans to look at taxing aviation and shipping.

The commitment to emissions cuts sends a clear signal to business to start investing in green technologies such as wind turbines.

More is required

Kumi Naidoo, executive director of Greenpeace International, who was thrown out of the conference centre for protesting earlier in the week, told The Telegraph that the deal was not enough to stop dangerous climate change.

The UN warns that emissions have to peak before 2020 and start coming down to keep the temperature rise below 2°C.

"The chance of averting catastrophic climate change is slipping through our hands with every passing year that nations fail to agree on a rescue plan for the planet,” said Naidoo.

Samantha Smith of the World Wide Fund for Nature International said the compromise had watered down the deal to such an extent that it had become almost meaningless. "They haven't reached a real deal," she noted. "They watered things down so everyone could get on board."

Celine Charveriat, director of campaigns and advocacy for Oxfam, said the world is “sleepwalking towards 4°C”, when millions of people will be displaced by floods and drought.

“The failure to seal an ambitious deal will have painful consequences for poor people around the world,” she said. “A 4°C temperature rise could be one of utter devastation for poor farmers, who will face increasing hunger and poverty.”