Posts Tagged “COP17”

  • Environment

    Durban diary 11: UN’s global pact won’t pay environmental debt

    12th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanEarly on Sunday morning the UN finalised an agreement on climate change that, as it stands, cannot hold global temperature rises to 2 degrees.

    The three part Durban pact extends the Kyoto Protocol beyond 2012; mobilises a $100bn Green Climate Fund by 2020; and sets nations to work on a comprehensive global agreement which is due to be completed by 2015, but will not take effect until 2020. Four more years of talks lie ahead.

    Sure, unions would, at the very least, want governments to continue negotiations. And the UK’s Environment Secretary Chris Huhne diligently supported the EU’s climate change Commissioner, Connie Hedegaard, in striking a deal that meets the EU’s aims. But his climate diplomacy somewhat had the rug pulled when his Chancellor discredited the UK’s domestic green economy programme in the Autumn Statement.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 10: Last call from the ITUC

    9th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanAs the restive crowds gather at the UN centre in Durban, the ITUC has issued a final appeal to governments to “make a U-turn on the road they are taking to climate disaster.” After two weeks of negotiations, the talks are entering their final hours with negotiations expected to continue into the early hours of Saturday morning. ITUC General Secretary Sharan Burrow said:

    “Negotiators are taking us further away from the goal of capping the rise of the earth temperature to 2 degrees. The gap between the science and decision makers is widening, which will leave a terrible impact for the planet and people.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 9: Expectation management backfires

    9th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanAfter nearly two weeks of stalled progress at the Durban climate conference, U.S. youth spoke out today for a real, science-based climate treaty.  Abigail Borah, a New Jersey resident, interrupted the start of lead U.S. negotiator Todd Stern’s speech to “call out” members of Congress for impeding global climate progress, delivering a passionate plea for an urgent path towards a fair and binding climate treaty. She was then ejected by security, but not before her delivery was applauded by the entire plenary.

    The South African Presidency had warned stakeholders to ‘interact but don’t cause tensions’. This follows the ejection yesterday of six young Canadian activists from the conference. ETUC Confederal Secretary Judith Kirton-Darling reports from Durban that:

    “We are apparently important as representatives of the world’s population, but we are told that negotiations are built on trust and that stakeholders should interact “without causing tensions”. I sense that there is ‘expectation management’ going on, the Presidency was keen to stress that the whole process has been ‘Party-driven’ and therefore the Presidency has no expectations.”

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 8: “If global warming reaches 2 degrees, Africa will be a terrible place”

    7th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    “The game of ping-pong between the US and China at climate conferences is becoming more and more tiresome.”

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanThe leader of the European Parliament delegation here in Durban added that, “Once again, the two biggest emitters of greenhouse gases are not contributing towards achieving a binding, global climate agreement.”

    ITUC delegate Gladys Branche (Sierra Leone Labour Congress) reported from a meeting with the Africa Group that the conference President is now setting up a task force to draft a statement for the wider G77 group that will hopfully match the EU’s commitment to a second Kyoto Protocol. The ITUC focus through unions in the G77 group of developing nations can have a strong bloc influence on China itself. We have to sustain pressure to counter the “low ambition” lobby at work here in Durban.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 7: Durban roadmap under wraps?

    6th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanTomorrow a coalition of trade unions and environmental organisations is organising a day of action on the Financial Transaction Tax (FTT) here at the Durban centre. It follows a heavily supported letter sent to President Zuma this week, signed by the TUC among many others, urging him to show leadership in support of the FTT as one of the mechanisms for fighting climate change and poverty at COP17. “We will not accept rich countries’ excuse that the financial crisis prevents them from fulfilling their promise to deliver $100bn annually to fight climate change,” the letter says.

    A big gesture is vital to unfreeze the main negotiations – the EU itself could get off the finance fence and call its finance Ministers to order and commit the financial flows promised so easily in Cancun. Will the UK take the lead?

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 6: What will UK Ministers bring to the table?

    5th December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanAs Ministers begin to arrive for the second, high level segment of these talks, what will the UK’s Environment Secretary Chris Huhne bring in his bag?

    What a weekend! Over there, UK Ministers and advisers have reaped an NGOs whirlwind, accusing the PM of leading the “most environmentally destructive government to hold power in this country since the modern environmental movement was born.” Over here in Durban, on Saturday, 20,000 people marched for Climate Justice and Green Jobs, led by the South African labour movement.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 5: ITUC on top of the world

    2nd December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanDorji Khatri of the Nepalese Union of trekking, travels, rafting and airlines, Unitrav speaks at the ITUC meeting today about his ascent of Mount Everest on 26 May 2011, when he planted the ITUC flag on the mountain top. Ten years ago the peak was covered in ice and now more and more rock is being exposed. Water is running down the mountain, filling the lakes below, building a threat of floods and landslides. UNITRAV thought Lord Lawson and the UK’s climate sceptics might want to contemplate this truth about global warming.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 4: UN returns to just transition

    1st December 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanIt’s impossible not to comment on the UK government’s latest mishandling of the green economy, on a day when the UN resumes work on the Cancun agreement that includes principles of just transition and green jobs agreed last year.

    But to begin with UN business here at the COP17 Climate Change Conference in Durban: Today’s session on a new form of  agreement is based on a text from the Cancun conference (pdf) that recognises the need to address the negative impacts of climate change policies through the prism of ‘ a just transition of the workforce, and the creation of decent work and quality jobs.’ JT strategies should inform national development strategies for both poduction and service related jobs, ‘promoting economic growth and sustainable development’.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 3: Climate sceptic language reaches into UK government

    30th November 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanThe talk here at the UN climate conference is of the UK rowing two ways at once. As a party to the EU, we join its solidarity call to other developed nations to renew their Kyoto Protocol commitments. Yet in his Autumn Statement yesterday the Chancellor, George Osborne, called green policies a “ridiculous cost” to British businesses.

    It’s odd to see the UK seeming to question the purpose of its own Green Economy Council, having just promised to be the greenest government ever, and abandoning hard won global leadership on the issue, here of all places.

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  • Environment

    Durban diary 2: Oil state Qatar to host next climate conference?

    29th November 2011 — Filed under: Environment

    Philip Pearson Philip Pearson

    UN Climate Change Conference, DurbanI’m here in Durban, taking part in an open debate with the South African miners’ union, the NUM, on a post-coal future when news comes through on where the UN will stage next year’s climate conference. How about Qatar, notorious for its violations of workers’ rights?

    It’s difficult to imagine a more crass way to handle this. ITUC General Secretary Sharan Burrow said:

    “Huge economic transformation is needed to tackle climate change. This massive task can only be achieved if working people’s rights are respected. It cannot be simply imposed from above.

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