Climate meeting crucial to success of Kyoto Protocol
By JASON TOPPING CONE
© Earth Times News Service
19 September, 2000
Canadian Environment Minister, David Anderson, is just one of the
environmental ministers expected to attend the Sixth Conference
of the Parties (COP6) to be held in The Netherlands in November.
The meeting is expected to be the best opportunity to bolster
support for a landmark treaty to decrease the release of green
house gas emissions.
COP6 is expected to be an opportunity to lobby the United States,
which has offered the main opposition to the Kyoto Protocol, to
ratify the climate change treaty, according to the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). The Kyoto Protocol, was
adopted in 1997, calls on governments to reduce their greenhouse
gas emission by 5.2 percent from their 1990 levels by 2012.
"Key countries must start demonstrating real political
leadership," said Michael Zammit Cutajar, Executive Secretary of
the UNFCCC. "if we are to ensure that strong and effective action
is launched to control greenhouse gas emissions. the longer we
wait to make the transition to low-emissions economies, the great
the damage from climate change will be."
During the Millennium Summit, world leaders called for the
ratification and entry into force of the Kyoto Protocol. The
Kyoto Protocol needs 55 countries to ratify it before it can
enter into force, currently 29 countries have ratified it,
according to UNFCCC.
COP6 will meet in The Hague on November 13th to the 24th,
according to the UNFCCC. COP6 is expected to draw some 10,000
participants. Preparatory meetings were just concluded in Lyon,
France, but many difficult issues were not resolved such as
defining carbon "sinks" used as part of an emissions trading
systems--where a tree absorb carbon dioxide therefore would
offset a certain amount of emissions--according to UNFCCC.
Ministers at COP6 will also have to resolve issues that include
how countries that are more susceptible to the effects of climate
change, such as islands effected by sea level rise, and the
economic consequences to developed countries of reducing
emissions will be aided, according to UNFCCC.
According to UNFCCC, the meeting will be a "success if it
triggers the ratification of the Kyoto Protocol by developed
countries in sufficient numbers to bring it into force and
motivates significant action by developing countries to enhance
their contributions to the achievement of the Convention's
objectives."
SOURCE: Earth Times
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