By Makereta Komai for Climate Pasifika in Bonn, Germany
09 June 2010, Bonn, Germany --- An indigenous people’s network on climate change was launched in Bonn Tuesday, to coincide with the global climate change negotiations now into its second week.
Calling itself the Indigenous Peoples Global Network on Climate Change and Self Determination (IPCCSD), the new group hopes to push for the inclusion of the rights of indigenous peoples into any climate change deal.
“We want to contribute to finding solutions to climate change. We believe we can use our traditional knowledge to adapt and mitigate against the impacts of climate change, said Joseph Ole Simel, representing indigenous peoples in Kenya.
An issue of interest to indigenous peoples in the current negotiations is the reduction of emissions through deforestation and degradation (REDD).
“We are happy with the current language in the AWG-LCA text. The text recognises the need to respect the rights of indigenous peoples and allows for their full participation in any REDD activities, said Victoria Tauli-Corpuz, the interim chair of the new indigenous peoples group.
The new group will ensure the views and experiences of indigenous peoples on climate change impacts and solutions are made visible at the regional and global arenas.
The group represents seven regions of the globe, including the Pacific.
There is no membership from the Pacific yet and the secretariat, which is based in the Philippines, is urging indigenous people’s groups in the Pacific to join the global network.
Ms Makereta Komai will be covering the Bonn Climate Change negotiations from 31 May – 11 June 2010, thanks to support from Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). She will provide daily coverage of the negotiations via PACNEWS and the SPREP website www.sprep.org, the climate pasifika blogspot, http://climatepasifika.blogspot.com and the PINA Green page http://green.pina.com.fj/
By Makereta Komai for Climate Pasifika in Bonn, Germany
08 June 2010, Bonn, Germany --- Concerns have been raised by international civil society organisations following the climate change negotiations in Bonn that ‘too many’ meetings are being convened outside the United Nations climate change convention process in preparation for Cancun in December.
“Negotiations on forests have been moved to Paris-Oslo on REDD process and the sources of finance are being addressed by the UN Secretary General’s high level advisory group, said the NGO’s briefing paper.
The NGO’s claim was strongly refuted by Mexico’s climate change diplomat, Ambassador Luis Alfonso Alba.
“I don’t share those concerns. Having these meetings are not new. It is something that we do every day at the United Nations and even in our national parliaments.
“Small groups are absolutely necessary in negotiations to build understanding. What is more important is that no decisions are taken in these small groups, said Ambassador de Alba.
Mexico has been holding small informal group discussions to bring about greater clarity on difficult issues before they are taken to the plenary sessions.
“We invite all like minded Parties to the table but the views of other Parties are also well represented in these small groups. We do not have a summary of the discussions because these meetings are only for the benefit of the chairs.
“There is nothing new or sinister about these informal sessions, said Ambassador de Alba.
Eight international NGO’s came out with their assessment of the Bonn talks Tuesday painting a ‘gloomy’ picture of the expected outcome here if the United States continues what it calls a ‘new paradigm for climate diplomacy.’
“The climate negotiations are being led astray. We lost our way in Copenhagen. We urgently need to get back to the Bali Roadmap here in Bonn, said the NGOs briefing paper.
Instead of honouring the Bali Action Plan, the US and a number of developed nations intend to ‘sink’ the Kyoto Protocol and ‘jump ship’ to a much leakier vessel created under the ad hoc working group on long term co-operative action (AWG-LCA).
“Rather than honour the Bali plan, they are now seeking to migrate favoured elements of the Kyoto Protocol (e.g. markets) into a new agreement under the AWG-LCA and to establish a system of voluntary pledges.”
The Bonn assessment report was compiled by Action Aid, Friends of the Earth, International Forum on Globalisation, Jubilee South, Pan African Climate Justice Alliance, Third World Network, Tebtebba and Sustainable Energy and Economy Network.
Ms Komai will be covering the Bonn Climate Change negotiations from 31 May – 11 June 2010, thanks to support from Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). She will provide daily coverage of the negotiations via PACNEWS and the SPREP website www.sprep.org, the climate pasifika blogspot, http://climatepasifika.blogspot.com and the PINA Green page http://green.pina.com.fj/
By Makereta Komai for Climate Pasifika in Bonn, Germany
07 June 2010, Bonn, Germany --- Delivering on the US$30 billion fast start finance can help rebuild the trust and confidence lost between industrialised countries and the developing nations in Copenhagen, said Yvo de Boer, the outgoing executive secretary of the UNFCCC Secretariat.
Speaking to journalists at the start of the second week of climate change negotiations here in Bonn, de Boer said developing countries need to see that the prompt start finance begin to flow.
“It’s important that industrialised countries make that money available as a motion of confidence in the promotion of partnership towards developing countries.
“Secondly, we need to get clarity on how that US$100 billion is going to be mobilised until 2020, said de Boer.
Currently, the $30 billion promised in Copenhagen has attracted pledges that have almost reached its target.
To date, the European Union (EU), Japan, the United States and Australia have made commitments to the Fund. Half of that amount has come from Japan, who has pledged US$15 billion for the next two years, until 2012.
But there are concerns that some of these donors are demanding that it be disbursed as loans and not as grants.
“Japan, I believe is making a portion of its funds to be available as loan, since its providing about half of the total committed funds. But at the end of the day, the $30 billion was conceived as a grant and not a loan. For fast start finance to achieve its goal, I think it should be distributed as a grant and not as a loan, said de Boer.
The initial fast start finance will be targeted at least developed countries (LDCs) and Small Island Developing Countries (SIDS).
“There is a general agreement that the funds be fed through existing institutions like the World Bank and United Nations Development Fund. Given past experiences, developing countries would like a new financial mechanism directly under the control of the convention but industrialised nations oppose this proposal.
Since the funds are likely to be delivered by different financial institutions and not within the existing convention financing mechanism, there will be different criteria for accessing the fast start finance, said de Boer.
“Right now, the challenge is to find middle ground – it might be found in creating a new body under the convention that will provide oversight in the area of financial support, suggested the UN climate chief.
De Boer was answering questions on the status of the negotiations.
“The talks here in Bonn are taking place in a very constructive, transparent and inclusive atmosphere. While the chair has made some progress on the technical issues, a number of hot political issues still need to be addressed.
Secondly, there needs to be clear leadership on the part of industrialised countries on their emissions target.
“If you look at the climate science, the commitments are not ambitious enough. What countries have offered since Copenhagen is not nearly enough to get you into the 25-40 percent range. Clearly we need to see greater ambition on the part of industrialised countries.
This reluctance, he said is making vulnerable nations nervous.
“The major concern is that there is too little action from industrialised nations and some emerging developing nations that will translate into the extinction of some island countries.
“The Copenhagen Accord talks about a maximum of 2 degrees in temperature increase, with a review in 2015 – whether that is adequate or we need to raise the level of ambition is something that negotiations here need to discuss and resolve before Cancun.”
An analysis of the current negotiations by Climate Action Network International puts the maximum global temperature at 4 degrees by 2100 – which will lead to catastrophic climate change impacts.
For Mexico, de Boer hopes to see a conclusion of the Bali Roadmap.
“It’s my personal hope that a practical and operational architecture will be ready by Cancun that will pave the way for an agreement that will be turned into a legally binding agreement under the convention.”
“What we need is architecture for mitigation, adaptation, technology, finance, capacity building and reducing emissions from reafforestation and degradation (REDD).
Two one week long negotiations are planned for 02-06 August and October before the Conference of the Parties meets in Cancun from 28 November – 10 December.
Ms Komai will be covering the Bonn Climate Change negotiations from 31 May – 11 June 2010, thanks to support from Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). She will provide daily coverage of the negotiations via PACNEWS and the SPREP website www.sprep.org, the climate pasifika blogspot, http://climatepasifika.blogspot.com and the PINA Green page http://green.pina.com.fj/
By Makereta Komai for Climate Pasifika in Bonn, Germany
04 June 2010 Bonn, Germany ---Vanuatu is one of the 11 countries chosen to pilot climate resilience and capacity building projects, funded as part of the European Union’s fast start climate change funding commitment promised in Copenhagen in 2009.
At a side event organised at the margins of the Bonn climate change talks, representatives from five major European nations that have made pledges to the climate change fast start financing briefed delegates on their commitments.
Norbet Gorben of German’s environment ministry said under the Global Climate Change Alliance, the EU was providing €40 million to pilot climate resilience projects in African, Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) states, which includes Vanuatu in the Pacific.
“The first tranche of the funds will be given in 2010. Half of the funds will be targeted at adaptation programmes. We are targeting the ‘smallest of the small.’
“We will build on the national adaptation plans and assist with adaptation practices and provide budget support, said Gorben.
At the same time, the EU has allocated €4.2 million to Fiji, Tonga and Vanuatu for adaptation projects.
“Tonga is looking at land use, while in Fiji the focus is on reducing emissions from deforestation and degradation (REDD) and Vanuatu on putting together its NAPA database on climate change.
“This assistance will be extended due to demand from 12 Pacific countries, said Gorben.
The European Union insists the funding initiative pledged in Copenhagen is a process of ‘learning by doing.’ Its member states will continue dialogue with developing countries to get to know their needs and expectations better, according to an EU briefing paper.
“Lessons learnt will be very valuable in helping to decide where to direct funding not yet allocated.”
It said experience with fast start funding will be key in shaping the post 2012 climate financing architecture.
The European Union has pledged €2.4 billion annually until 2012 to combat the impact of climate change. This, it says represents a third of the global commitments made by mostly industrialised countries that supported the Copenhagen Accord in 2009.
“Despite the recent economic difficulties and strong budgetary constraints, all 27 member states of the EU contributed to this funding.
63 percent of the EU confirmed pledge in 2010 will go towards mitigation projects while the rest will be for adaptation. A huge bulk of that funding will support reducing emissions from forests.
The EU has also directed that 61 percent of its pledge be distributed through bilateral channels and only 39 percent through the multilateral process including financial mechanisms within the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
With governments tightening their coffers in the wake of the global financial crisis, development campaigners are calling for more transparency in the initial stages of climate change funding for developing countries.
Campaigners say they want to ensure climate funding promises are over and above current development aid (ODA), rather than transferred from existing projects.
The finance of climate change mitigation and adaptation in developing countries is a key pillar in the climate negotiations.
There is a lot of slippery language around ‘new and additional’,” said Rob Bailey, a policy advisor on climate change for Oxfam.
According to the Copenhagen Accord, “this funding will come from a wide variety of sources, public and private, bilateral and multilateral, including alternative sources of finance.”
In the Copenhagen Accord, developed countries agreed to provide vulnerable nations with “new and additional resources” of about US$30 billion for period 2010-2012 to help them with climate change mitigation and adaptation.
Australia, France, Japan, Norway, the United Kingdom, and the United States have collectively agreed in the context of an ambitious and comprehensive outcome in Copenhagen to dedicate USD3.5bn as initial public finance towards slowing, halting and eventually reversing deforestation in developing countries.
Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe said the EU has failed to provide clarity about where the €7.2 billion pledged for 2010-2012 for immediate climate finance needs in developing countries will come from.
“This unwillingness to be clear about the sources of their fast start finance is only corroborating the grape vine, which contends that a great majority in the EU intend to recycle their ODA commitments and baptise it climate finance,” said Augustine B. Njamnshi of the Pan-African Climate Justice Alliance.
“This lack of clarity is frustrating developing countries, especially those who quickly associated with the Copenhagen Accord with the hope of getting something from the package.”
EU leaders this week in Bonn insisted the money pledged would be ”fresh,” language that does not exclude previously committed development aid from being double counted as climate finance. The lack of country-by-country detail in today’s report deepens green and development groups’ concerns that the commitment made in Copenhagen that funds would be new and additional is not being kept. In addition, there is not enough detail on how the money will be divided between projects.
“Helping poor countries adapt to climate change impacts and develop in a low carbon way are both equally important,” said Tim Gore, Oxfam International EU Climate Adviser.
“However, about twice as much has been allocated for low carbon development rather than adaptation, which means that at the moment, the bulk of the money is more likely to go to larger emerging economies instead of the World’s poorest,” said Gore.
Ms Komai will be covering the Bonn Climate Change negotiations from 31 May – 11 June 2010, thanks to support from Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) and the World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF). She will provide daily coverage of the negotiations via PACNEWS and the SPREP website www.sprep.org, the climate pasifika blogspot, http://climatepasifika.blogspot.com and the PINA Green page http://green.pina.com.fj/
