“Modest fillip to climate change negotiations”

Briefing journalists after the Major Economies Forum meeting, Indian
special envoy on climate change Shyam Saran said the declaration would
provide a fillip to the negotiations at Copenhagen, "modest though it
will be."The negotiations on mitigation were the most difficult and
the developing countries could not get the industrial nations to
commit themselves to an intermediate goal of reducing their emissions
by 40 per cent by 2020. Still, the agreement to work towards limiting
the maximum rise in global average temperature to 2 degrees Celsius
over the pre-industrial period was a worthwhile target to aspire
for.From the Indian standpoint, the strong part of the declaration on
the global partnership to develop climate friendly technologies was
"one of the more forward looking parts" of the document. As for the
funding mechanism for the developing countries, the issue was not
addressed in any great detail but there was recognition that the
climate change negotiations would not be successful unless financial
resources were made available to the developing countries.The Green
Fund proposed by Mexico was a forward looking proposal that would be
based on assessed contributions from all countries and provide a
stable source. Still, the pattern and criteria for contributions was
not clear.As for the British proposal outlined by Prime Minister
Gordon Brown, its merit was the specific target of $100 billion set
for 2020 but it would draw financing from the markets and might not be
a stable source as the recent collapse of the carbon markets in Europe
had demonstrated.

The Hindu, July 11