Author: editor

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Written in association with WasteCare Waste Management

[Sunny Flower Charger And iPetals Charger]

By Raúl Pierri and Daniela Estrada

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva)  COP15 proved to be a “spectacular failure even according to its own terms,” but civil society had “some successes,” such as the inclusion of certain issues on the climate agenda, and making the voice of the South heard loud and clear.

That was how activists assessed their efforts at COP15 as the climate change talks came to an agonising end Saturday in Copenhagen.

Barred from the Bella Center, the official venue, and treated harshly by security forces at some of the massive demonstrations held throughout the two weeks of the conference, representatives of civil society – gathered simultaneously in the Danish capital at their own people’s climate summit, Klimaforum09 – highlighted a series of victories achieved.

“Despite the lack of transparency, civil society organisations have given visibility to positions that are more in line with climate justice, which we see as the only way to move towards a sustainable planet,” Eduardo Giesen, Latin American and Caribbean coordinator for Friends of the Earth International’s Climate Justice and Energy Programme, told TerraViva.

“We focused our efforts on supporting developing countries so they could present a united front against the demands of the industrialised world, and not give in to pressures that in some cases bordered on colonialism,” he added.

Klimaforum09 closed its two weeks of activities with a concert and a ceremony where this year’s organisers transferred organisational duties to representatives of Mexico and Latin America, where the next parallel summit will be held in 2010.

“The general sensation is that what wasn’t achieved at the Bella Center was achieved at Klimaforum” in terms of content consensus and forging of alliances, Giesen said.

For her part, Canadian journalist and researcher Naomi Klein called on activists to not give up hope. “I think it’s really important to make sure that we don’t leave this gathering feeling discouraged,” she said.

According to Klein, the fact that negotiators at the Bella Center were unable to reach an agreement even within their own conception of how to address climate change is proof that it is a failed model.

“That’s why it is very important to go forward and tell a different story of what happened here in Copenhagen. That story must be that their model reveals itself to be a spectacular failure even according to its own terms,” she said.

“And because their model failed, it’s our turn now. So don’t allow yourselves to get depressed,” she added.

In Klein’s view, the model has failed because of its emphasis on the carbon market and other market-based mechanisms.

“Discourse about climate change has been really taken over by technocrats, (it’s become) very bureaucratised, and has been extremely exclusive. This is actually similar to the discussion on trade a decade ago, where it was all acronyms, all incredible impenetrable long talks,” she said.

“And many people felt: I can’t be part of the discussion, I don’t have an advanced degree on economics, I can’t participate,” she added.

Klein underlined the need to reject “the model” in which negotiations are conducted under the Convention.

“We need to reject any measure that allows the countries that created the problem to evade their responsibility, (which is) that they need to cut their emissions,” she stressed.

For his part, Giesen condemned international NGOs that “toe the line” of industrialised countries and back counterproductive mechanisms.

“Our NGOs work with communities to achieve environmental justice. We haven’t turned into consultancy firms seeking to finance their activities by any means, like certain multinational NGOs who have found in the carbon market a way to make a lot of money. They’ve bought into capitalism,” he said.

Klein, meanwhile, highlighted what she saw as the “successes” of the last two weeks. “The rich world can no longer claim not to know (what) failing to act (entails). The voices of the South, the cost of millions of lives, the disappearance of countries and cultures – all that has landed on the agenda,” she said.

Changing the system

“System Change – Not Climate Change,” is the title of the final statement from Klimaforum09, signed by some 360 organizations from around the world.

Drafted months ago and discussed over the last week in the Danish capital, this “People’s Declaration” argues that “there are solutions to the climate crisis,” and puts forward six demands.

“What people and the planet need is a just and sustainable transition of our societies to a form that will ensure the rights of life and dignity of all people and deliver a more fertile planet and more fulfilling lives to present and future generations,” it states.

The signatory organisations called on governments to take urgent climate action, most importantly the “complete abandonment of fossil fuels within the next 30 years, which must include specific milestones for every five-year period.”

They also demanded “an immediate cut in GHG (greenhouse gases) of industrialized countries of at least 40 percent compared to 1990 levels by 2020,” and “recognition, payment and compensation of climate debt for the overconsumption of atmospheric space and adverse effects of climate change on all affected groups and people.”

The statement goes on to reject “purely market-oriented and technology-centred false and dangerous solutions,” such as “nuclear energy, agro-fuels, carbon capture and storage, Clean Development Mechanisms, biochar, genetically ‘climate-readied’ crops, geoengineering, and reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD).”

The “real solutions” are “based on safe, clean, renewable, and sustainable use of natural resources, as well as transitions to food, energy, land, and water sovereignty.”

The signatory organisations also proposed that an “equitable tax on carbon emissions” be established instead of “the regime of tradable emission quotas,” and that multilateral financial bodies like the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund “be replaced by democratic and equitable institutions functioning in accordance with the United Nations Charter.”

They also demanded a “mechanism for strict surveillance and control of the operations of TNCs (transnational corporations).”

“Irrespective of the outcome of the Copenhagen Summit on Climate Change, there is an urgent need to build a global movement of movements dedicated to the long-term task of promoting a sustainable transition of our societies,” the statement concludes.
(END/2009)

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Por Stephen Leahy

COPENHAGUE (IPS/TerraViva) No se hizo historia en Copenhague. Tampoco se selló ningún pacto contra el cambio climático. Tras dos años de intensas negociaciones entre 193 países, rompe los ojos la división entre el mundo rico y el pobre.

Los países pobres quieren reducciones drásticas de las emisiones causantes del recalentamiento por parte del mundo industrial, y éste sigue resistiéndose a cortes sustantivos y metas obligatorias.

Pese a las enormes presiones, las grandes esperanzas y los esfuerzos de último minuto de gobernantes de 128 países, todo concluyó en un vago texto titulado Acuerdo de Copenhague. La promesa de “sellar un pacto” climático fue pospuesta al menos un año más.

Y hablando de divisiones, la mayor parte de la sociedad civil considera que la reunión de Copenhague fue un amargo desastre. Es un fracaso que “condena a millones de personas del mundo pobre al hambre, al sufrimiento y a la pérdida de vidas”, dijo el nigeriano Nnimmo Bassey, presidente de Amigos de la Tierra Internacional.

En el lado opuesto, el presidente de Estados Unidos, Barack Obama, sostuvo que se había logrado un “avance significativo y sin precedentes”, al hablar en una conferencia de prensa poco antes de la medianoche del viernes en el Bella Center, sede oficial de la 15 Conferencia de las Partes de la Convención Marco de las Naciones Unidas para el Cambio Climático (COP-15).

“Todas las grandes economías se han unido para aceptar su responsabilidad en las acciones necesarias para afrontar el peligro del cambio climático”, añadió Obama.

Parece evidente que los gobernantes no han prestado mucha atención a los anteriores 15 años de negociaciones climáticas.

“Los jefes de Estado ahora están realmente comprometidos”, opinó Robert Orr, secretario general adjunto de las Naciones Unidas para Coordinación de Políticas y Planeación Estratégica. “En Copenhague fue la primera vez que emplearon vocabulario climático”, dijo.

“Esto pone al clima en el mapa de los gobernantes y a estos en el mapa del clima”, añadió Orr. También aventuró que la brecha entre la política y la ciencia está finalmente empezando a cerrarse.

Es un poco tarde para despertar a la realidad del cambio climático. Dos nuevos estudios indican que la retroalimentación climática hará imposible que el aumento de la temperatura media del planeta no supere los dos grados en el transcurso de este siglo.

Para conseguirlo, no solo el mundo deberá dejar de emitir dióxido de carbono en las próximas décadas, sino que además habrá que retirar grandes cantidades de ese gas de la atmósfera para reducir su concentración de las actuales 389 partes por millón (ppm) a 350 ppm.

Fue a última hora del viernes cuando el mandatario estadounidense anunció que su país junto con India, Sudáfrica, Brasil y China habían acordado un texto a puertas cerradas, llamado Acuerdo de Copenhague.

Pero, como sólo participaron cinco de los 193 países que pasaron dos semanas discutiendo en Copenhague, algunos delegados se mostraron visiblemente enojados por no haber sido consultados, y las conversaciones continuaron toda la noche.

Para la tarde de este sábado, persistía la confusión sobre el estatuto legal del Acuerdo de Copenhague, y un puñado de naciones, entre ellas Arabia Saudita, Bolivia y Pakistán, se negaban a aceptarlo.

En definitiva, el Acuerdo no tiene carácter legal bajo los términos de la Convención de Cambio Climático, y los países que son parte de ella apenas “tomaron nota” de su existencia y expresaron, o no, su apoyo al mismo.

El viernes por la noche, Obama reconoció que se trataba sólo de un paso en un largo camino para alcanzar las metas indicadas por la ciencia. El mandatario insistió en su importancia, puesto que los países aceptaron drásticas reducciones de emisiones a largo plazo, con el fin de evitar que la temperatura media del planeta se eleve más de dos grados por encima de las marcas de la era preindustrial.

Según el texto, las naciones en desarrollo también aceptaron adoptar medidas voluntarias para reducir la cantidad de gases de efecto invernadero que arrojan a la atmósfera y aumentar esas medidas si se les suministra apoyo financiero.

Y hubo acuerdo en que los países ricos entreguen 100.000 millones de dólares por año para 2020 destinados a asistir a los países en desarrollo en la protección de sus bosques, la adaptación al cambio climático y la reducción de sus propias emisiones.

Se aceptó asimismo trabajar hacia un acuerdo legalmente vinculante que pueda ser adoptado el año que viene en la COP-16 que se celebrará en México.

“Estados Unidos no está legalmente obligado por nada de lo que se hizo aquí en Copenhague”, advirtió Obama.

Estados Unidos está internamente dividido sobre este asunto y debe recorrer aún un largo camino para adoptar obligaciones en la materia.

No había transcurrido una hora desde que Obama efectuó su discurso inaugural en la sesión matinal de la COP-15 cuando varios legisladores estadounidenses del Partido Republicano celebraron una conferencia de prensa en el Bella Center para negar que el cambio climático fuera causado por emisiones de combustibles fósiles, o sea del petróleo, el carbón y el gas natural.

Las conclusiones del Grupo Intergubernamental de Expertos sobre el Cambio Climático (IPCC) y de decenas de academias científicas de todo el mundo son sospechosas, agregaron los legisladores, ninguno de ellos científicos y todos procedentes de estados con poderosos intereses en el sector automotor o de combustibles fósiles.

“Hemos perdido muchas cosas en el camino”, manifestó Dessima Williams, de Granada, y portavoz de la Alianza de Pequeños Estados Insulares (AOSIS, por su sigla en inglés), integrada por 43 países.

“Hemos perdido el compromiso vigoroso para estabilizar (el aumento de) la temperatura mundial en 1,5 grados”, agregó. “Creemos que esto es fundamental para la supervivencia de nuestros estados miembros”, destacó Williams en la sesión final de la COP 15, este sábado.

Las activistas esperaban que un texto sensible al género reconociera la realidad de que las mujeres son por lejos las más perjudicadas por el cambio climático, señaló Ana Rojas, de Energía, una red internacional de género y sustentabilidad con sede en Holanda.

Sólo un tercio de los delegados que asistieron a la COP 15 este año son mujeres, lo cual dificulta la igualdad en la representación de las opiniones de mujeres y hombres en relación con el cambio climático.

“Necesitamos una visión compartida del género en el acuerdo final. Y no sólo con respecto a la adaptación, sino también a la mitigación y el financiamiento” de las medidas contra el cambio climático, dijo Rojas.

Aunque reconoció algunos avances, está lejos de ser el “acuerdo justo, ambicioso y legalmente vinculante” que la sociedad civil defendía.

Afuera de las sesiones en el Centro Bella, 1.800 manifestantes y periodistas fueron arrestados bajo la sospecha de que pudieran cometer ilegalidades, en lo que la sociedad civil consideró un intento del gobierno danés de reprimir la oposición legítima y la libertad de expresión.

El uso de “gases lacrimógenos, spray pimienta, tácticas de dispersión de multitudes y arrestos colectivos preventivos fija un precedente peligroso, no sólo para Dinamarca, sino para el futuro del mundo”, advirtió Tadzio Müller, de Climate Justice Action, una organización ecologista internacional.

“El planeta enfrenta una crisis trágica de liderazgo” sobre el cambio climático, declaró el director ejecutivo de Greenpeace Internacional, Kumi Naidoo.

El Acuerdo representa “una importante concesión a las industrias que contaminan el clima, especialmente del sector de los combustibles fósiles”, dijo Naidoo.

“La posibilidad de impedir el caos climático acaba de hacerse mucho más difícil”, concluyó.

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By Stephen Leahy

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva) There is no Copenhagen climate treaty. History was not made here and no deal was sealed.

After two years of intense negotiations by 194 countries, what is abundantly clear is the enormous divide between the rich and poor countries. Poor countries want deep cuts in emissions by the industrialised world, and the latter continue to resist significant cuts and legally binding targets.

Despite the enormous pressures, high expectations and last minute efforts by 128 heads of state, all that emerged is a vague agreement of sorts called the “Copenhagen Accord”.

“Sealing the deal” on a new climate treaty has been postponed for at least a year. (more…)

By Darryl D’Monte

COPENHAGEN, Dec 19 (IPS/TerraViva) – Many countries treat Bangladesh as a country that is so afflicted by calamities that it is incapable of pulling itself out of dire poverty. Yet, it has blazed a trail in drawing up blueprints for community-driven climate adaptation strategies.

Part of this blueprint is to revive traditional farming practices that could withstand extreme weather changes.

“People used traditional farming practices,” notes Prof Ainun Nishat, a former academic, now senior advisor for climate in Asia to the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN) in Dhaka, told IPS. “We had 5,000 varieties of rice which could withstand this variability, but have now been lost.”

Non-government organisations and the IUCN have for several years been encouraging people to revive such practices. In undivided Bengal, before the partition of India in 1947, for instance, it was common for people to set aside five percent of their land for a pond to breed fish and irrigate paddy.

He cites a programme reintroducing water-tolerant species as well as those that can survive in floods, drought and salinity, a breakthrough. There is a species of rice that can be submerged under water for 15 days without deteriorating. The new government is also implementing a project to resuscitate river networks.

Since Bangladesh receives up to two billion tonnes of sediment from the Ganges and Brahmaputra rivers every year, it is encouraging communities to maintain the age-old networks of small rivers and canals, which have fallen into disrepair. Traditionally in Bengal, these were excavated by manual labour under the supervision of the local community and this valuable practice is being revived.

“This initiative is community-based,” he says. “It is both top-down and bottom-up. Collectively, we sensitise the government.”

“Bangladesh is nature’s disaster laboratory,” says Prof Nishat. “Apart from volcanoes, we have every type (of disaster),” he adds, stressing the urgency of adopting mitigation measures, particularly at the community level. He is particularly worried about the erratic monsoon, which can give rise to drought-like conditions.

A decade ago, experts realised that to help people combat climate variability, they had to find alternative means of generating incomes. One way was to harvest the troublesome hyacinth weed in ponds and pile it to grow seedlings. IUCN and non-government organisations introduced these methods in two coastal islands of Bhola and Hatiya.

A. Atiq Rahman, the well-known executive director of the Bangladesh Centre of Advanced Studies, who took part in the just concluded climate talks in this Danish capital, organised three international workshops to synthesise the lessons drawn from efforts to explore alternative sources of income. The Bangladesh government expressed an interest in the proceedings. When it had to formulate plans to cope with climate change in 2003-2005, it did away with the normal route of hiring consultants and created seven task forces, half of which were headed by non-government experts, including Prof Nishat.

The government allocated 200 million U.S. dollars for this purpose, for which 12 to 15 projects were shortlisted. Importantly, the task forces were not put under a ministry or directorate but operated with a high degree of autonomy. “This was because of the cross-cutting nature of these problems: every ministry was involved.”

“A key issue is food security,” he says. “The seal-level rise is less worrying than the ingress of salinity.” By 2100, it is estimated that salinity may travel 89 metres inland, and this will affect people’s livelihoods.

Experts are also monitoring “storm surges” and cyclones, which have increased in intensity and frequency. Between 1960 and 2009, there were 15 major events; from 2007, there have already been four. “The sea is also growing rough and preventing fishermen from venturing out on certain days,” Prof Nishat reports.

In 2007, then Environment Minister C.S. Karim asked officials and NGOs to contribute to a report in the build-up to the Copenhagen conference. To operationalise the Bali Action Plan – the so-called “road map” to a new global climate treaty – the government was fully engaged in drawing up an adaptation strategy, which attracted the attention of donors.

Funding for the strategy came from the British government, the World Bank and the British Department for International Development. The resulting ‘Bangladesh Climate Change Strategy and Action Plan 2009’, was published in September or three months ahead of the Copenhagen talks.

There are six themes: food security, social protection and health; disaster management; infrastructure; research and knowledge management; mitigation and low-carbon development; and capacity building and institution strengthening.

“This is an open-ended document in the making, not a finished product,” Prof Nishat clarifies. “Low-carbon growth is an important component. We hope to add people’s responses to the projects listed under each theme.”

The new government, headed by Sheikh Hasina, has instituted a task force to review these activities. “She has strengthened the political commitment to tackle climate change,” he says. “It was in her election manifesto.”

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Por Raúl Pierri y Daniela Estrada

COPENHAGUE (IPS/TerraViva)  La COP-15 demostró ser un “espectacular fracaso en sus propios términos”, pero la sociedad civil tuvo algunos “éxitos”, como imponer temas en la agenda climática y hacer oír más fuerte la voz el Sur.

Así evaluaron activistas sus esfuerzos al cierre de la COP-15 (15 Conferencia de las Partes de la Convención Marco de las Naciones Unidas sobre el Cambio Climático), que todavía sesionaba agónicamente el sábado.

Excluidos del Bella Center, sede de las conversaciones oficiales, y soportando la represión contra algunas de las numerosas manifestaciones en la capital danesa, representantes de la sociedad civil, reunidos en forma paralela en Copenhague en el Klimaforum, destacaron victorias en estas dos semanas.

“A pesar de la falta de transparencia, el movimiento social ha permitido hacer visible las posturas más consistentes con la justicia climática, que nosotros la concebimos como la única forma de transitar hacia un mundo sustentable”, dijo a TerraViva Eduardo Geisen, coordinador para América Latina y el Caribe del Programa de Justicia Climática y Energía de Amigos de la Tierra Internacional.

Además,“hemos dado un vital apoyo para que los países en desarrollo se hayan mantenido unidos frente a las exigencias del mundo industrializado y no hayan cedido a las presiones que en algunos casos rayaron en lo colonialista”, añadió.

Las dos semanas de actividades en el Klimaforum fueron selladas el viernes con un espectáculo artístico y el traspaso de la organización de la próxima cumbre paralela, en 2010, a representantes de México y América Latina.

“El sentimiento generalizado es que lo que no se logró en el Bella Center se logró en el Klimaforum”, en términos de sintonía de contenidos y construcción de alianzas, resumió Giesen.

Por su parte, la periodista e investigadora canadiense Naomi Klein llamó a los activistas a no desanimarse.

“Es realmente importante asegurarnos de que no nos vayamos de esta reunión desalentados”, afirmó.

El hecho de que los negociadores en el Bella Center no logren un acuerdo dentro de sus propias concepciones de cómo resolver el problema demuestra que se trata de un modelo fallido, sostuvo.

“Es muy importante contar una historia diferente de lo que ocurrió en Copenhague. La historia debe ser que su modelo demuestra ser un espectacular fracaso incluso en sus propios términos”, afirmó.

“Y porque su modelo fracasó, ahora es nuestro turno. Por tanto, no se permitan deprimirse”, añadió.

Para Klein, todo el proceso está fallido por su énfasis en el mercado de carbono y otros mecanismos de carácter económico.

“El discurso sobre cambio climático ha sido asaltado por tecnócratas… y se ha vuelto extremadamente exclusivo. Esto es de hecho muy similar a las discusiones sobre comercio hace una década, donde todo eran acrónimos, todo eran conversaciones increíblemente largas e impenetrables”, dijo.

“Mucha gente pensaba: no puedo ser parte de la discusión, no tengo un título en economía”, agregó.

La canadiense subrayó la necesidad de rechazar “el modelo” en que se manejan las negociaciones en el marco de la Convención.

“Debemos rechazar cualquier medida que permita a los países que crearon el problema evadir su responsabilidad: deben recortar sus emisiones”, enfatizó.

Por su parte, Giesen repudió a organizaciones no gubernamentales (ONG) internacionales que “siguen el discurso” de los países del Norte, y apoyan mecanismos que tienen efectos contraproducentes.

“Nosotros somos ONG que trabajamos con las comunidades por la justicia ambiental. No nos hemos convertido en empresas consultoras que buscamos financiarnos de cualquier modo, como lo están haciendo algunas ONG multinacionales, que han visto en el mercado de carbono una forma de adquirir mucho dinero. Han entrado en el orden del capitalismo”, afirmó.

Mientras, Klein destacó los “éxitos” de las últimas dos semanas.

“El mundo rico ya no puede argüir no saber lo que implica dejar de actuar. Las voces del Sur, el costo de millones de vidas, la desaparición de países y culturas… todo eso ha aterrizado en la agenda”, indicó.

Cambiando el sistema

“Cambiemos el sistema, no el clima”, es el título de la declaración final del Klimaforum, firmada por unas 360 organizaciones de todo el mundo.

Preparado desde hace meses y discutido durante la semana pasada en la capital danesa, el documento de seis puntos plantea que “hay soluciones a la crisis del clima”.

“Lo que necesitan los pueblos y el planeta es una transición justa y sostenible de nuestras sociedades a un modelo que garantice el derecho a la vida y la dignidad de todas las personas, y entregue un planeta más fértil y vidas más plenas a las generaciones presentes y futuras”, señala.

Los firmantes llamaron a los gobiernos a abandonar los combustibles fósiles en los próximos 30 años, con metas específicas para cada período quinquenal.

También exigieron una reducción inmediata de las emisiones de gases de efecto invernadero de los países industrializados de 40 por ciento respecto de 1990 para 2020, así como el reconocimiento y pago de la deuda generada por el consumo excesivo del espacio atmosférico y los efectos sobre las poblaciones afectadas.

El texto rechaza las “falsas y peligrosas soluciones orientadas al mercado”, como la energía nuclear, los agrocombustibles, la captura y almacenamiento de carbono, los Mecanismos de Desarrollo Limpio, el carbón vegetal, los transgénicos denominados “climate ready” y la iniciativa REDD (Reducción de Emisiones de Carbono causadas por la Deforestación y la Degradación de los Bosques).

Las “soluciones reales” estarían basadas en el “uso seguro, limpio, renovable y sostenible de los recursos naturales, y la transición a la soberanía alimentaria, energética, sobre la tierra y las aguas”.

También propusieron un impuesto equitativo a las emisiones de dióxido de carbono, en lugar del régimen de cuotas comerciables, y el reemplazo de los organismos financieros multilaterales, como el Banco Mundial y el Fondo Monetario Internacional, por instituciones “equitativas y democráticas”.

Asimismo, buscan la creación de un mecanismo que controlelas operaciones de las empresas trasnacionales.

“Independientemente de los resultados de la Cumbre de Copenhague sobre el Cambio Climático, hay una necesidad urgente de construir un movimiento mundial de movimientos que trabajen a largo plazo a favor de una transición sostenible para nuestras sociedades”, concluyeron.

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Mario Osava

RIO DE JANEIRO (IPS/TerraViva) – “In a year’s time, the Japanese archipelago will be completely under water.” This official announcement was made following a violent eruption of Mt. Fuji, as a series of devastating earthquakes shook the country, forcing the world to face the challenge of taking in 110 million refuges within a very short time.

After a brutal diplomatic battle, the Japanese government managed to secure frail support from its fellow nations and evacuate 65 million people. Twenty million sank with the islands, many of them voluntarily, out of love for their country or to give younger people a better chance of fleeing. The rest are believed to have died before the islands sank, victims of the quakes, tsunamis and other natural disasters.

This account is part of a futuristic book published in Japan in 1973, and translated into English as “Japan Sinks”. The author, Japanese novelist Komatsu Sakyo, imagines this catastrophe based on potential natural phenomena, such as the intensification and alteration of tectonic plate shifts under the Pacific Ocean.

But outside the world of fiction, the planet today is being hit by increasingly frequent floods, and many small island states and coastal cities face the real possibility of sinking in the near future. And all of this is a result of human actions.

The threat in real life is coming from above rather than below, but the consequences are equally tragic, even if they appear less catastrophic because they are more spread out in time and space.

A huge cataclysm like the one depicted by Sakyo may be what the world needs to reach an effective agreement that will steer it away from the suicidal path of global warming.

Certain changes, especially those wrought against the economic tide, are only possible after exceptional tragedies or social turmoil. Last year’s global financial crisis, for example, was not dramatic enough to bring about structural changes.

The magnitude of Sakyo’s fictional disaster does not lie merely in the number of victims, but in the fact that it completely wipes out a rich nation like Japan, a country that many in the 1970s saw as challenging the economic power of the United States. The novel is also critical of the arrogance displayed by Japan in the post-war reconstruction period.

The fact that tropical countries, especially small, impoverished nations, will suffer the worst effects of global warming fails to prompt cooperation that should be natural in our present circumstances, as it is a threat that affects the entire world.

The current climate crisis highlights the multiple dimensions of the inequalities among nations, which hinder negotiations. The leading issues – such as legally-binding targets for emissions and funding for programs to address climate change – divide the world, with wealthy countries on one side and the rest of the world on the other, and a middle group of emerging nations whose intention to continue to be counted within the ranks of the poor nations (in terms of emissions cuts, etc) is rejected by the rich.

This inequality is a spoke in the wheel of any multilateral talks, in both market, financial, patent or health matters.

These are all opportunities for developing countries to close the gap that separates them from the rich and obtain more aid for their own development, now with the irrefutable argument that the industrialised world is responsible for the historic accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

But when it comes to climate change, the blocs formed in other forums fall apart. Brazil, for example, is persistently under pressure from environmentalists to break away from the G77 group of 130 developing nations so that it can contribute to reaching an agreement and regaining the leadership role it had in the negotiations for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 1992, and the Kyoto Protocol in 1997.

Because it has specific and feasible means to reduce greenhouse gas emissions – by curbing deforestation and increasing its already vastly developed clean energy production -, environmental activists argue that it would be to Brazil’s own advantage to commit to ambitious targets.

China, which is associated with the G77, alienated itself from the coalition by moving closer to the United States in volume of greenhouse gases emitted, building one coal-fired electric power plant a week, and holding more than two trillion dollars in reserves.

It’s frightening to think of 1.3 billion Chinese speeding forward towards what is now recognised as an unsustainable process of industrialisation and consumption.

The position of countries that are rich in fossil fuels differs radically from that of those dependent on imported oil. Latitudes and altitudes, the abundance or lack of forests, the threat of desertification, or the dependence on glaciers are some of the many aspects that mark the differences in how climate change impacts each country.

Numerous small island states are already fighting for survival, so they have joined forces with those African nations that are severely affected by desertification and major crop losses to demand that 1.5 degrees C be set as the limit for the rise in temperature in this century. Exceeding that threshold will condemn entire nations to almost certain death or displacement.

But, what power do these countries have to counter the two-degree limit adopted?

This is not about rich countries imposing their will on poor countries, or of a class struggle between states. The goals that must be met are being dictated by scientific studies and assessments. Climate change has crowned a new absolute power: the power of science, whose findings are now determining the very existence of the world’s entire population.

Thousands of scientists who participated in the reports of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) agreed that a temperature rise of two degrees C by 2100 is a feasible and tolerable limit. Above that, chaos will ensue.

Climate sceptics don’t count. They’re a tiny minority and, in many cases, have lost credibility because they are thought to defend the interests of the fossil fuel industry, or to act out because they feel attacked by attempts to prevent the great climate disaster.

Voices have already been raised against the verdict issued by climate experts, voices that demand that society be included in decision-making, with suggestions of holding referendums. But this is a field where the premises lay outside the dynamics of “democracy.” Climate change is a fact, not an issue.

Politics can only decide on how to handle the phenomenon. Questioning it or determining any variations in the facts is the exclusive domain of science.

This new dimension of what many refer to as the “age of knowledge” will dictate the rules that govern many activities, demanding energy efficiency, and forcing people to change their patterns of consumption and their habits, as has already been achieved, for example, with tobacco in the field of health.
(END/2009)

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Daniela Estrada

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva) Before the outcome of COP 15 has even emerged, Latin American social organisations are already discussing their strategies for the next climate summit, to be held in a year’s time in Mexico.

The primary challenge is to broaden and strengthen the links between the different civil society movements and networks in the region, the international coordinator of Jubilee South, Beverly Keene, told TerraViva.

Jubilee South is a network of social movements and people’s organisations in Latin America, the Caribbean, Africa and Asia, formed in 1999 to fight for “freedom from debt and domination” in developing countries.

Keene spoke at a session of Klimaforum09 – the civil society meeting held parallel to the climate change summit in Copenhagen – focused on what directions to take on the road to COP 16, in December 2010 in the Mexican capital.

“Frankly, I do not expect anything (from COP 15). We have stated very clearly that no agreement at all is better than one which only reinforces the false solutions we have been fighting,” Camila Moreno of Brazil, a member of Friends of the Earth International, told TerraViva at another Klimaforum session.

Activists concur that the international movement for climate justice has grown stronger over the past year.

One of its main achievements was the first hearing of the International Court of Climate Justice, celebrated in October in the eastern Bolivian city of Cochabamba by NGOs from all over the world. Seven cases, claiming environmental harm contributing to climate change, were presented by Latin American communities and civil society organisations.

A people’s tribunal independent of formal justice systems, the aim of the Court is to pass ethical and moral judgment on transnational corporations and complicit states in order to raise the visibility of environmental crimes and the changes needed to coexist in balance with nature.

“The invitation is to begin the journey toward Mexico 2010. This time COP is coming to our house (Latin America), and we must start mobilising,” said Lyda Fernanda Forero, of the secretariat of the Hemispheric Social Alliance (HSA), an umbrella group for over 60 social networks in the Americas.

Nicola Bullard, of Climate Justice Now (CJN), a global network of organisations and movements, said climate change provided an opportunity to forge stronger links between the struggles of civil society against the World Trade Organisation and other multilateral institutions.

The destruction of the environment goes hand-in-hand with social inequality, she said, at the session that was also addressed by Keene.

The issue of climate change must become a political problem, one that challenges the capitalist model of development, and that does not allow governments and transnational corporations to take a short cut to “green capitalism,” with low greenhouse gas emissions but the same financial architecture, activists argue.

Amparo Miciano, of the World March of Women, highlighted the fact that during the two weeks’ duration of COP 15 and Klimaforum, people from the industrialised North and the developing South joined together to confront the climate crisis.

“I have experienced big civil society mobilisations. I’m from Porto Alegre (in southern Brazil), where the World Social Forum (WSF, an annual global gathering held as a counterpoint to the World Economic Forum) came into being, and what is happening here reminds me a lot of the first WSF there. It’s like a huge public education event,” Moreno said.

“Copenhagen will be a watershed,” said the Brazilian activist.

In the view of CJN’s Bullard, world public opinion is on the side of the concept of “climate justice,” and this support must be utilised.

For his part, Diego Azzi, a Brazilian labour activist responsible for regional integration for the Trade Union Confederation of the Americas (TUCA), said that Latin American trade unionists will have a greater presence at COP 16 in Mexico.

“We are trying to raise awareness among Latin American trade unionists about these environmental issues, through what we call ‘auto-reforma sindical’ (internal reforms of labour unions), which is linked to the trade union perspective on models of development, production and consumption,” he told IPS/TerraViva.

The NGOs are planning a timetable of actions for 2010, but some priorities are already clear: working at grassroots level, raising public awareness and putting pressure on those in government.

One of the most concrete proposals so far is to hold many more sessions and hearings before Courts of Climate Justice, and present the cases dealt with in Mexico.
(END/2009)

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By Mantoe Phakathi

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva) –

The Ogaden region is found in the southeastern part of Ethiopia, bordering on Somalia. It is a semi-arid region that has suffered increasingly frequent droughts, with harsh consequences for its pastoralist population. But the 100 or so members of the Ogaden Community Association of Sweden (OCAS) were not outside the Bella Center to make a point on climate change.

OCAS president Musluf Hassan said they were appealing to Obama to save them from Ethiopian Prime Minister Meles Zenawi, accusing Ethiopia of having invaded the territory in 1948 and making war on them ever since.

The region was first conquered by Ethiopia in the latter part of the 19th century by Menelik II.  However, during the brief Italian colonial occupation of Ethiopia beginning in 1936, the region was administered as part of Italian Somaliland, and Ethiopia failed to convince the British to cede the territory to it after the Second World War.

In 1948, under U.S. pressure, the territory was returned to Ethiopian control, but has remained restive, with the Ogaden National Liberation Front fighting a continued guerrilla struggle for independence.

In 2007, Ethiopia launched a military crackdown in Ogaden. International rights organisations like Human Rights Watch have accused the Ethiopian government of committing abuses, such as torturing and killing civilians in the region.

“We therefore appeal to world leaders – especially Obama because we have so much faith in him – to reject the proposal Zenawi made on Wednesday, which was not representative of the African position,” said Umar.

In a press conference given by Zenawi, as coordinator of African heads of state and government on climate change, and French President Nicholas Sarkozy Wednesday, it was stated that Ethiopia had agreed on a maximum two degree temperature rise and called on the parties to make a 10 billion dollar start-up fund available. Obama then congratulated the Ethiopians on their “leadership.”

But the G77 group of 130 developing nations and China made it clear that this was not the Africa Group’s position, which was set out in a formal submission to the UNFCCC.

About 100 OCAS members were there to say that Zenawi, who has already suffered a great deal of criticism for his proposal, is an inappropriate leader for the African team because he has no respect for human rights.

“Because of the war he is perpetuating against the Ogaden people, many people are raped and killed every day,” said Odal Umar. “We have lots of faith in Obama because he seems to be embracing only countries which respect human rights.”

(END/2009)

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No Real Deal, and No Exit

Analysis by Stephen Leahy

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva) The roof of our house is on fire but our leaders, our economic system and we ourselves are ignoring the alarms and continuing to add more fuel. There are no exit doors in our house; there is nowhere else to go.

Dangerous climate change is already here.

The two-week climate summit in Copenhagen came to an end with disappointing results and details that are still vague.

A ”Copenhagen Accord” was agreed by the US, China, South Africa and India by Friday night. It was unclear which other countries were willing to support it.

But coral reefs are dying, the Arctic is melting and rising sea levels threaten the homes of millions. And we’re on our way to a planet-transforming four-degree C rise in global average temperatures in as soon as 50 years.

Future generations could face an utterly transformed planet, where large areas will be seven to 14 degrees C warmer, making them uninhabitable. In this world-on-fire, the one to two metre sea level rise by 2100 will leave hundreds of millions homeless, according to the latest science presented at the “4 Degrees and Beyond, International Climate Science Conference” at the University of Oxford in September.

That’s the science-based, slap-in-the-face reality as the Copenhagen climate talks fizzle out here with little progress Friday.

“Our leaders do not get the scale of the problem or the rapidity of the changes. They don’t get that it must be dealt with now,” said Andrew Weaver, a climatologist at Canada’s University of British Columbia and lead author of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports.

“Now” means that global carbon emissions peak in five years and begin to decline shortly thereafter to near zero by 2050, according to a report summarising the very latest science by the world’s top climate scientists, including Weaver. Called “The Copenhagen Diagnosis, 2009: Updating the World on the Latest Climate Science”, it was released a week before the talks began here Dec. 7.

“More modest, achievable targets in the short term will get the planet on the right track,” Canada’s Prime Minister Stephen Harper has been often quoted as saying. Harper’s “modest” target for Canada amounts to a three-percent reduction from 1990 levels by 2020. The U.S. target is little better.

Based on the scientific evidence, the world’s best and brightest climate scientists conclude that Canada and other industrialised nations must reduce emissions 25 to 40 percent by 2020 compared to 1990 to have any hope of keeping the warming at two degrees C.

“Two degrees C will be a very difficult for modern society to cope with,” said Pål Prestrud, an Arctic researcher and director of Center for International Climate and Environmental Research in Oslo, Norway.

Even if all emissions were cut off today, global temperatures would decline very slowly – over a period of a thousand years. “If we wait too long, it will be too late to do anything,” Presetrud warned TerraViva here.

No scientist considers stabilising the climate at two degrees warmer to be getting the planet on the right track. The Arctic is already melting at the present 0.8 C of warming. There may be no sea ice in the summer in just 5 to 10 years.

What happens when the cold top of the world that drives the global weather system warms up? Temperature and precipitation patterns in Europe and North America will change, affecting agriculture, forestry and water supplies, the “Arctic Climate Feedbacks: Global Implications” report warned in September.

Worse still, a warmer Arctic will emit large volumes of carbon and methane, which are currently stored in the frozen soils called permafrost. Once that process gets underway, runaway global heating may be unstoppable.

At two degrees warmer, the majority of corals will die due to a combination of warmer temperatures and ocean acidification. Coral reefs are the nurseries for much of the fish in the oceans and hundreds of millions of people are dependent on them. Sea level rise will displace many millions more.

Finally, two degrees C of warming is only the global average. What it really means is that temperatures will range from one to four or five degrees hotter depending on the region. It also means at least one metre of sea level rise by 2100. Countries in Africa, small islands states and the least developed countries are calling for a 1.5 C target here.

Humans have enjoyed 10,000 years of climate stability, in which the global average temperature varied less than one degree C – even during the Little Ice Age and Middle Warming Period, says Robert Corell, director of the Global Change Programme at the H. John Heinz III Center for Science, Economics, and the Environment in Washington, DC.

Global emissions over the past five years have been above the worst case scenarios of the IPCC, and on a path for a five- to six-degree C rise in temperatures by 2100, Corell told TerraViva.

He also warned that Earth’s natural absorbers of carbon, the oceans and forests, are taking up less carbon every year, meaning concentrations of heat-trapping carbon will increase faster than expected.

All the commitments for reductions made in Copenhagen up to date translate into a 3.8-degree C rise in global temperatures, he said in an interview.

“Canada’s federal government doesn’t have a freakin’ clue what two degrees means,” said Canada’s Weaver with vehemence. Vested corporate interests from one sector are blocking the transformation to a low carbon economy, he said: “Big oil is running things.”

“I am sorry to say,” writes James Hansen, “that most of what politicians are doing on the climate front is greenwashing – their proposals sound good, but they are deceiving you and themselves at the same time.”

One of the most respected climate experts, Hansen is director of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies.

“Governments are stating emission goals that they know are lies,” Hansen wrote in the Observer newspaper Nov. 29.

“Are we going to stand up and give global politicians a hard slap in the face, to make them face the truth?” he asked. “It will take lot of us – probably in the streets. Or are we going to let them continue to kid themselves and us, and cheat our children and grandchildren?”

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By Servaas van den Bosch*

COPENHAGEN (IPS/TerraViva) Heads of state and government are working fervently to complete an agreement in Copenhagen, but texts coming out of their midst so far lack details on emissions cuts and long-term funding.

Negotiations – resumed after U.S. President Barack Obama’s speech failed to deliver any tangible targets – are likely to continue into tomorrow.

“While the reality of climate change is not in doubt, I have to be honest, as the world watches us today, I think our ability to take collective action is in doubt right now, and it hangs in the balance,” Obama observed.

The latest draft Copenhagen accord suggests extending the mandate of the LCA and KP working groups to continue discussions, but so far major sticking points between developed and developing countries are not being worked out.

In the latest text the door is left open for a long-term goal of a maximum 1.5 degree rise in global warming to be adopted after 2016 when the agreement is reviewed. Till then, the leaders stick to the two degree temperature threshold spelled out by the IPCC.

No agreement has been reached yet on the amount by which overall emissions should be reduced before 2020, but an overall 50 percent cut by 2050 was adopted. Annex I countries will talk measures to reduce cuts by 80 percent by 2050.

Both developing and developed countries underline the need for emissions to peak ‘as soon as possible’, stressing that this will take more time in developing nations, where poverty eradication and economic growth are the first priorities.

The agreement highlights the need to measure carbon emissions per capita, mentioning “the right to equitable access to atmospheric space”. This point was very important for countries like China and India with large populations.

Other than a $30 billion start-up fund for the period 2010-2012, there are no hard commitments to funding for adaptation and mitigation.

An amount of $100 billion per year by 2020 is proposed for this, but it is unclear how the money will be gathered. On Thursday Friends of the Earth said Secretary of State Hillary Clinton’s announcement of this figure was “inadequate.”

“We are not sure where the money is coming from; is it public, private, is it self-financing by the developing countries, is it from WB and IMF as well? We should have truly public finance coming from the U.S. as well as other Annex 1 countries, no strings attached.”

Developing countries’ demands for the creation of a new multilateral fund to administer and disperse funding under the Convention has been met with the establishment of the ‘Copenhagen Climate Fund’. Governance of the fund will be shared equally among developing and industrial countries. A Technology Mechanism will be started to accelerate development and transfer of technology.

Mitigation actions by developing countries are required, but not spelled out, and a REDD Plus mechanism is endorsed. There is no mention of women’s rights, or the rights of indigenous peoples, nor is there clarity about the controversial issue of intellectual property rights. The U.S. and China still disagree on the issue of monitoring, reporting and verification (MRV), while the other parties have agreed this should be ‘rigorous, robust and transparent’.

The draft of the ‘Copenhagen Accord’ was supposed to be submitted for discussion in the plenary at 6:00 PM on Friday, but this deadline passed as discussions continued.

Civil society organisations were still speaking of a “failure” in Copenhagen. “I’m not surprised that Copenhagen failed. It was the U.S. goal to obstruct any forward progress here. There is little changed from the Bush to the Obama administrations,” Anne Petermann, co-director of the U.S.-based Global Justice Ecology Project, told TerraViva.

Negotiators from developing countries remained critical about the lack of detail on funding.

“The amount of funding that will be provided to developing countries, especially the most vulnerable, to adapt to climate change as well as to adopt mitigation methods, still needs to be worked out,” said Sri Lankan U.N. ambassador Palitha Kohona. “You can’t expect to provide a pittance and also require them to make the changes, it just won’t work. We’ll need to have adequate sums so that these countries can make the changes necessary.”

“Ten billion dollars a year is a joke,” fumed Venezuelan president Hugo Chávez. “The military expenditure of the U.S. is 700 billion dollars per year,” he told the plenary session. “If the climate were a bank it would have been saved already.”

* Claudia Ciobanu and Rajiv Fernando contributed to this report.
(END/2009)

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