The United States, Russia, China and India continued to be seen as among the key obstacles to a new climate change treaty as the United Nations climate conference in Nairobi drew to a close this week.
The Kyoto protocol ends in 2012. But many of the Nairobi delegates were deeply sceptical about whether the current round of talks will deliver a mandate to negotiate a new convention at the same time next year.
Environmentalists, including UN Framework on Climate Change executive secretary Yvo de Boer, believe that it takes two years to negotiate a pact and two years to secure ratification. The implication is that talks on a new set of commitments for beyond 2012 must begin in 2008 at the latest.
More than 100 ministers and 6 000 participants are attending the annual conference, which is charting a way forward on how nations will reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.
Richard Worthington, of the South African climate action network which is participating in the congress, said there was much indecision in critical negotiations, as countries jostled to protect their interests. The talks were ”painstakingly slow”, he said.
Some industrialising countries — particularly China, India and Brazil — were still defensive about the possible negotiation of a disguised cap system which would force them to reduce emissions. However, Worthington insisted that capped emissions for the Group of 77 developing countries and China were not on the cards.
His and other civil society organisations were encouraged by Kofi Annan’s strong stance on countries that were still shunning Kyoto. Although he did not name them, his comments were seen as a veiled criticism of the US and Australia.
Speaking at the conference on Wednesday Annan said ”a few diehard sceptics continue trying to sow doubt. They should be seen for what they are: out of step, out of arguments and out of time.”
Speaking on behalf of China and the Group of 77 developing countries, which South Africa chairs in this round of talks, South Africa’s Environment Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk echoed Annan’s sentiments. ”The people who rely on us for new hope and a strengthened climate deal do not want to see a few countries holding our common future to ransom or retreating from commitments to address climate change,” Van Schalkwyk said.
While developed countries should cut back further on their emissions, he added, developing countries could not be expected to cap their emissions at present.
Van Schalkwyk highlighted the two basic approaches to be followed on Kyoto. One, favoured by some developed countries, was to ”cap now”. The other told developed countries ”cap first”, and developing countries ”empower first”. South Africa favoured the second option.
He said it would be unfair and misguided to ignore the fact that the developed world had achieved economic progress over more than a century of ”cumulative emissions”.
Adaptation to climate change measures was a top priority for developing countries, said Van Schalkwyk, who was ”encouraged” by the five-year plan to help vulnerable states, launched in Nairobi this week. Agreement on the Adaptation Fund was the conference’s major success.
De Boer agreed. ”The Adaptation Fund is crucial to developing countries,” he said, ”because it allows them to really begin working on activities to adapt to climate change.”
The fund will be funded by Clean Development Mechanisms (CDMs) and voluntary contributions. CDMs give European companies carbon credits if they invest in clean energy projects in developing nations, as part of the European Union’s carbon trading scheme. De Boer said the number of such projects would determine the size of the fund.
But the CDM concept also came under fire at the Nairobi conference. More than 300 such projects have been approved worldwide, but only four are located in sub-Saharan Africa — all in South Africa.
Annan announced this week that development agencies would join forces in trying to secure more projects for Africa.