Environmentalists feel the climate change conference at Copenhagen will carry weight only if participating nations reach a conscientious agreement to arrest global warming
Twelve years after the Kyoto Protocol, touted as the definitive international agreement to arrest global warming, was adopted by world nations in Kyoto, Japan, under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCC), global warming remains as pressing a problem as it was prior to 1997. So, as the Copenhagen Summit gets underway from today and continues till December 18, the need for a seminal climate change agreement has never been more urgently felt. However, going by past reluctance of developed countries to commit to legally-binding carbon emission cuts and disinclination of developing nations to agree to discriminatory carbon burden-sharing, the outcome of the Copenhagen Summit is anybody’s guess.
“It’s been a pattern with developed nations; all these years, they have been breaking all the rules that they expect developing nations to follow,” says Ramachandran of Kalpavriksh, a Pune-based environment action group. “For sustainable development, it’s imperative that developed nations, the biggest polluters, start by conserving energy and human resources, before dictating terms to others,” he adds.
With the early effects of global warming now being increasingly felt, it can no longer be pushed under the carpet, as has been done in the years since the Kyoto Protocol was approved. And hence, the Copenhagen (also dubbed Hope-nhagen by environmentalists) summit assumes much significance. “We can no longer afford to postpone a decision on global warming. All development till date has been uneven and lopsided, in favour of developed countries. To top it, these nations create environmental mess and then want developing countries to clean it up. This has to stop,” asserts Dharmaraj Patil of Centre for Environment Education (CEE), Pune.
With Prime Minister Manmohan Singh recently announcing his decision to be present at Copenhagen, Denmark on December 17, just days after India (the world’s fourth biggest emitter) announced its aim to cut carbon intensity by 20-25 percent (by 2020 compared to 2005 levels), the consensus reached at Copenhagen is bound to have long-term implications for both our planet and the future of humanity. However, as Patil puts it, “Developed nations must make common cause with developing ones to save our planet; otherwise it will be too little, too late.” Continuing in the same vein, Ramachandran says rich nations are digging their own graves by refusing to accept the gaping reality of climate change. “The time for decisive action has arrived. There can be no further procrastination on this issue and everyone should realize this once and for all,” he adds on a sombre note.
Warming Up
· In 2012, the Kyoto Protocol to prevent climate changes and global warming runs out and there’s an urgent need for a new climate protocol. Hence, the Copenhagen Summit
· Government representatives from 170 countries expected to be present at the 11-day-long summit, from Dec 7 to 18, along with NGOs, journalists and others
· ‘Burden-sharing’ to be the point of contention at the summit. Climate scientists say by 2050, the world must cut emissions by 80 per cent compared with 1990 levels to limit global warming
· A Guardian poll reveals almost nine out of 10 climate scientists doubt political efforts to restrict global warming to an additional two degree centigrade average rise — the level the European Union defines as ‘dangerous’ — will succeed
