THE ANTARCTIC

Planet Tiger

Over the next few months Planet tiger will examine the issues and the differences amongst scientists as to whether the world is suffering from man-made climate warming or not.

We shall be also publishing the views of former UK Chancellor Nigel Lawson in this regard.

Comments are welcome.

Photo: World Food Program/Natasha Scripture

Planet Tiger.

In the run-up to the Copenhagen climate conference, many experts said agriculture should be a central issue in the discussions. After all, farmers are directly affected by climate change, they contribute up to a third of all man-made greenhouse gases, and they can also mitigate their impact by capturing excess carbon dioxide in the soil. 

Many farmers worldwide hoped that negotiators in Copenhagen would devise a way to shield them from the heat waves, droughts, floods, and other unpredictable weather predicted under climate change, and reward them for activities that trap greenhouse gases. But agriculture wasn’t mentioned in the final accord signed December 18th by the United States, China, India, Brazil, and South Africa. 

“So it’s basically back to the drawing board as far as agriculture is concerned,” says Ajay Vashee, president of the International Federation of Agricultural Producers.

Vashee says at least negotiators agreed on a framework for a possible future agreement that could include farmers. 

Farms vs. forests?

Experts note that agriculture is a newcomer to climate negotiations. By comparison, it took several years of talks before reducing emissions from deforestation received a pledge of financial backing in Copenhagen.

The details of that deal — how countries can earn credit for preserving and restoring their forests — are still sketchy, however. And the American Farm Bureau Federation, the nation’s largest farmers’ organization, warns that incentives to grow trees could backfire if they lead farmers to plant fewer crops.

“People need to understand that there [are] going to be some trade-offs here,” says Russell Williams, the Farm Bureau’s director of regulatory relations. “If you’re taking this much land out of production, what’s that going to do to food prices? They really need to find a way, if they’re going to move forward with this stuff, to have these forestry and agriculture offsets harmonized so you don’t have a perverse incentive to forest land that’s going to feed people.”

Farms + forests?

David Waskow, climate change program director at the advocacy group Oxfam America, says there are circumstances in which the pro-forest and pro-farming camps could be in opposition. “But I think there are also ways in which they can be very mutually beneficial.” He says in some cases, introducing trees into cropping systems can improve yields while storing carbon. 

“We’ve seen that in areas like the Sahel where farmers have increased tree cover, that’s really been beneficial in terms of natural fertilizers, in terms of water retention,” he says. “So there’s actually quite a bit of synergy there.”

Philosophical rift

Waskow says Oxfam is one of several organizations that prefer these kinds of ecologically-based solutions to the Western model of intensive agriculture using pesticides and chemical fertilizers. 

There is a deep philosophical rift within the agriculture community on this issue. Those who say organic agriculture is the only way to go drew fire in Copenhagen from the Farm Bureau’s Russell Williams.

“You just have to stand up and say, ‘Hey, wait a second. It doesn’t do anybody any good to denigrate Western agriculture,’” he says. “And no matter what you think, and no matter what you say, Western agriculture has become the most efficient land use for food. The United States feeds a whole heck of a lot of people.”

And the world will have to feed a whole heck of a lot more people in the coming decades, experts say, even as a changing climate makes growing food more challenging. As climate change negotiations move forward, expect to see more sparks fly over the best way to reduce greenhouse gases while continuing to feed a hungry planet.

voa.gov

Planet Tiger.

World Health Organization Director-General Margaret Chan says she is disappointed a deal on climate change was not struck in Copenhagen.  But she says important steps were taken that, she believes, will ultimately result in an agreement to stop or retard climate change.  

She says the relationship between climate change and health is obvious.  For example, she says millions of people will suffer from either too much water or too little water under climate change.

Chan says extensive flooding may lead to loss of life from drowning and disease.  She says contaminated floodwaters can cause fatal illnesses, such as diarrhea and cholera.  

On the other hand, she says some areas will have too little water and prolonged drought will affect the kind of crops people normally grow.

“The prediction is that in the next 20 years to 30 years, if the situation continues to get worse, the productivity from the agricultural sector and from subsistence farming in Africa, the production would reduce by as much as 50 percent,” she said.  “If there is any truth to that, can you imagine the impact on hunger, on acute and chronic malnutrition?”  

Scientists say the warming of the planet will be gradual, but that extreme weather events will increase in frequency and intensity.  
They say the effects of more storms, floods, droughts and heat waves will be abrupt and profound.  

The World Health Organization says the effects of so-called climate-sensitive diseases already are killing millions of people.  WHO reports more than three-and-a-half million people die every year from malnutrition-related causes.  It says diarrhea-related diseases kill nearly two million people and almost one million die from malaria.

WHO Chief Margaret Chan says such problems will be magnified under climate change. “With the changes in temperature – vectors – disease vectors like mosquitoes have been reported to cause malaria in places that had never reported malaria cases,” she said.

Chan says climate change is a global phenomenon.  While no country will be exempt, she says its consequences will not be evenly distributed.  The WHO chief says poor countries that already are struggling with huge problems will be most affected.  

Chan says fragile health systems in the developing world will come under increased stress.  She says they will have great difficulty coping with the increased burden of disease and other health problems.

voa.gov

Planet Tiger

Some Americans feel cost of climate change legislation is greater than benefit

Climate change legislation, passed by the U.S. House of Representatives, appears stalled in the Senate.  Many conservatives in America simply don’t want it.  

“No country is more important than the United States in resolving these climate change issues,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon said.  

The Senate Foreign Relations Committee hosted an important guest some weeks back.  Moon is a strong voice on the need for mandated changes in greenhouse gas emissions. 

But climate change legislation, which passed the U.S. House of Representatives, appears stalled in the Senate, in line behind healthcare and financial services reform.  The bills would require cuts in U.S CO2 emissions.

Democratic Senator John Kerry says passage before Copenhagen won’t happen. “We hope to be headed to Copenhagen with an outline at least of where our legislation is going at least on the floor of the Senate,” he said.

Climate policy analyst Jake Schmidt says passing strong legislation promptly is crucial if the U.S. is to be a leader on the environment. “Well clearly before we are really credible players in international eyes, we have to have domestic legislation that enforces our commitments,” he said.

The White House says the president will propose at Copenhagen a U.S. emissions target of 17 percent below 2005 levels by 2020. 

David Kreutzer is an economist who tracks climate change for the conservative Heritage Foundation. He says the Senate bill faces hurdles, much like the bill in the House did.

“One of the problems is that the Waxman-Markey bill, the one in the House, passed only by 7 votes after a lot of wheeling and dealing and horse-trading and so on and that was right before the 4th of July break and it turned out it was fairly unpopular when legislators went home,” he said.

Kreutzer and other conservatives insist that legislation curbing C02 emissions will cost the U.S. economy trillions of dollars and do little to bring down global temperature. 

Kreutzer urges President Obama to just say no in Copenhagen to binding  mandates. “The real leadership that we should offer is to say this is a bad deal,” he said. “This cutting carbon imposes a cost on the world economy that far exceeds any benefits.”

Kreutzer is also against proposals for developed countries to help fund the clean up of developing nations.   “The citizens of the United States aren’t at all convinced that we have a global warming problem that is severe enough for a blank check solution,” he stated.

Environmentalists like the Earth Policy Institute’s Janet Larsen say this is dangerous talk. She’s attending the conference in Copenhagen.

“The concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is at about 387 parts per million.  That’s a level of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere the world may not have seen in the last 50 million years, so we are clearly moving into un-charted territory,” she said.

One of the goals of Copenhagen is to lay the groundwork for an international treaty that binds nations in the area of climate change.  The Senate would have to ratify the treaty for it to take effect in the U.S.

(voanews.com)

Planet Tiger
Robert Zoellick says rich countries need to appreciate developing needs of poorer countries

The World Bank wants the issue of climate change to be connected to strategies of growth and development. The World Bank also says that strong economic growth in India is helping the world recover from the global financial crisis.

World Bank President Robert B. Zoellick says he expects a series of political commitments at the United Nations conference on climate change starting next week in Copenhagen.

Zoellick, who is in India to meet top leaders, was speaking to reporters in New Delhi Friday.

He says that to bring developing countries into the process of cooperating on climate change, richer countries will have to appreciate their development needs. For example, Zoellick points out that 400 million people in India, and about 10 per cent in several countries of Sub Saharan Africa, still have no access to energy.

The World Bank wants to assist developing countries in adopting low carbon use as they try to generate more electricity and develop new industries.

Zoellick says that in India for example, there is tremendous potential to tap hydro power and solar power. “This has multiple benefits because it is not only solar production. But we think there is opportunities given some of the great technology capabilities in India to develop this as another industry which can also be a source of exports,” he said.

Zoellick says developing nations should also focus on improving energy efficiencies in existing industries and sectors such as transportation to cut down their carbon emissions. “In much of the developing world there are still huge gains to be had, win-win gains by using energy more efficiently,” he said.

The World Bank chief says India is playing an important role in helping the world emerge from the recent economic slowdown. He expects the country to return to the high rates of growth of eight to nine per cent over the next one or two years. “India is now a rising economic power that handled the recent economic crisis very well. It contributed to world economic stability and could become a pole of global economic growth over time,” he said.

He however adds that there is still a long road ahead for India’s poor. He says the challenge for the country is to improve development and infrastructure. India is one of the largest recipients of World Bank aid – it has received more than $5 billion this year to support projects in areas such as power, roads, water and rural development.
(voanews.com)

Planet Tiger

The international conference on climate change opens Monday in Copenhagen, Denmark, hosting thousands of participants and observers hoping to reach a deal to combat global warming. Initial expectations have been scaled back, but pressure remains for a substantive political agreement.

The international conference on climate change opens Monday in Copenhagen, Denmark, hosting thousands of participants and observers hoping to reach a deal to combat global warming. Initial expectations have been scaled back, but pressure remains for a substantive political agreement.

For the next two weeks this city plays host to experts, officials, activists and eventually world leaders as they try to clinch a deal.

Speaking to journalists on the eve of the conference, top U.N. climate official Yvo de Boer said it is time to act.

“Time is up,” said Yvo de Boer. “Over the next two weeks, governments have to deliver a strong and long-term response to the challenges of climate change.”

The goal was to reach a legally binding agreement to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, blamed for heating up the atmosphere. But big questions remain over who cuts, by how much, who pays and what it will cost.

Initial expectations for Copenhagen have been scaled back to try to reach political agreement on a framework, with a detailed, binding treaty to follow.

More steps will be needed, said Yvo de Boer, but he remained confident.

“Never in the 17 years of climate change negotiations have so many different nations made so many firm pledges together,” he said.

That, said de Boer, makes this conference a turning point already. Certainly many Copenhagen residents hope that is true and they see climate change as a crucial issue.

MAN: “I think the most important thing we can politically is to force the leaders to take seriously the problems we are facing.”

MAN: “The issue is important for my future and my children’s future as well.”

COUPLE: “It is very important. Super important – it involves all of us whether we live here in Denmark or whether we live in Asia or in North America, for that matter.”

MAN: “I think it is very important for the people in the world that we do something about it right now.”

Copenhagen has embraced the conference – with posters and reminders of what is at stake at almost every corner. One exhibit has taken a different tack – with large posters of some of the world’s beauty spots – remaining wilderness and wildlife.

The exhibit is meant as a message to world leaders, when they come here, to make sure such beauty remains for future generations.

(voanews.com)

Planet Tiger

Two-week conference aims to achieve legally binding agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions and has been billed as last best chance to clinch a deal.

UN officials, climate experts, environmental activists, and more than 60 world leaders gather in Copenhagen for a two-week conference on climate change to begin December 7. Their aim is to achieve a legally binding agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions. But there are questions about how much can be achieved and how any agreement would be implemented.

The Copenhagen conference has been billed as the last best chance to clinch a deal, but doubts have been raised whether it can do that.

Environmental groups will press the case for urgent action, says Charlie Kronick, climate advisor at Greenpeace UK.

“We need to have a legally binding agreement to reduce carbon emission in developed countries as quickly as possible,” he urged.  “And what we need along with that is a significant commitment for funding from the developed countries to the developing countries – to fund technology transfer, to fund forest protection and also to fund adaptation to climate change, that we’re already committed to,” he said.

The goal is to reduce greenhouse gas emissions blamed for heating up the atmosphere.  And, since industrialized nations were the greatest polluters for years, they, more than others, are under pressure to cut emissions.  

But, many say developing countries also need to do more. They in turn want financial help to make the transition.

Both need to work together, says Nick Nuttall, spokesman for the UN Environment Program.

“What we’re looking for in Copenhagen is a global partnership between the North and the South, between the developed, industrialized nations and the rapidly developing ones with the other developing nations also a part of that cooperative partnership deal, which is the only way we’re going to deal with this,” he said.

Most scientists say human activity is behind global warming and that it’s up to humans to make changes to stem the tide.

But, politics and economics get in the way, says Charlie Kronick of Greenpeace.

“Governments in general and politicians all over the world are looking at a price tag that’s attached to their term of office,” he said.  “They always forget, and it’s rarely emphasized in public, that it’s better to spend the money now than in the future. The worse the problem gets, the more it costs to adapt.” 

Copenhagen is supposed to come up with a successor to the 1997 Kyoto agreement that mandated cuts in emissions.  It expires in 2012.  Some say Kyoto was doomed from the start because the United States never signed on.

But, President Obama will come to Copenhagen. And the United States has put emission cut proposals on the table.  

The conference is the moment of truth, says Nick Nuttall of the UN.

“This is the point at which governments really have to decide if they’re serious about climate and if so, what they’re going to do about it,” he said.

It now remains to be seen if politicians are listening

(voanews.com)

Daily Tiger News

On the eve of an international conference on climate change, a top U.N. official is again calling for $30 billion in fast-track aid to help poor countries ramp up efforts to control carbon emissions linked to global warming. For the full story click this link.

Planet Tiger

On 5 December, Jean-Pierre Loubinoux, Director General of the International Union of Railways (UIC), the initiator of this special train, together with Achim Steiner, the Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme and James P. Leape, Director General of WWF hosted more than 400 high level EcoPassengers: climate change negotiators, rail business leaders, environmental activists, journalists and a group of Young Climate Champions on board of the Climate Express taking them to COP 15 in Copenhagen.

The Climate Express is part Train to Copenhagen’ campaign aiming to support and encourage decision-makers to delivering a successor to the Kyoto Protocol, the first international effort to cut green house gas emissions. Its purpose is also to send out the message that the next-generation climate agreement and its supporting policies and procedures need to address the transport sector’s growing emissions

Planet Tiger

Dr. George V. Safonov, who is  Director Center for Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, State University – Higher School of Economics, Moscow, has written an illuminating article. Visit the UN Climate Change Conference website here for the full story.

Dr. George V. Safonov, Director Center for Environmental and Natural Resource Economics, State University – Higher School of Economics, Moscow06/12/2009 13:05/12/2009 13:05