Cartagena occupies the ‘middle ground’ in negotiations

By Cherelle Jackson

 APIA – The Cartagena Dialogue, a network of countries working for a constructive solution in the negotiations on climate change occupies the middle ground in climate change negotiations.

This is according to Chair of Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG KP), Adrian Macey from New Zealand who critiqued the shortcomings in the UNFCCC process as means of finding a solution to the impact of climate change.

“I find the UNFCCC as a very very strange organisation compared to other organisations. In all other bilateral organisations I have worked with there has been middle ground, occupied by committees or others to breaker solutions when parties are locked into disagreements, but for some reason UNFCCC has great difficulty developing this.”

Macey then went on to say that the Cartagena Dialogue fills the role.

“ It’s great that you are now occupying this stage which is necessary to decision making,” he said on the first day of the meeting in Apia, Samoa.

Cartagena Dialogue in the past two days have been discussing issues relating to adaptation, climate finance and others.

The 35 countries present discussed what they would take to the upcoming COP17 in Durban at the end of the year.

Macey said “collective ambition” is necessary to achieve outcomes at the COP17.

“ There’s clearly a gap here, between agreed goal of limiting global warming and collective efforts that are on the table at the moment, and I see little prospect of significant increase on that ambition,” Macey said.

He encouraged the Dialogue to set up a Kyoto Protocol branch of the Dialogue to discuss strategies for integration into the COP Processes.KP branch of CD so we can make use of them if we are asked

Cartagena Dialogue reflect on climate change solutions

By Cherelle Jackson

APIA, Samoa - The Fifth Meeting of the Cartagena Dialogue opened in Apia, Samoa, today. More than 35 country delagates took part in the meeting that is chaired by Taulealeausumai Lavasa Malua, the CEO of the Ministry of Natural Resource and Environment.
The Cartagena Dialogue is a network of countries working for a constructive solution in the negotiations on climate change. It includes countries from almost every negotiating group within the UN Climate Change negotiations. According to reports from Cancun, the Dialogue allowed countries a safe place to test out text and areas for consensus that they could take back to their negotiating groups.
Todays meeting was opened by the Samoan Minister of Natural Resource and Environment,  Faamoetauloa Ulaitino Faale Tumaalii who spoke on the need for a collective approach to active solutions.
"The Cartagena Dialogue provides a good space for countries who work towards real solutions for issues," he said.
According to him UNFCCC has been criticised for failing to rise up to the challenge on climate change, but that the Cartagena Dialogue memebers should not be discouraged.
He noted the four main issues the Dialogue will be discussing during the two day meeting, which include: ambitious mitigation targets, adaptation, continuation of Kyoto Protocal, a possible Durban Mandate at the upcoming Climate Change Conference in December, and financing on climate change.
The meeting will hear from participants today and tommorow.

 UNCSD Prep Comm Pacific meets in Samoa

The UN Conference for Sustainable Development (UNCSD or Rio+20) Subregional Preparatory Committee for Pacific Countries, convened in Apia, Samoa, on 22 July.   

During the morning session participants discussed global and Pacific regional preparations for Rio+20. Participants then considered green economy in the context of sustainable development and poverty eradication, focusing on greening the economy in a blue world.
During the afternoon session participants examined institutional frameworks for implementing sustainable development in the Pacific region. Delegates heard presentations on national institutional frameworks for sustainable development, resources for transforming economies, including through climate financing, and on regional partnerships.   

During the closing session, UN ESCAP introduced an outcome document containing recommendations on the green economy and IFSD. Delegates agreed to adopt the document “in principle,” noting countries could provide comments until 30 July 2011. The meeting closed at 4:49pm. (ENB)

On Nauru, a Sinking Feeling

By MARCUS STEPHEN - NEW YORK TIMES
Published: July 18, 2011

Yaren, Nauru - I forgive you if you have never heard of Nauru — but you will not forgive yourselves if you ignore our story. At just 8 square miles, about a third of the size of Manhattan, and located in the southern Pacific Ocean, Nauru appears as merely a pinpoint on most maps — if it is not missing entirely in a vast expanse of blue.

But make no mistake; we are a sovereign nation, with our own language, customs and history dating back 3,000 years. Nauru is worth a quick Internet search, I assure you, for not only will you discover a fascinating country that is often overlooked, you will find an indispensible cautionary tale about life in a place with hard ecological limits.

Phosphate mining, first by foreign companies and later our own, cleared the lush tropical rainforest that once covered our island’s interior, scarring the land and leaving only a thin strip of coastline for us to live on. The legacy of exploitation left us with few economic alternatives and one of the highest unemployment rates in the world, and led previous governments to make unwise investments that ultimately squandered our country’s savings.

I am not looking for sympathy, but rather warning you what can happen when a country runs out of options. The world is headed down a similar path with the relentless burning of coal and oil, which is altering the planet’s climate, melting ice caps, making oceans more acidic and edging us ever closer to a day when no one will be able to take clean water, fertile soil or abundant food for granted.

Climate change also threatens the very existence of many countries in the Pacific, where the sea level is projected to rise three feet or more by the end of the century. Already, Nauru’s coast, the only habitable area, is steadily eroding, and communities in Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands have been forced to flee their homes to escape record tides. The low-lying nations of Tuvalu, Kiribati and the Marshall Islands may vanish entirely within our grandchildren’s lifetimes.

Similar climate stories are playing out on nearly every continent, where a steady onslaught of droughts, floods and heat waves, which are expected to become even more frequent and intense with climate change, have displaced millions of people and led to widespread food shortages.

The changes have already heightened competition over scarce resources, and could foreshadow life in a world where conflicts are increasingly driven by environmental catastrophes.

Yet the international community has not begun to prepare for the strain they will put on humanitarian organizations or their implications for political stability around the world.

In 2009, an initiative by the Pacific Small Island Developing States, of which I am chairman, prompted the United Nations General Assembly to recognize the link between climate change and security. But two years later, no concrete action has been taken.

So I was pleased to learn that the United Nations Security Council will take up the issue tomorrow in an open debate, in which I will have the opportunity to address the body and reiterate my organization’s proposals.

First, the Security Council should join the General Assembly in recognizing climate change as a threat to international peace and security. It is a threat as great as nuclear proliferation or global terrorism. Second, a special representative on climate and security should be appointed. Third, we must assess whether the United Nations system is itself capable of responding to a crisis of this magnitude.

The stakes are too high to implement these measures only after a disaster is already upon us. Negotiations to reduce emissions should remain the primary forum for reaching an international agreement. We are not asking for blue helmets to intervene; we are simply asking the international community to plan for the biggest environmental and humanitarian challenge of our time.

Nauru has begun an intensive program to restore the damage done by mining, and my administration has put environmental sustainability at the center of our policymaking. Making our island whole again will be a long and difficult process, but it is our home and we cannot leave it for another one.