D+C Development and Cooperation (No. 3, May/June 2001,
p. 3)
Setback in the Fight against Global Warming
Dieter Brauer
Scientists of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are ringing the alarm bells: if the emissions of greenhouse gases - caused mainly by the burning of fossil fuels and intensified agriculture - continue unchecked at their present rate, the earth’s average temperatures are likely to rise between 1.4 and 5.8 degrees centigrade until the end of the century. The consequences of global warming can already be observed: polar ice caps are shinking, and glaciers in the Alps and the Himalaya Mountains are melting with severe effects on water flows in the big rivers on which hundreds of millions of people depend for their water supply. The world’s oceans are rising and tropical storms are becoming more frequent and devastating, putting in risk human settlements in low lying coastal areas and small island states. Floods and droughts occur with increasing frequency. Insurance companies estimate that annual damages due to global warming could be as high as 300 billion dollars worldwide, with the developing countries being the most vulnerable to these man-made catastrophes.
The assessments presented by the IPCC to a United Nations conference of about 100 states in Accra, Ghana, in March 2001 are not entirely new. The international community has been discussing climate change and its likely damaging impact for years. However, the estimates now put forward by the IPCC are even more dramatic than previous prognostications on the pace of global warming. One would have thought that politicians around the globe would be spurred into determined action to reverse the trend to ever higher emissions of greenhouse gases. But the new United States administration under President George W. Bush has dealt a severe blow to such hopes. With undisguised bluntness he told the visiting German Federal Chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder, that it was not in the interest of the US economy to sign the Kyoto Protocol negotiated in 1997 to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. In Kyoto, industrial and developing countries had agreed to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by an average of 5.2 per cent of the 1990 levels between 2008-2012. The reduction targets accepted for the industrial states - the main polluters of the atmosphere - were 8 per cent for the European Union,
7 per cent for the US, and 6 per cent for Japan.
This was a comfortable arrangement for the United States which is causing about 22 per cent of global carbon dioxide emissions with little more than 4 per cent of global population. But President Bush apparently believes the Kyoto Protocol is “unfair” to America because it exempts developing countries from reduction efforts. Moreover, the state of California is in the midst of an energy crisis which Americans hope to solve by building additional fossil fuel based power stations. Energy saving measures, which could be an alternative to investing in new facilities, are not popular in a people which is still used to squandering non-renewable sources of energy on gas-guzzling cars, air-conditioners, badly insulated homes, and other energy-intensive luxuries. The refusal of President Bush to sign the modest reduction targets of the Kyoto Protocol makes a mockery of all the talk about global responsibility and world leadership the rest of the world has to hear so often from American politicians.
Where do we go from here? Is the Kyoto Protocol really “dead” as President Bush told Chancellor Schroeder and, a few days later, an EU delegation? In July 2001, the next round of climate negotiations is due to be held in Bonn, Germany. The Europeans now hope to get acceptance for the Kyoto Protocol even without the Americans. The agreement will come into force if it is ratified by at least 55 per cent of UN member states and if those states are responsible for 55 per cent of total greenhouse gas emissions. EU environment commissioner Margot Wallström said after talks in Washington and Canada that she had given up hope that the US would rethink its position. The EU would now try to get the support of Russia and Japan to reach the required quorum of 55 per cent of carbon dioxide emissions. Those states which were not willing to participate in the climate protection effort would have to face not only protests from the international community but also calls for boycott of US corporations from environmental and consumers’organisations.
But boycotts and a trade war between Europe and the United States over climate issues would certainly not be in the interest of anybody on both sides of the Atlantic. The solution of burning global issues is only possible through international cooperation, not through increased confrontation. However, selfish attitudes like those exhibited by President Bush can no longer be tolerated by the international community. After all, as the IPCC scientists are predicting, everybody will be affected by the imminent changes of the global climate, and the Americans are among the major culprits. It is, therefore, the right strategy for the EU to go ahead with the Kyoto process - with or without the Americans. By standing alone, outside the consensus of the international community, the United States risk losing their claim to moral and political leadership in the world. Once the American people realise that this is the consequence of the present policy of the US administration, they may want to come back aboard and take up the struggle against the dangers entailed in the global warming of our atmosphere.
D+C Development and Cooperation,
published by: Deutsche Stiftung für internationale Entwicklung (DSE)
Editorial office, postal address:
D+C Development and Cooperation, P.O. Box, D-60268 Frankfurt, Germany.
E-Mail: HDBrauer@cs.com
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