CAN Intervention – AWG Opening – December 3rd 2007

CAN intervention AWG Monday 3 December 2007 4:30-6 pm

Mr. Chair, excellencies, distinguished delegates, welcome to Indonesia and Bali (say also in Bahasa Indonesia). Thank you for the opportunity to speak on behalf of the over 400 member organizations of the Climate Action Network, my name is Elshinta Suyoso Marsden of WWF-Indonesia.

2007 has been a remarkable climate year already. You have a unique opportunity, indeed responsibility, to crown this year with a Bali mandate that truly delivers on the personal commitments made by almost 100 heads of state to avoid dangerous warming through a post-2012 climate deal.

Like never before, the climate crisis is now in the public spotlight and expectations are very high for this meeting.

The combination of high population density and high levels of biodiversity together with a staggering 80,000 kilometers of coastline and 17,500 islands, makes Indonesia one of the countries most vulnerable to the impacts of climate change. The impacts are noticeable throughout our Asia-Pacific region; more frequent and severe heat waves, floods, extreme weather events and prolonged droughts will continue to lead to increased injury, illness and death. Continued warming temperatures will also increase the number of malaria and dengue fever cases and lead to an increase in other infectious diseases as a result of poor nutrition due to food production disruption.

The IPCC reports are unequivocal about the impacts the world will experience if we continue down the current path. The IPCC also shows we have the technologies and policy measures we need in order to avoid dangerous climate if, but only if, immediate action is taken.

The Climate Action Network (CAN) wishes to be quite clear in its demands, what we need from Bali is industrialized country leadership – putting warm words into cool action, and living up to commitments, old and new. We also need incentives from industrialized countries to enable developing countries to increase their contributions and do their fair share. This will require new mechanisms that substantially increase the use of low-carbon technologies in developing countries, and other mechanisms to greatly scale-up financial and technological support for adaptation.

The signal from Bali must be clear: a comprehensive negotiation must be launched. This must result, by the end of 2009, in an agreement on substantially greater emissions reductions globally, consistent with achieving the target of staying well below 2 degrees Celcius of warming from pre-industrial levels.

As to the negotiation process under the Kyoto track:
The first task of the AWG is to agree in Bali the indicative range of emissions reductions required from Annex I. CAN believes the scientific basis established by the IPCC commands the reductions will be at least within the currently proposed range of -25 to -40% of 1990 emissions by 2020.

We need to expand the workplan of the Ad-Hoc Working Group (AWG) to include, amongst others, the following important issues related to Annex I commitments beyond 2012.

• deep emissions reductions in Annex I countries
•  fair and transparent target sharing criteria for Annex I
•  analysis of the existing flexible mechanisms
•  exploration of the scale and modes of finance, investment and technology transfer
•  expansion of Annex A to include emissions from shipping and aviation

The following para was not delivered but distributed to delegates as part of the printed statement, at the request of the UNFCCC.

As to the Convention track, there is a real need to formalise the Dialogue. As Brazil stated in Bonn: “Discussions in the absence of negotiations cannot prosper”. The lessons from the Dialogue must be taken up in formal negotiations under the Convention that explore how industrialized countries will incentivise the enhanced actions by developing country to decarbonise their development.

The mandate for this working group on the Bali roadmap should include, amongst others, the following important elements:

• the overall level of ambition, based on a review of the best-available science, to keep global temperature increases as far below 2ºC as possible
• launching negotiations to increase the contributions from developing countries
• a fair and equitable process to define the fair share of each country
• rapidly increasing support for the most vulnerable to adapt to unavoidable climate impacts
• technology cooperation
• a mechanism to guarantee reliable incentives to rapidly reduce absolute emissions from tropical deforestation and degradation in developing countries, which recognises the rights of Indigenous Peoples and the sovereignty of developing countries over their forests
• an effective compliance regime.

Delivery resumed here…

Formal negotiations on both the Convention and Kyoto track should be concluded in 2009, to allow sufficient time for agreement to enter into force before the 31st of December 2012.

If global emissions are to peak by 2015, as the IPCC reports shows they should, what we agree in Bali is absolutely critical.

Do we condemn ourselves to suffer the litany of irreversible dangerous climate impacts laid out in the IPCC report, or do we embrace a sustainable future?

Negotiators, the world is looking to you to make the right decisions.