The week started off with the first reading on the negotiating text. The order of reading was modified from the one presented in the written version of the text, to allocate proper time for discussion on the issues related to developing country concerns. Therefore, the discussions started off with the issues related to adaptation, finance, technology transfer, and currently the mitigation has only started, which will be followed up by discussions on shared vision.
The developing countries lead by the G77 and China started off with their concerns, inconsistency, clarifications regarding the text. Representing the Group, following are the issues raised during the intervention by the Phillipines:
Clarification: the intervention by G77 requested clarification on the idea of poor developing countries under the section A, paragraph 22. There has been request on the resilience concept under the Section A para 22 f. further ther were clarification needed in terms of NAPA like Actions, the concept of climate refugees, the proposal for review of the review, whether it would consist of national and international supported actions? the difference in NAPA and/ or national adaptation actions, Sound evidenced based under the Section Implementation Action, and the group needs clarification of the whole idea of the monitoring issues mentioned in the paragraph 51, 52 of the Section on Monitoring and review.
Consistency: the group pointed out certain inconsistency regarding language interms of clasification of the country groups, especially mentioned in terms of 22j of the Text. Further, there is required consistency on the 32, aboiut the matter of priority of action.
Concerns: there have been attempts made in terms being inconsistent with the convention. It has been pointed out that there is attempt to new classification of group of countries.
Problematic: there might be review of all national actions by the international review undre the current schemes. the Text only talks about the catalytic role, but the convention currently states about the scope being extended to beyond the catalyitc role. also there has been proposal for the multiwindow approach, but it is not clear whether the approach will be like that of the AF. Undre various forms, there has been attempt to impose additional commitments, like para 34, 47 option 4, heading of the 24, and 19a.
The other important interventions were made in from the part of the countries like India, Panama, Australia, Bangladesh, and Switzerland.
On finance, the G77 and China suggested some changes in the current text to align it with the Convention and the BAP. The issues like co-financing, carbon market, and the market mechanisms for raising the money are problematic for the Group. The EU spoke about the need to maintain the equity, and coherency of financial mechanisms and also to take into considerations other portions of the text like the issues related to adaptation. It has been iterated by the developing country parties as well as in the intervention of the G77 and China that the public money should be the main source and the private money would be only looked after as complementary to the public source of funds.
In terms of finance, the most talked about proposals made by the Norway and Mexico, are the talk of the week. These two proposals have different components in them. The Norwegian proposal talked about the part of the AAUs auctioned to the climate change funding. While the Mexican Proposal insists on the laying down of the principles on which the assessed contribution to the climate change fund will be made. The discussion however, was not focused on the part of the developed countries about how much of the money they are willing to commit. This was being pointed out by many of the country delegates whom we met during the week.
On technology issues, the country interventions were totally bifurcated. The developing countries raised the issues of barriers in the form of IPR, and know-how transfers. The developed countries though maintained that the IPR is not a barrier, and in-fact they are an incentive for innovative actions for developing climate friendly technologies. There were interesting intervention being made in the part of China, who iterated that the climate is a global public good and the development of the technology should take into account this characteristic. Also they proposed for the improvement of the current IPR system. The countries like, Japan, US, iterated the need for maintaining the current form of the system and they said that this would in fact lead to development of the climate friendly technologies. The other important idea being flagged in the discussions was the patent pooling system. The patent pooling will serve the purpose of the information on patent and also the accessibility of the technologies. However, the developed country did not engage with the idea.
The important areas that were not being discussed include the TAPs and their concrete role in diffusion, deployment and development of the technologies. The linkages between the TAPs and the national imperatives are the areas that need to be carefully dealt with. The international guidelines on technology should be in such a way so as they would not contradict the national needs.
India pointed out that there are two issues: existing and tech for tomorrow’s tech. For existing ones, one of the way to move forward is to utilise the NAMA route, and for the technologies that needs to be developed, we propose the concepts of regional and nodal technology innovation centres, involving the business, policymakers and innovation centres. These need not be new ones, the existing structures should be used in this regard. Also this will facilitate more constructive role for the private sector in technology development as well.
The bunker fuels - emissions from shipping and aviation are still on the negotiation table and the main ambition of NGOs is to keep the bunkers on the negotiation table. Some delegates also expressed that they want to keep bunkers on the list. ICAO and IMO gave a poor report of their ineffectiveness. And it seems that they remain unable to come forward with tackling emissions from aviation and shipping. ICAO puts high hope on sustainable biofuels, but at their side event on Tuesday, they were unable to define what actually "sustainable" means for them. An intervention was made by Greenpeace that they amount needed for aviation is far too much to speak about sustainability. UNWTO jumped on the same track like ICAO, putting main emphasis on using sustainable biofuels to tackle emissions. UNWTO has to proof that these biofuels stay sustainable by setting criteria and indicators.
Reported by :
Tirthankar Mandal from Bonn
June 2009
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