Slow Progress Made in Bonn Climate Talks

"Countries have narrowed gaps in many practical areas, for example on how to strengthen action for adapting to the impacts of climate change," said Yvo de Boer, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

"This is important progress given the very limited time negotiators have to get to an agreed outcome in Copenhagen in December this year," de Boer said.

UN climate officials Working Group Chair Michael Zammit Cutajar, left, and UNFCCC Executive Secretary Yvo de Boer (Photo courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin)

Copenhagen, Denmark will be the site of the UN's annual climate change conference at which countries are expected to adopt an agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol, whose first commitment period for reducing greenhouse gas emissions ends in 2012.

More than 2,000 delegates from government, business and industry, environmental organizations and research institutions, participated in the Bonn meeting, which began on March 29 and is the first of four sessions planned ahead of the Copenhagen conference.

Negotiations on greenhouse gas emissions reductions to be achieved by industrialized countries after 2012 centered on issues related to the scale of the reductions, improvements to emissions trading and the Kyoto Protocol's carbon offset mechanisms, as well as concerns relating to land-use change and forestry.

Some delegates expressed disappointment over the lack of substantive discussion on emission reductions by the industrialized countries now governed by the Kyoto Protocol.

The global conservation organization WWF said on Wednesday that the Bonn talks resulted in a friendlier atmosphere among delegates compared to last year's meeting in Poland but no steps forward were taken on key issues such as emission reductions and financial support.

"Friendly rhetoric certainly helps, but without serious commitment and binding targets to reduce carbon dioxide it simply isn't good enough to protect a fragile planet from runaway climate change," said Kim Carstensen, leader of WWF's Global Climate Initiative.

"The atmosphere at the talks in Bonn may have improved, but the climate out there is still spinning out of control. We must turn nice words into aggressive action to tackle the giant threat that's upon us," he said.

"There have been positive discussions on a range of issues, including on technology cooperation between industrialized and developing countries, as well as on the specificities of reducing emissions from deforestation in developing countries," said Michael Zammit Cutajar, who chairs the Ad hoc Working Group on Long-term Cooperative Action under the Convention.

Climate-friendly technologies must be affordable, says a delegate from India showing a 5 Watt LED light bulb produced in India that costs US$24. (Photo courtesy ENB)

"Stringent targets for emission cuts will be the heart of the new global deal, and finance for technology and adaptation is the lifeblood," said Carstensen. "But the heart is not beating and the blood is not flowing, as Bonn only managed to build a frame and some muscles, bringing parties closer to consensus on the overall structure and the mechanisms of the deal."

The group of Least Developed Countries has called for US$2 billion to finance the implementation of their national adaptation plans. Their delegates highlighted the adverse effects of climate change on the most vulnerable countries and called on developed countries to provide sufficient funds for the Least Developed Countries Fund.

Cutajar said that all countries have the opportunity to provide input to the draft for the negotiating text ahead of the next round of talks in June.

"I invite countries to forward their input to the climate change secretariat by April 24, so that their views on how to shape the text and what to include in the text can be incorporated," he said.

Two additional meetings will be held in 2009, in August and in November, delegates agreed in Bonn.

Some 192 States have signed on to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, the parent treaty of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which has 184 parties and legally binds 37 highly industrialized nations and countries transitioning to a market economy to limit and reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.

The objective of both treaties is to stabilize greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that will prevent dangerous human interference with the climate system.

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