(CARICOM Secretariat, Turkeyen, Greater Georgetown, Guyana) CARICOM Secretariat’s Assistant Secretary-General Human and Social Development, Dr Edward Greene is of the firm belief that the Caribbean and other coastal states need to advocate for programmes that stress mitigation and technological transfer with special emphasis on low carbon development strategies when they begin negotiations with the Conference of the Parties (COP-15) of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) at the end of the year.
Speaking against the background of intense preparations for the 15th Session of the Conference scheduled for Copenhagen in December, Dr Greene told participants on Thursday at a related workshop hosted by the Organisation of American States (OAS), in Washington, DC that developing countries ought to consider programmes to combat deforestation, which he said was responsible for 20 per cent of Green House Gases (GHG) emissions.
He explained that this was critical to countries such as Belize, Dominican Republic, Guyana, Haiti and Suriname. In this regard, Dr Greene called for equity in any agreement, which came out of Copenhagen and noted that such equity would mean that an important part of the finance had originated from developed countries, and must take into account what he called the “polluter/payer’ – those who pollute must pay – principle and the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities, that is countries pay according to their capabilities.
Acknowledging that there was a demand for accurate assessment of regional vulnerabilities to climate change and confident projection of future regional changes, Dr Greene was of the opinion that appropriate adaptation strategies involving long-term planning of infrastructure, biodiversity conservation, and economic resources had to be earmarked and mobilised to respond to climate change impacts.
Dr Greene also made it clear that emphasis would have to be placed on finding additional significant finance for climate change adaptation. He emphasized that this would mean exploring several new paths, including extension of carbon trading and project mechanisms; revenue drawn from auctions of carbon emitting rights, either within national or regional markets or at the international level and taxes on green house gases (GHG).
He reported that CARICOM had taken steps to shore up its role in the negotiations, by establishing a Task Force on Climate Change and Development “to give direction to the priorities and police formulation as we move toward Copenhagen and beyond.”
“Our political leaders are seized with the need for engaging more in the negotiating theatres recognizing that most of the technical work has been done. There is need for political will and a will not to delay the global agenda for climate change in the face of the global financial crisis. To do this would be a grievous error,” he concluded.
