09/02/02 -- VICTORY! Canada Moves to Ratify Kyoto Treaty

VICTORY!

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FOREST CONSERVATION NEWS TODAY

Canada Moves to Ratify Kyoto Treaty

Forest and Global Ecological Sustainability Depends Upon Reducing

Greenhouse Gas Emissions

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Forest Networking a Project of Forests.org, Inc.

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FOLLOW-UP ACTION ALERT

Thank the Canadian PM for promising to ratify the Kyoto Treaty, urge

him to improve Canadian Forest Conservation practices next

http://forests.org/emailaction/climate.htm

September 2, 2002

OVERVIEW & COMMENTARY by Forests.org

In a major surprise climate change policy development, Canada’s Prime

Minister has announced he will submit the Kyoto Treaty to Parliament

for its approval by the end of the year. The Canadian Parliament is

expected to vote for ratification. This means if Russia honors its

pledge to ratify the treaty by the end of the year, the Kyoto Treaty

will come into effect. There had been some indication late last week

that Russia was reconsidering its pledge to ratify the treaty.

However, recent reports are that there was a “misinterpretation” of

comments by a low-level official, and indeed Russia remains onboard

the surging Kyoto bandwagon. America – the leader of the “Axis of

Ecocide” – remains in a deep state of severe environmental denial.

The mantle of climate change leadership taken up by the EU, Japan and

now Canada is desperately needed as the Toxic Texan remains absent

without leave in regard to environmental protection. Canada’s and

Russia’s ratification will have major significance for the

sustainability of the world’s forests, climate, water, oceans and all

their life forms. I can not help but suspect that the avalanche of

emails we worked together to generate over the past days had some

small part to play in the Canadian governments final decision. Thank

you – you have participated in a victory for all of humanity. Please

communicate your gratitude to Prime Minister Jean Chrétien for his

bold and decisive international environmental leadership –

encouraging him to work on forest conservation in Canada next – at

http://forests.org/emailaction/climate.htm .

I have already noted in earlier editorializing the major impact

climate change is having upon forests and other terrestrial and

aquatic ecosystems. There can be no forest conservation without

reductions in greenhouse gas emissions which requires major

investments in renewable energy. The Kyoto Treaty will not save the

Earth’s climate or forests, nor will it lead single-handedly to

global ecological sustainability. But it is a significant beginning

that, like the Montreal Protocol for ozone depletion before it, can

be refined as our understanding of the threat continues to grow.

It is already clear the Kyoto goals are not enough. The treaty’s

importance lies in the mechanisms and initiatives to be established

for beginning to address climate change. The age of restoration

ecology, renewable energies and equitable development can be built

upon this framework and must commence with vigor. The only way out

of the Earth’s ecological conundrum is through large scale ecosystem

protection and restoration, and developing sustainable, non-polluting

energy sources. The World’s best minds and all its resources must be

brought to bear upon these ends or the human race will expire.

g.b.

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ITEM #1

Title: PM to Put Kyoto to Parliament by Year

Date: September 2, 2002

Byline: Robin Pomeroy

JOHANNESBURG (Reuters) - Canada's parliament will vote on ratifying

the Kyoto climate change pact by the end of the year, Prime Minister

Jean Chretien said in a surprise announcement to the Earth Summit on

Monday.

If parliament approves the pact, which was rejected by the United

States last year, and if Russia also ratifies, as it has said it

intends to do, the treaty on cutting "greenhouse gas" emissions

blamed for contributing to global warming will have enough backers to

come into legal force.

"Before the end of the year, the Canadian parliament will be asked

to vote on the ratification of the Kyoto accord," Chretien told the

World Summit on Sustainable Development (WSSD).

The move surprised and delighted environmentalists as Canada has

often worked closely with the United States on global environmental

issues.

"It has split the North American bloc on Kyoto. Canada has joined the

rest of the world and left the United States behind," said Jennifer

Morgan of WWF.

Steven Guilbeault, a Canadian WWF campaigner, said he expected

parliament to approve the pact. "If there was a vote tomorrow morning

it would go through," he said.

One hundred Liberals and the Bloc Quebecois, the New Democratic

Party, have said they supported Kyoto, he said.

U.S. President George W. Bush threw the pact into doubt when he

pulled out of the Kyoto treaty last year.

To come into force, Kyoto must be ratified by developed countries

responsible for 55 percent of 1990 carbon dioxide emissions. The

United States emitted one third of that total.

But since the U.S. pullout, momentum has gathered to push ahead,

with the European Union leading diplomatic efforts to keep the pact

alive.

If it ratifies the pact, Canada will have until 2012 to cut emissions

from power generation, transport and other sectors by six percent

from 1990 levels. Latest estimates show Canada's emissions had risen

20 percent by 2000.

The U.S. position is that Kyoto would harm its economy, but it has

said it would not try to prevent others from going ahead.

"The U.S. position is we are not trying to discourage other countries

from ratifying the Kyoto Protocol,”nRobert Card, undersecretary at

the U.S. department of energy told Reuters on the sidelines of the

WSSD. Russian President Vladimir Putin has indicated he wants the

State Duma parliament to ratify Kyoto after the summer.

Under Kyoto, developed countries agreed individual targets for

cutting emissions, aiming to achieve a 5.2 percent reduction of 1990

levels by 2012.

ITEM #2

Title: Russia intends to ratify Kyoto, despite difficulties

Date: September 3, 2002

JOHANNESBURG: Russia intends to ratify the Kyoto Protocol, even

though US abandonment of the UN's climate-change pact will mean a

loss of potential revenue, Russian Deputy Minister for Economic

Development and Trade Mukhamed Tsikanov said Friday.

Tsikanov, speaking on the sidelines of the Earth Summit, denied a

news agency report that there was a risk that Russia might not

ratify Kyoto.

"It's not true. It was a mistake of interpretation," he said.

"US non-participation establishes difficulties (for Russian

ratification) but Russia is still preparing to ratify the Kyoto

Protocol," he said.

Russian ratification is vital for the protocol, whose complex

rulebook was completed last year after four years of bitter

wrangling.

The Kyoto Protocol requires industrialised countries to trim output

of carbon-based gases by a deadline of 2008-2012 compared to their

1990 level.

US President George W. Bush abandoned it in March 2001, dealing it a

nearly fatal blow.

The accord will take effect once it has been ratified by at least 55

countries accounting for at least 55 percent of carbon dioxide (CO2)

pollution as of 1990 levels.

Ratification by Russia, the last major industrial signatory, is

vital, because this will push the numbers beyond 55 per cent.

The European Union (EU) and Japan have already ratified, while

Australia -- a close US ally -- has refused. Canada is embroiled in

an internal wrangle among its provinces which is troubling

ratification, but its 1990 pollution levels are too small to affect

the 55 percent target.

Under the pact, industrialised signatories can "trade" pollution

under a planned market in CO2 emissions. A country that is under its

quota target can sell some of that surplus to another signatory that

is over its target.

Russia had hoped to reap big profits from this market.

Its pollution levels are way below those of 1990 because of the

collapse of the Soviet economy and the conversion of its industry

and power stations to cleaner technology.

The United States, which accounts for a quarter of global emissions,

would have had to make huge cuts in its pollution levels in order to

meet Kyoto's targets.

But the defection of the United States means that the biggest

potential buyer in the carbon market has disappeared.

Joke Waller-Hunter, executive secretary of Kyoto's parent treaty,

the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), announced on

Friday that Kyoto had now been ratified by 87 countries, accounting

for 37.1 per cent of emissions by industrialised countries.

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