16/05/2011
The top United Nations climate change official
on May 12 urged governments to step up the
pace of negotiations on the further reduction
of emissions of the hazardous greenhouse
gases blamed for global warming, ahead of
the next UN climate change conference in
Durban, South Africa, in December.
Christiana Figueres,
the Executive Secretary of the UN Framework
Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), said
States needed to agree on the strengthening
of international conditions to allow nations
to work together to make deeper global emission
cuts.
"This means confronting
the open political question of the future
of the Kyoto Protocol, the only agreement
today that captures binding commitments
by industrialized countries", Ms. Figueres
told a news conference at UN Headquarters.
The Kyoto Protocol is
an addition to the UNFCCC that contains
legally binding measures to reduce greenhouse
gas emissions, and whose first commitment
period is due to expire next year. Negotiations
on the second commitment phase of the Protocol
continue.
"What governments
have very clear before them is that they're
already facing the possibility of a regulatory
gap [on the new phase of the protocol] and
the more they delay that, the more firm
the regulatory gap will be. So I don't expect
that they will choose to extend that. My
sense is there will be a lot of political
commitment& but that is really going
to be the top political issue for this year",
she said.
Governments also needed
to design the new climate institutions that
will provide adequate and efficient climate
support to developing countries, including
the green climate fund, the technology mechanism
and the setting up of the climate change
adaptation committee, she added.
Outside of the negotiations
process, Ms. Figueres said there were encouraging
climate change trends, including a move,
even by large economies towards new policies
that promote low-carbon growth. The private
was also increasingly investing in low-carbon
business and renewable energy, she added.
"So in Durban,
governments need to take further steps to
drive both of those very important trends
and faster", she said.
She voiced concern that
"the pace of the negotiations is going
slower than science demands and the level
of ambition is lower than science demands".
Source: UN News Centre at http://www.un.org/news
+ More
Brazil celebrates the
International Day for Biodiversity
18/05/2011
To commemorate the International Day for
Biodiversity, celebrated on May 22, the
Secretariat of Biodiversity and Forests
of the MMA has released several publications
on Brazil's biodiversity. The event was
held in Brasília today (May 18),
with the participation of Minister Izabella
Teixeira and other authorities.
One of these publications
- entitled Study on the Contribution of
Protected Areas for the National Economy
- reveals that, in 2009, revenue from the
Ecological ICMS (a type of tax) transferred
to municipalities that have Protected Areas
(PAs or Conservation Units) in their territories
was R$ 402.7 million. On the other hand,
the visitation to the 67 national parks
(which are also PAs) has the potential to
generate between R$ 1.6 billion and R$ 1.8
billion per year.
