Kyoto pact flaws must not be repeated

The Yomiuri Shimbun

Negotiations on an international framework to succeed the Kyoto Protocol are getting into full swing. As host of next year's summit meeting of the Group of Eight industrialized nations to be held at the Lake Toya resort in Hokkaido, Japan must be actively involved in the negotiations.

Two international conferences in the United States last week discussed measures for cutting emissions of greenhouse gases, which contribute to global warming. About 160 nations participated in the first high-level meeting on climate change held at the United Nations, while representatives from major emitting countries were invited to attend the forum, which was sponsored by the U.S. government.

About 80 percent of greenhouse gas emissions are spewed into the atmosphere by the European Union and the 16 nations, including Japan and China, that sat at the table of the U.S.-sponsored conference.

The United States sniffed at the 1997 Kyoto pact and its calls on signatory nations to cut such gases in 2008-12 from 1990 levels, saying it would harm the U.S. economy. However, Washington changed its stance after some some U.S. states adopted laws requiring cuts in emissions in an attempt to combat global warming. Last week, the United States even chaired the major emitter countries' meeting.

At the conference, participants confirmed they would establish a new framework by 2009, and aim for the goal set by leaders at this year's G-8 summit meeting in Germany to cut global gas emissions by half their current levels by 2050.

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Split over mandatory cuts

There has been much head-scratching over what kind of framework should be created to achieve this target.

The Kyoto accord assigns mandatory, country-by-country emission limits for the reduction of greenhouse gas emissions to signatory nations. The EU insists similar mandatory limits should be incorporated in the post-Kyoto pact, a move apparently aimed at nurturing the international market for trading greenhouse gas credits.

However, the United States has shown no sign it will budge from its opposition to mandatory targets on global warming.

China, which apparently has dethroned the United States as the world's largest emitter, was not required to make emission cuts under the Kyoto Protocol because it was regarded as a developing country. Beijing has bristled at suggestions it should shoulder obligations on a par with those undertaken by developed nations.

Japan, meanwhile, insists the post-Kyoto Protocol framework must be flexible and all-encompassing.

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No easy answers

It is imperative that the post-Kyoto pact has every major emitter on board; the shortcomings of the Kyoto Protocol must not be repeated. Japan's strategy aims to bring major emitter countries to the same table, but the government will have its work cut out trying to get the plan off the drawing board and turning it into action.

Transferring clean technology to developing countries is an issue that needs to be addressed. U.S. President George W. Bush called for the creation of a global fund to promote technology on reducing carbon dioxide emission for developing nations. Japan should actively participate in designing the fund's blueprint and its operation.

The 13th Conference of the Parties (COP13) to the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change to be held in Bali, Indonesia, in December and the G-8 summit meeting in Hokkaido will be crucial stages for negotiations as the clock ticks down toward 2009.

Even if a post-Kyoto framework is created under the U.N. initiative, the fate of the new framework will be determined by a series of negotiations, including the recent U.S.-sponsored conference. Japan must face those negotiations with a concrete strategy in place.

(From The Yomiuri Shimbun, Sept. 30, 2007)