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Tanzania: Copenhagen conference 'a success'

23 December 2009, The Citizen
URL: http://thecitizen.co.tz/newe.php?id=16428

Dar es Salaam:  Tanzania has described the just-ended United Nations Conference on Climate Change held in Copenhagen as a success despite its failure to reach a mandatory agreement.

Speaking to journalists in her office in Dar es Salaam yesterday, the state minister in the Vice President Office (Environment), Dr Batilda Burian, said the conference has laid a good ground for next year's climate summit which will be held in Mexico.  She said the conference was unanimous that the Kyoto protocol should not be scrapped and developing countries should start its second implementation phase as its section 3.9 indicates.

She said the US decision to agree on reducing emissions by 17 per cent from the 2005 levels was a good indication that all countries were serious about the war against global climatic change.

"The Copenhagen summit witnessed for the first time that the US was represented at a presidential level during the climate conference and its decision to lower emissions by 17 per cent from the 2005 levels demonstrates a major success of the meeting," Dr Burian said.

Another achievement, according to her, was the agreement by delegates to establish a special system to look for funds to tackle climate change problems.  Elaborating, she said the summit agreed to form a special commission which would look into possible ways of raising funds to help the less developed countries in the war against the effects of emission of green house gases.

She said the conference also formed the Copenhagen Climate Change Fund which would sponsor environmental projects like those for reforestation.

According to Dr Burian, though the rise in temperatures has been set at below two degrees centigrade, the conference has given fast developing and developed countries until January 31 next year to officially declare by how much they would reduce the emissions.

However, Dr Burian said although the discussions had reached promising stages, the conference failed to agree on most of Tanzania�s and African countries' recommendations due to the developed countries' reluctance to endorse the changes.  She mentioned some of the areas which members failed to agree upon as the country's recommendation that developed countries should ensure that global emissions would be decreased by at least 40 per cent compared to 1990 levels.

The minister said in order to tackle climate change, Africa requested that developed nations commit themselves to at least five per cent of their income for compensating the underdeveloped world from climate changes.   She said this would have seen Africa receiving more Sh400 billion every year, but members did not endorse the idea.

Apart from the money African countries requested that they should be empowered technologically so that they could effectively deal with the effects of climate change, but nothing was agreed upon.

More than 117 countries' leaders and other delegates from the world met in Copenhagen for two weeks from December 7 to discuss and agree on how to tackle the global climate change.