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G-8 to take up climate change
Europe, Japan, US, and developing nations are divided over how to handle greenhouse-gas emissions.
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China is not a member of the G-8 but was invited to the summit along with Brazil, India, Mexico, and South Africa.
India's statements on the subject echo China's. Pradipto Ghosh, India's environment secretary, was quoted May 28 by the Press Trust of India news agency as saying
"Legally mandated measures for reducing greenhouse gas emissions are likely to have significant adverse impacts on GDP growth of developing countries, including India. [Plans to cut greenhouse gases could also have] serious implications for our poverty-alleviation programs. This is not the path we want to pursue."
African countries will not be directly involved in next week's G-8 discussions on global warming. But their interests are being voiced by Oxfam, the British aid and relief organization.
Rich countries are obliged to help developing countries adapt to climate change, Oxfam asserts – an effort that could cost at least $50 billion a year, reported Britain's Financial Times. Said Oxfam senior researcher Kate Raworth:
"This is not about aid, it is about the world's biggest and richest polluters covering the costs forced upon those who are most vulnerable.... Developing countries cannot and should not be expected to foot the bill for the impact of rich countries' emissions."
Beginning with its rejection of the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, the US has resisted international controls on its energy production and use – particularly as they relate to climate change. The US has aired two chief objections: that major developing countries (including China) are wrongly exempted from its targets and timetables for reducing greenhouse gases and that the Kyoto agreement would harm the US economy.
US officials voiced those concerns this week in Darwin, Australia, where representatives of the 21 Pacific Rim countries making up the Asia Pacific Economic Cooperation forum met to plan the group's summit in September, where climate change will be a key issue. Said US Deputy Secretary of Energy Clay Sell, as quoted by the Associated Press:
"Each country brings its own unique circumstances, its own assets, its limitations.... A strong economy is the key enabler to addressing the challenge of greenhouse gas emissions."
Along with the US, Australia (the fourth-largest coal producer in the world) has refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol. At the Darwin meeting, the two countries said they want to discuss ways to develop clean technologies to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions before any carbon-reduction schemes are considered. Said Australian Industry Minister Ian Macfarlane:
"Once we know how to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, the challenge will then be to have those technologies employed and to set targets."
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