In Bali, developing nations push for climate aid

At the UN-sponsored climate talks, countries seek money to cope with severe floods and other global-warming effects.

from the December 7, 2007 edition

Page 2 of 2

Page 1 | 2

"It is clear that we are already seeing changing conditions, and there is a real urgency for strong national and international policy action," says Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center.

The US Senate took a step in that direction Wednesday, when the Environment and Public Works Committee finished its work on the Lieberman-Warner Act. In addition to setting up CO2 emissions targets and a carbon-trading system to help meet them, the bill would earmark $1 billion a year to help poor countries adapt to global warming. The money would come from government auctions of greenhouse-gas emission permits.

At the 11-day conference here in Bali, meanwhile, developing countries have been working to put more financial muscle behind adaptation assistance. As an alternative to voluntary funds, which are falling far short of the need, they're pushing for increased adaptation funding under the Kyoto Protocol.

Under the protocol, a company can earn emission credits by building emissions-cutting projects in developing countries – dubbed a clean-development mechanism (CDM). CDM credits can be traded on the international carbon market, with 2 percent of the value set aside in an adaptation fund. But by some pessimistic estimates, that levy is only likely to generate several hundred million dollars a year. So developing countries want to expand the levy to cover all carbon credits issued under the protocol – not just those issued via the clean-development mechanism. Their goal here is to put the protocol's adaptation fund squarely on the agenda for the protocol's first operational review, slated for next year. The protocol's first commitment period takes effect Jan. 1. In addition, developing countries are pushing to streamline and cut the high cost of applying for adaptation money.

While Bhutan forges ahead with its GEF-funded project to reduce flood risk, experts in other countries are rediscovering local traditional knowledge and social institutions long since sidelined as archaic. Some of these approaches may be more nimble in responding to changes in local environmental conditions that a strictly top-down approach, according to Neil Leary, science director for a UN-sponsored study released this week on developing-country adaptation efforts.

Yet adaptation must go hand-in-hand with development, specialists say. Oxfam's Raworth argues that in any post-2012 climate agreement, the press for adequate funding for adaptation should stand on a equal footing with efforts to set new, more-stringent emissions-reduction targets. Without that, she says, negotiators are likely to set up an adaptation financing system "that is perfect in structure but puny in size."

1 | Page 2