Juan

A New Adaptation Framework: Don’t hold your breath for this empty shell

greeder December 5, 2011 0 Comments

by Graham Reeder This past week (and year), I’ve been following the issue of adaptation. As many of you know, Climate Change is not just a long-term threat that is looming in the horizon; it is being experienced by people now in a very real way. The World Health Organisation estimates that climatic changes are causing 150,000 deaths annually; the vast majority of which are in sub-Saharan...

The [im]possible outcome of Cancun

COA Admin December 9, 2010 0 Comments

-by Juan C. Soriano At the beginning of the conference I wrote about countries coming to Cancun with low expectations but hoping to agree to a balanced outcome – in other words a balanced package of decisions involving mitigation, finance, accountability (Measurable, Reportable, and Verifiable or MRVs in UN lingo), and the legal form of the outcome. The negotiations are in their final stages...

Prostituting our natural forests to the higher bidder

COA Admin October 8, 2009 0 Comments

by Juan Carlos Soriano Over the weekend, the Secretariat circulated Non-paper No. 11 with consolidated text for the negotiations to establish a mechanism to Reduce Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in developing countries (REDD). I felt that the REED discussions were sort of moving forward, the text was shorter but the number of contentious issues remained the same. The...

Negotiating their forests

COA Admin October 2, 2009 0 Comments

By Juan Carlos Soriano Every living person on this planet depends on forests for our survival, and the 60 million indigenous people who live in forests worldwide have been their primary guardians. An agreement on reducing emissions from deforestation and forest degradation (REDD) under the climate negotiations will affect the rights of indigenous peoples. Currently, the language of the...

Closing session… the count down

COA Admin November 17, 2006 0 Comments

by Juan 9:20pm : The COPMOP2 has adopted all decisions. The issues of voluntary commitments have been forwarded for futher consultation prior to COP13. All decisions adopted can be characterized as insignificant compromises. Russia accepted to move on without a decision on their proposal for commitments by non -Annex I parties in return for accepting Belarus into the ‘hot air’ club. The...