Climate change talks deadlocked: Saran

Developing countries feel that they are being pushed into an unfair regime

Efforts to achieve a global agreement to address climate change at the United Nations Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December are at a deadlock, Shyam Saran, Special Envoy of the Prime Minister of India on Climate Change, told participants at the India Economic Summit on Tuesday.

“There is now a very deliberate attempt to downgrade international expectations and that is unfortunate,” Saran said.

India wants to have “a supportive climate change regime to help us do what we are already doing in our own interest,” added Saran, who last week participated in UN climate change talks in Barcelona, Spain.

Even Barcelona yielded little, as Saran made clear: “I’m afraid we ended the Barcelona sessions without much cheer for Copenhagen. The economic and financial crisis has dampened the enthusiasm required for taking the decisions needed for progress on the climate change agenda.”

“But we are a developing economy. We are not making our action on climate conditional to what anyone else is doing. If we have to do more, then we do need global support,” he added. He also noted that there was a perception among the developing countries, rightly or wrongly, that they were being pushed into an unfair regime. In 2012 the Kyoto Protocol to prevent climate change and global warming runs out. To keep the process on the line there is an urgent need for a new climate protocol. At the conference in Copenhagen 2009 the parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change meet for the last time at the government level before the climate agreement need to be renewed. The climate conference in Copenhagen is therefore essential for progress on a global climate agreement, and needs to end with the conclusion of the Copenhagen Protocol to prevent global warming and climate change.

Any global climate change agreement has to be fair and equitable, he declared. In the run-up to Copenhagen, Saran noted, “the debate has been intertwined with very real fears for the economic prospects of countries.” Other participants in the discussion agreed that the international community must remain focused on achieving a global agreement on climate change at the Copenhagen conference. Lord Stern said, “An agreement in Copenhagen is fundamental to a solution.” Ben J Verwaayen, Chief Executive Officer, Alcatel-Lucent, France, added: “This is not something we can ignore. The best thing to do is to get on with life.”

The argument that growth is not compatible with environmental responsibility is a “false choice,” argued Lord Stern, I G Patel Professor of Economics and Government, India Observatory, London School of Economics, United Kingdom. Major developing economies such as Brazil, China and India are outlining ambitious and creative climate plans, he remarked.

“If the rich world has that deeper understanding, then suspicions that they are doing all these things and others are doing nothing will disappear.” He warned that protectionist measures in the name of carbon-emission reduction would be the wrong response. “The right response is the collaborative one,” said Stern.

Business leaders on the panel agreed. “We should reaffirm the need to approach the problem multilaterally,” said William A. Reinsch, President, National Foreign Trade Council (NFTC), USA. “We need to leap off the cliff together.”

Verwaayen called on governments to act immediately. “If we lose momentum and inspiration, we will not just have a postponement of a couple of months. It will go off the table for a long time. We cannot afford it. We need leadership to get it done and business should speak up.” Instead of blaming each other, countries must collaborate, especially in developing energy-saving technology, renewable energy and alternative fuels. “The innovations will come out of China and India,” predicted Deepak Puri, Chairman and Managing Director, Moser Baer, India.

Suresh Vaswani, Joint Chief Executive Officer, IT Business, and Member of the Board, Wipro, India, said that companies should “open source” green technology. He pointed out three factors imperative for the recognition of the climate change problem. “Companies should reduce their greenhouse gas emissions, while the common man should realise that his actions reflect on climate change. Lastly, open source should be used as a technology by all firms.” The panelists noted that there was a need to reaffirm and approach climate change as a problem of global commons.

Particularly for solar energy, Saran said, “We need to create a regulatory and incentive framework for solar applications connected to the grid, based on the assumption that costs will fall by creating scale and incentives. Availability and storage are absolutely key to scaling up.” There was also a suggestion that a global deal must lead to successful transfer of technology from developed to developing countries. “India has a great stake in the global pact on climate change and as a responsible country it has been unilaterally taking measures to reduce its carbon foot print. However, India is still a developing country with severe constraints on resources, and this must be recognised by developed countries,” added Saran.