As this is being written European heads of government are gathering in Brussels for a two-day summit.
At the top of their agenda is the subject of climate change. The meeting is widely expected to endorse plans to reduce European carbon dioxide emissions by 20 per cent by 2020 and endorse the recommendation of EU environment ministers to cut the figure still further – by 30 per cent over the 1990 benchmark – provided international agreement can be achieved on such measures.
What all this reflects in a sense is that Europe, if it acts decisively, has the chance of counteracting the dangers of climate change and influencing others, possibly becoming the global leader on such matters.
Away from Europe, political awareness of the importance of the issue is also growing. China, widely regarded as one of the world’s major contributors to carbon emissions as a result of its dash for economic growth, has accepted the need to address the issue. In a speech on March 7, the Chinese Premier, Wen Jiabao, confirmed his government’s decision to introduce a carbon-trading scheme along with policies that will result in a reduction in greenhouse gases. Speaking to the Peoples National Congress, China’s Premier detailed plans to close what he described as backward steel and iron foundries and inefficient power plants, and vowed to bring pollution under control.
“We must make conserving energy, decreasing energy consumption, protecting the environment and using land intensively the breakthrough point and main fulcrum for changing the pattern of economic growth,” the leader of the world’s most populous nation said.
It is also probable given rapidly changing US voter sentiment on the environment that the global responses to climate change will accelerate after 2008 if as seems likely there an environmentally aware Democrat is elected to the White House next year.
What all this points to is that the subject of climate change, or more properly environmental security, is becoming the future political issue that touches all others, whether it be foreign policy, public health, housing, trade, security or social welfare.
So far and fast has this realisation dawned, that detailed discussions are presently underway at the United Nations to introduce environmental security and by extension the need to address climate change as a matter for consideration by the UN Security Council. Normally, the Security Council would only take up issues relating to conflict and its resolution, but both permanent and non-permanent members of the council are actively discussing this possibility when Britain takes over the presidency in April.
In the Caribbean the political ramifications of this and the ways in which the climate will change the nature of international dialogue seem scarcely to have dawned on most politicians or the business community. With the notable exceptions of Cuba’s acting President Raul Castro and Guyana’s President Bharrat Jagdeo, recognition of the political, strategic and economic implications of rapid changes in the climate and environmental policy seems to have been completely missed.
This is despite the fact that the region is largely made up of low-lying states, which are vulnerable to extreme weather conditions and where much of the population live in areas that could be flooded if the ocean temperatures rise by only a few degrees.
While there is no absolute certainty of this, most of the worlds leading scientists agree that if unaddressed, the process of global warming is nearing a tipping point and that sea levels could rise by three metres in the next 100 years.
Already in the Caribbean it is hard to ignore the observable impact of changed weather conditions, sea surge, beach erosion, damage to reefs and the breaching of sea defences even in 2006, a year in which there was limited hurricane activity,
The long-term consequences of catastrophic climate change, however, go much further. They range from unchecked migration and economic dislocation, through issues such as food and water security, to how long it would take for societies where the majority of the population live on or near the coast to recover from sea level change.
The EU has recognised that to achieve its desired levels of reductions, it will have to encourage emission reductions in more advanced nations in the developing world. But it has not understood where small and vulnerable low carbon emitting states such as those in the Caribbean that are significantly at risk, fit into a global policy.
This suggests that there is a need for the region to develop its own thinking in a manner that not only makes clear its position, but also helps its private sector to benefit from the partnerships that are likely to follow any global agreement on climate change.
A recent paper produced by the European Commission suggests the need to invest in the production of energy from renewable resourc-es. It has set a goal for 2020 to produce 20 pr cent of all energy in Europe from harnessing wind, solar, wave and tide energy for electricity generation. Europe is also committing itself to the development of effective carbon trading schemes and working towards the reduction through legislation and taxation of aviation and ships’ emissions.
At the moment those most active in the region trying to create policy are non-governmental organisations and the tourism industry, which has fully recognised the need to develop appropriate responses to changed policy and sentiment in its major markets.
But as yet, few others have understood the economic threat let alone the business opportunities that might arise, for instance, from ideas such as a Caribbean Basin carbon trading scheme.
While Cariforum alone is probably too small to make a carbon bank viable or to justify a regional certification body there is an opportunity for one or another entity within the Caribbean Basin to lead the way by bringing interested parties together to begin to develop this and other responses to the rapidly changing international policy environment on environmental security and climate change.
What is required is a thought-provoking and challenging speech from a Caribbean head of government on climate change that indicates that environmental security is an issue that requires leadership just as much as trade negotiations, security or success in the Cricket World Cup.
Previous columns can be found at www.caribbean-council.org
