http://www.americanlands.org To: All Activists From: Aaron Rappaport, American Lands Date: December 4, 2000 According to the Reuters article below, it looks like efforts to salvage something from the collapsed Climate Summit in The Hague will begin immediately! What this means for forests is not yet clear. The U.S. and the E.U. were reported to be close to a deal at The Hague on the crediting and management of forests for carbon sequestration. However, the details of that deal have never been made available to the public. It was rumored to still include some credit for business as usual forest activities, which is unacceptable. How it credited forest management *above* business-as-usual, for instance the public purchase and permanent set-aside of industrial timberland for either a Maine Woods National Park or for fish-protective stream buffers, is not known. While any credit for business-as-usual forestry is unacceptable, full credit for forest protection and restoration must be part of any climate deal. Clearly, these next two weeks have assumed a critical importance for the future of the world's climate and forests, an importance that was not previously anticipated. We will keep you updated as the talks, and our knowledge of "the deal from The Hague" develop. Aaron Monday December 4 2:25 PM ET EU, U.S. to Meet to Try to Salvage Climate Deal By Robin Pomeroy BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Top government officials from the United States and the European Union meet in Canada on Wednesday to try to salvage a deal on curbing global warming, an EU official said Monday. The two-day meeting will be the first between the two sides since U.N.-sponsored talks to set a global strategy on cutting ''greenhouse gas'' emissions collapsed spectacularly last month. If the Ottawa session brings the two sides closer, it could pave the way for a ministerial-level meeting that could take place in Oslo early next week, the EU official said. Huge differences between the United States and the EU on how to implement a 1997 U.N. climate pact agreed in Kyoto, Japan, scuttled a deal when some 180 countries met at a two-week conference in The Hague last month. The biggest stumbling block was the U.S. position that countries should be allowed to offset the carbon dioxide soaked up by their forests and farmlands against the pollution reduction targets agreed in Kyoto. The EU accused the United States and its negotiating allies including Japan and Canada of trying to undermine the Kyoto targets. The 15-country bloc rejected a last-minute compromise which would have allowed limited use of such ``carbon sinks.'' Getting an agreement on sinks will be the key to agreement in Ottawa, the EU official said. The other main ``crunch point'' will be the EU's insistence that countries make a large part of their emissions cuts through domestic action, rather than by buying emissions reduction credits from other countries. Kyoto Agreement To Cut Emissions At Kyoto, developed countries agreed to cut emissions of the gasses scientists say trap heat inside the Earth's atmosphere causing extreme disruption to weather patterns. Governments were supposed to set detailed rules for how this target -- to reduce emissions by five percent of 1990 levels by 2008-2012 -- should be achieved. Due to the deadlock the talks were officially ``suspended'' in the hope a deal could be achieved by the first half of 2001. Canada and Japan, which are partners of the United States in the so-called ``umbrella group'' of countries seeking maximum flexibility for implementing Kyoto, will attend the Ottawa meeting. The EU will be represented by its executive Commission and the governments of France, Sweden, Britain and Germany, the official said. All sides have said they want to reach a deal as quickly as possible, not least because of the prospect of a Republican U.S. president -- George W. Bush -- who is known to be less favorable to Kyoto than his Democratic rival Al Gore. Any deal between the umbrella group and the EU will still have to be accepted by the developing nations which, although they do not have emissions reductions targets, are likely to be hardest hit by climate change. The G77 group of developing countries said in The Hague any deal would have to include an aid package to help them cope with the rising sea levels, floods and droughts they fear will result from global warming.
