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Brazil rejects 2050 climate target without 2020 goal

10 December 2009, Reuters AlertNet
URL: http://www.alertnet.org/thenews/newsdesk/GEE5B717X.htm

Copenhagen:  Brazil's climate change ambassador said on Tuesday that the country will not sign up for a long-term goal of halving global emissions by 2050 unless rich nations take on tougher mid-term targets for 2020.

The Danish hosts of Dec. 7-18 talks in Copenhagen see agreement to halve emissions as a core part of a deal, meant to provide the outline of a new climate treaty to be finalised next year. Sergio Serra also said that a deal to tackle climate change by preserving swathes of forest could only be sealed as part of a wider financial pact to help poorer nations fight warming.

Recession-hit rich countries have not yet tabled concrete finance offers to help developing nations prepare for and slow climate change.  Aid for developing nations and the ambition of rich nation carbon cuts are two key stumbling blocks between north and south in two-year talks.  Developing countries want rich nations to adopt strong mid-term targets for 2020 before signing up to a 2050 goal.

Most emissions growth is expected to happen in poorer countries in the next decades, and they fear that a global goal that is not paired with strong short-term targets and generous financial funding will penalise their future economic growth.   "The 50 percent cut by 2050 makes no sense unless you have a mid-term target (for rich nations). With a mid-term target it can be a reasonable figure," Serra told Reuters in an interview.

All industrialised countries have now proposed 2020 targets but they don't go far enough, major emerging economies say.  Developing nations are divided on the 2020 targets they would like rich nations to take on, Serra said. Brazil and several other large nations are still asking for target emissions cuts of 25 to 40 percent from 1990 levels, referenced in previous United Nations climate agreements, Serra said.

But other nations, including small island states very vulnerable to rising seas and other changes expected from rising temperatures, have called for a target of up to 45 percent.  The current commitments from rich nations add up to cuts of about 14-18 percent by 2020 compared with 1990 levels. 

Central to the Copenhagen talks is a scheme called Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation (REDD), under which polluters could pay developing countries to maintain forests as carbon sinks.   Indonesia, another nation with large forests, said they hoped a deal could be wrapped up by the end of this week, but Serra said it was unlikely anything would be signed off.

"The problem with having a REDD agreement done by Friday, although it would be desirable, is that REDD in fact is a financial mechanism," Serra said.  "If we are not near an agreement on the global financial package I doubt we will have the sectoral or limited package on REDD," he added.

He said any financial agreement would not have to be entirely complete, and there would be time to "fill in the blanks" later, but it would need to provide a framework.   Brazil recently signalled it is open to allow rich nations to acquire carbon offsets in return for REDD finance, after months of opposition on the grounds that would allow rich nations to continue polluting.

But Serra said a mooted 10 percent limit on the portion of its efforts that could be packaged into credits was fixed.   "We still have serious concerns that a REDD scheme ... doesn't affect environmental integrity," he said, adding that the concession on offsets was aimed at boosting rich nations' commitment to cuts.

"We would like to see it (the 10 percent) as a limit...The idea was also to drive for more ambition in the targets of developed countries, if they are going to use 10 percent."  (Reuters)