Posted by Julie-Anne Richards

Members of the Australian delegation have told me that they're reading my blog. Hello out there! 

I've neglected to blog for 2 days. Saturday night was the NGO party at this meeting. Its a tradition that the NGO party is a big night, when everyone turns up (although I believe members of the Australian and US delegations have to disavow their government positions). It was a lot of fun, and unfortunately I didn't have my camera to take incriminating photos. Your imagination will have to be your guide :)

Sunday is the official day off the negotiations – but I had 7 hours of CAN meetings, so not exactly a relaxing day off! Still the second week's the important week, so its crucial to be ready!

And yet, still today started with a huge bang! The Australian Environment Minister Ian Campbell's grand statement about his mythical “new Kyoto” generated howls of laughter. The rest of the world finds this statement to be high comedy coming from a country that hasn't ratified the Kyoto Protocol and whose emissions are increasing by over 25% (excluding land clearing). The NGOs awarded Australia a Fossil of the Day for this effort. It was a joint award with Canada – as they are similarly behaving badly. Canadian Environment Minister Rona Ambrose actually said that Canada was meeting all of its Kyoto commitments ... just with the exception of the small matter of MEETING THEIR TARGET! Why worry about the small details?

Tomorrow's ECO will have a great piece on it – recommend checking it out at www.climatenetwork.org.

Here's a great quote from Malcolm Farr, of Sydney's Daily Telegraph: “PRIME Minister John Howard will use two meetings this week to push his contention that climate change can be managed by Australia's coal industry.” Hey – after all, the tobacco industry solved the problem of lung cancer effectively, didn't they?

The Australians have been pushing very hard to get Carbon Capture and Storage (CCS) or geosequestration, into the Clean Development Mechanism (CDM). The CDM is the key mechanism within the Kyoto Protocol which provides for developing countries to input into reducing global emissions. At the moment its concentrated in fast developing countries (like India and China) and big projects – its not reaching the Least Developed Countries and small scale projects effectively. Including CCS in the CDM will only exacerbate this problem – with mega projects in a few countries taking all the project money available. Its very important that CCS not be allowed into the CDM for at least the first commitment period – as there are plenty of unresolved problems with CCS. Read CANA's CCS page here: www.cana.net.au

I understand that Prime Minister Howard announced an emissions trading taskforce tonight. So, whilst the EU emissions trading scheme is trading over $25 billion a year, Australia is going to talk about it. Hmmm.

Note: the above is the opinion of Julie-Anne Richards, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Climate Action Network.

Posted by Julie-Anne Richards

The meeting's inaugural Fossil of the Day was awarded today. And, no surprises, Australia won first and third prizes! The Fossil of the Day is awarded for countries behaving badly (see www.fossiloftheday.org for more info), and Australia behaved very badly yesterday by comparing the Australian vulnerability to climate change to the vulnerability of Africa and the Pacific Nations. Has the Australian delegation realised that they are not from a developing country? Perhaps they're not across the fact that Africa faces massive drought and desertification as a result of climate change - which could result in mass famines. Or, perhaps they haven't heard that the Pacific Islands risk losing their entire countries to climate change! The Australian delegation need to visit CANA's website www.cana.net.au/socialimpacts to see the severe impacts that climate change will have on these regions.

Australia also won a joint third place fossil of the day, for insisting (with Saudi Arabia) that the negotiations should finish at 6pm on the dot (clockwatchers!), and then droning on and on with their intervention AFTER 6pm.

The funds for adaptation were talked about today. Unfortunately, less than 10% of the money that will be needed to help developing countries cope with climate change has been committed. And Australia has committed a big, fat doughnut. Yes $0.

The Kyoto countries had an all day session on what the new targets for developed countries should be, for the next commitment period. The EU talked about the need to keep climate climate below 2^oC - otherwise we will face dangerous climate change.

Note: the above is the opinion of Julie-Anne Richards, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Climate Action Network.

  Posted by Julie-Anne Richards

Today the new President of the international negotiations on climate change (COPMOP) made a strong statement "Climate change is rapidly emerging as one of the most serious threats that humanity may ever face," said the President of the conference, Kenyan Environment Minister Kivutha.

Warning that global warming threatened the development goals for billions of the world's poorest people, conference President Kibwana said:   "We face a genuine danger that recent gains in poverty reduction will be thrown into reverse in coming decades, particularly for the poorest communities on the continent of Africa."

This first COPMOP to be held in Africa lends a sense of urgency to the negotiations, and places an emphasis on the adaptation work that is happening at COPMOP.  The meeting is already talking about adaptation and funding.  The funding pledged at the moment is less than 10% of what is needed - and we need to ramp this up significantly, if we're not to completely lose sight of the Millennium Development Goals (see www.cana.net.au/socialimpacts for how climate change will impact on MDGs).

Speaking of Africa, its very exciting to be here in Kenya.  The main problem with holding the meeting in Kenya, is that it is so much more tempting to do touristic things (safaris!) than work for 15 hours a day.  But, we still get to see a little of Kenya, even if it is out of the window of a taxi.  My taxi driver tonight was Tony Ngure. 

A local Kenyan, he said that Kenyans have noticed big changes in their weather patterns.  "We used to be able to tell when the rains were coming, and how long they would last for.  You might get it 2 or 3 days wrong, but you could tell when they were coming," he told me in the taxi on the way home.  "Now, we can't tell.  The rains come, the rains don't come, but we can't plan our crops around the rains anymore.  The rains are all messed up."

These negotiations must go well, so we can avoid much worst impacts for Kenyans, and others around the world.

Note:  the above is the opinion of Julie-Anne Richards, and does not necessarily reflect the opinion of Climate Action Network.