JAPAN: G8 emissions target a step back
Updated
The G-8 meeting of leading industrial nations has wound up in Japan with a fudge on the key issue of climate change.
The target to cut global greenhouse emissions by half by 2050 is being criticised as a step backward and major developing nations China and India remain opposed to joining the club.
Presenter: Karon Snowdon
Speakers: Australian PM, Kevin Rudd; South Africa's Environment Minister, Marthinus van Schalkwyk; European Commission President, Jose Manuel Barroso; Professor Barry Brook, Director of the Research Institute for Climate Change at Adelaide University.
SNOWDON: The G8 statement acknowledged the scientific evidence of climate change and the need to avoid its serious consequences. So the goal of aiming for a 50 per cent reduction of global emissions by 2050 is actually a setback, according to Professor Barry Brook, the Director of the Research Institute for Climate Change at Adelaide University.
BROOK: Well the immediate thought (is) that it's a statement of convenience rather than of conviction. So it seems like it hasn't got much of a vision in there, it's not actually setting any particular ambitious target. You've got to have a bit of vision really for the future and that's why the G8 announcement's disappointing because it's saying let's just take a few baby steps but not really change anything structurally.
RUDD: This has been a useful day; it's been one step forward in what's going to be a difficult process.
SNOWDON: Australia's Prime Minister Kevin Rudd was among the non-G8 members invited to attend the meeting.
RUDD: Today in the meeting with the major economies, I indicated that Australia wants to see a new grand bargain, a new grand consensus between developed and developing countries so that we can act together to bring down greenhouse gas emissions in order to save the planet.
SNOWDON: But that didn't happen. The so-called group of five, Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa has demanded that rich nations take the lead. South Africa's Environment Minister Marthinus van Schalkwyk criticised the statement, saying rich nations are putting a burden on developing countries.
SCHALKWYK: We will not commit and agree to an escape clause that will make it that much easier for some of the developed countries to get out and leave only some countries to carry the burden.
SNOWDON: European Commission President Jose Manuel Barroso said the summit shouldn't be seen as a confrontation between developed and developing countries. But he appeared to take issue with the US.
BARROSO: Without a big step of the United States we cannot achieve agreement because it's the major economy in the world. And the signal that the economy sends is critically important, namely for the bigger emerging economies like China and India.
SNOWDON: The deadlock is well known. Without the US moving first, China and India won't budge. In Denmark next year the world is meant to reach a binding agreement to take it beyond the Kyoto Protocol. Professor Barry Brook says the G8 meeting failed the test of whether cooperation will win out.
BROOK: Well if the G8 don't buy into this, then the target set in Copenhagen will be useless because the G8 because of their historical responsibility, and in fact they still contribute on a per capita basis a huge amount to the problem, means that if they don't get on board and set some serious targets then the nations which are currently catching up and will soon overtake the G8 nations in terms of their emissions and industrial outputs such as China and India, and indeed much of the rest of the developed world, are not going to take this whole issue seriously. And yet the science tells us that a 50 per cent reduction will not adequately solve the problem, it'll take us to somewhere between 550 and 750 parts per million CO2, and that means three to four degrees of warming, and that means some fairly catastrophic outcomes.
