PREPARATORY MEETINGS ON CLIMATE CHANGE CONVENTION IN GENEVA, 27 FEBRUARY - 12 MARCH
Press Release
HE/928
PREPARATORY MEETINGS ON CLIMATE CHANGE CONVENTION IN GENEVA, 27 FEBRUARY - 12 MARCH
19960223 GENEVA, 23 February (UNEP) -- A two-week period of preparatory meetings on the 1992 Framework Convention on Climate Change starts here on Tuesday, 27 February. More than 150 countries are expected to attend the meetings, which are the last before the Convention's Conference of Parties holds its second annual meeting (COP-2) from 8 to 19 July at the Palais de Nations in Geneva.The preparatory meetings are the first to be held since the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) finalized its second assessment report last December. The IPCC's role is to provide objective assessments of scientific, technical and socio-economic research on climate change, its impacts and the possible policy responses. The parties to the climate change Convention have the task of deciding on what responses to adopt and of apportioning responsibility for undertaking them, notably between developed and developing countries.
During the preparatory meetings, a review will be conducted of the policy implications of the IPCC report, which evaluates the current scientific understanding of climate change, particularly the effect of human activities. Among other conclusions, the IPCC found that "climate has changed over the past century", that "climate is expected to continue to change in the future", and that "the balance of the evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate".
The 2,000-page report also analyses environmental and socio-economic impacts, response options for managing those impacts and for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, and the economic and social dimensions of climate change. According to the report, "significant reductions in net greenhouse gas emissions are technically possible and can be economically feasible".
The first Conference of Parties, held in Berlin in April 1995, concluded that the present commitments of developed countries under the Convention, notably the commitment to take measures aimed at returning their greenhouse gas emissions to 1990 levels by the year 2000, were not adequate. It established a process that would enable the Parties to take appropriate action for the period beyond the year 2000, including a strengthening of developed country commitments through the adoption of a protocol or other legal instrument. The adoption of those new commitments will take place at the third meeting of the Conference of Parties in 1997.
- 2 - Press Release HE/928 23 February 1996
The July meeting in Geneva will be important for reviewing progress towards meeting existing commitments. It will also be key to advancing the talks on future commitments and should mark the transition from the current focus on analysis to the full-scale negotiations that will conclude in 1997.
Consideration of future commitments will take place in the ad hoc group on the Berlin mandate during the second week of meetings, from 5 to 8 March. To prepare for the formal discussions, there will be workshops on the afternoon of 28 February and on the afternoon of 4 March. The subsidiary body on implementation and the subsidiary body for scientific and technological advice will both meet from 27 February to 4 March. The scientific and technological subsidiary body will consider the IPCC's second assessment report, as well as a secretariat report on technologies that could help to mitigate emissions. It will also start discussing the guidelines to be used by the developing countries in preparing their first "national communications" describing their actions in support of the Convention. A workshop on the subject will be convened by the Group of 77 and China on 26 February.
There will also be a workshop on how non-governmental organizations, including environmental groups, businesses and local government authorities, could have input into the Convention process. That 26 February workshop will be convened by the International Academy of the Environment, in conjunction with the Convention secretariat. It will explore the need for a non-governmental advisory committee and/or a business consultative mechanism.
The negotiations for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change were inspired by growing scientific understanding of the links between humanity's greenhouse gas emissions and changes in how the atmosphere absorbs and transmits radiation. The Convention was drafted in time to be signed by 154 governments plus the European Community (now Union) at the 1992 Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. It entered into force on 21 March 1994 and has now been ratified by 152 countries plus the European Community.
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