LATIN AMERICA PRODUCES LESS THAN 6 PER CENT OF WORLD'S CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS
Press Release
ENV/DEV/454
REC/15
LATIN AMERICA PRODUCES LESS THAN 6 PER CENT OF WORLD'S CARBON DIOXIDE EMISSIONS
19971204 SANTIAGO, 4 December (ECLAC) -- Latin America and the Caribbean generate less than 6 per cent of the world's carbon dioxide, while developed countries generate around 70 per cent, according to a study presented at the Third Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in Kyoto, Japan. Latin America is highlighted, however, as the region with one of the largest CO2 deposits because of its forested areas, which allow a high degree of reabsorption of the gas.The data on world CO2 emissions is included in the study, Energy and Sustainable Development in Latin America and the Caribbean: Approaches to Energy Policy, published by the Economic Commission on Latin America and the Caribbean (ECLAC), the Latin American Organization for Energy, and the Deutsche Gesellschaft für Technische Zusammenerarbeit of the German Government within the framework of a project by the same name.
This project seeks to reinforce the formulation of energy policies which harmonize economic growth, social equity and environmental preservation, within a context of reforms which have been adopted by nations in that region in recent years.
The study concludes that Latin American and Caribbean countries made relative but significant progress toward reducing regional and global air pollution, as noted in specific data on emissions. "The specific emissions of CO2 within the whole energy system were reduced by more than 20 per cent between 1970 and 1990", it states. "The most important reduction (23 per cent) occurred between 1972 to 1985. From then on the specific emissions remained constant."
The greatest reduction took place in Brazil between 1970 and 1990, when specific emissions from the energy sector decreased by a third, remaining constant at that level until 1995. In the Central American and Andean subregions, the reduction of CO2 was slow, but steady. In the Caribbean, as in the southern cone, there were no clear trends.
The study notes that while the Latin American and Caribbean energy sectors had decreased their contributions to environmental problems on global or regional levels, they do play an important role in local contamination.
- 2 - Press Release ENV/DEV/454 REC/15 4 December 1997
According to other United Nations statistics, the United States contributes 33.7 per cent of the world's CO2 emissions, with 4.5 per cent of the world's population and 25 per cent of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP). The European Union is responsible for 21 per cent of the CO2 emissions, with 25 per cent of GDP and 6 per cent of the population, Latin America produces 6 per cent of the world's CO2, with 6 per cent of the GDP and 8 per cent of the population.
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