BEIJING CONFERENCE CALLS FOR WAVE OF TECHNOLOGICAL

 

TRANSFORMATION TO ADDRESS CLIMATE CHANGE

 

BEIJING/NEW YORK, 8 November (Department of Economic and Social Affairs) -- Effective international cooperation will be required to achieve a wave of technological transformation needed to address climate change over the coming decades, according to participants attending the Beijing High-level Conference on Climate Change:  Technology Development and Technology Transfer that concluded today.

Opening the two-day meeting, China Premier Wen Jiabao urged developed countries to transfer climate-friendly technologies to China and other developing countries, and he called on the international community to establish a fund and mechanism for overcoming technology transfer barriers.

United Nations Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon, in his message to the Conference, stressed the importance of making newer and cleaner technology available across the globe.  “New thinking and specific measures are necessary to remove existing barriers to clean technology transfer and diffusion.  Clean technologies have proven their worth again and again,” he said.

Many of the 800 participants attending the meeting stressed the need to provide early sharing of technologies as they develop so they can be adapted to differing climates and national settings.  They also highlighted the need to accelerate, in a systematic way, the diffusion of advanced technologies in the market globally.  A statement and summary accepted at the conclusion of the conference emphasizes the “need to accelerate research, development, deployment and transfer of technologies”, in order to address the challenges posed by climate change.

During the conference, participants discussed the status of clean technologies, the barriers to transfer, as well as mechanisms to overcome them.  Public-private cooperation and partnerships were highlighted as a key to the deployment in the marketplace where the majority of the investments will be made.  Participants also highlighted that the scale of the climate change challenge calls for new and innovative mechanisms of international cooperation, particularly in the fields of research, development, transfer and deployment of climate related technologies.

“Of particular value at this Conference was that experts, policy-makers and other stakeholders engaged each other on critical issues, away from the constraints of the negotiating table,” said Sha Zukang, United Nations Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs.  “We saw areas where real differences persist, but also areas of common interest and possible convergence,” he added.

“I am confident that the Conference will contribute positively to the forthcoming climate change negotiations in Poznan in December,” said Zie Zhenhua, Vice Chairman of the National Development and Reform Commission of China.

The meeting was held in the run-up to the next Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Poznan, Poland in December 2008.  More than 30 ministerial-level representatives, four heads of United Nations agencies, and representatives from over 67 countries participated.

For more information, please contact Ling Wang, tel.:  134 2615 6499; Dan Shepard, United Nations Department of Public Information, tel.:  212 963 9495; e-mail:  shepard@un.org; or www.CCChina.gov.cn/BjCTC/en, www.unfccc.int, www.un.org/esa/sustdev.

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For information media • not an official record