By RTCC Staff
UNFCCC chief Christiana Figueres called for countries to remember the target to limit warming to two degrees Celsius. (Source: Flickr/UNFCCC)
The next round of climate change negotiations in Doha must build on Durban’s momentum, the head of the UN climate change agency has said.
Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UNFCCC, also laid out five targets for the next talks to continue the work done in South Africa last year.
“There is no doubt that Durban resulted in one of the most encompassing and furthest reaching outcomes in the history of the climate change negotiations,” she said at an informal meeting of officials from 32 countries.
The talks aim to reduce the future impact of climate change, improve resilience to its effects and to help distribute finance and technology where it is needed.
“In Cancun [in 2010], Parties agreed to stay below a two degrees Celsius average global temperature increase. Everything possible needs to make this real – and even more so to move the world into the ambit of 1.5 degrees Celsius,” added Figueres.
To-do list
Next week will see the start of the Climate Change Conference in the UNFCCC’s home base of Bonn, Germany.
Setting out a “to-do” list for Doha, Figueres called on nations to address five areas:
– A new commitment period of the Kyoto protocol
– Pledges for climate action outside of the Kyoto initiative
– Finalising details to put technology transfer into operation
– Progress on long term finance, the so-called Green Climate Fund, that is hoped to generate $100bn if funds annually
– Set out a path for globally binding deal for all countries, as agreed in Durban
“Directly or indirectly, the success for the climate of all these “to-do’s” depends on a sufficient level of ambition,” said Figueres.
“Ambition to support developing countries, ambition mobilize finance and last but certainly not least, ambition to decisively and tangibly reduce emissions according to what science demands.”
The UN process has received criticism for being too slow however it remains the only fully-inclusive platform for the talks.
What do you think of the “to-do” list? Should Kyoto be the priority for now or should we start on a global deal to cut emissions now?
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