Earth Equity News

Cancun Agreement: A Step in the Right Direction. Greenpeace International, 12/11/10. “Governments in Cancun, Mexico, have chosen hope over fear and put the building blocks back in place for a global deal to combat climate change. For the first time in years, governments put aside some major differences and compromised to reach a climate agreement. However, with large compromise also comes disappointment. The UN climate conference in Cancun may have saved the multilateral process after last year's abject failure in Copenhagen but we have not yet been saved from climate change. After years of walk outs, public booing, blocking and the collapse of talks, governments have shown that they can compromise and cooperate, key ingredients in moving forward to achieve a global deal…

“Here are the major points of work that will need to be followed in order to make this agreement a real one and a good one: 1) On the key issue of climate finance, Governments established a fund to deliver the billions needed for the developing world to deal with climate change and stop deforestation. But they didn’t establish any way of providing that money. 2) Another major decision on the table in Cancun deals with a mechanism that will protect tropical forests while safeguarding indigenous peoples' rights and biodiversity. The REDD agreement sidesteps some critical parts that must be defined and strengthened over the coming months. 3) Governments not only acknowledged the gap between their current weak pledges to cut greenhouse gas emissions and where they need to get to, they actually stated that cuts needed to be in line with the science -- 25 to 40% cuts by 2020 -- and that they need to keep global temperature rise below two degrees.”