It's already here?!
Today, over 7000 delegates from 194 countries converged for a two weeks at the magnificent Qatar National conference centre in Doha for the 2012 United Nations framework on Climate Change Conference UNFCCC or COP18.
The 18th session of these meetings began amidst warnings of calamity, experts warned that existing mitigation pledges are not nearly enough to limit warnings to a manageable 2 degrees celsius. UN climate chief Christiana Figueres speaking days ago says, ''a faster response to climate change is necessary and possible''.
In similar developments, the International Institute for Environment and Development IIED reveals that, the rich nations have failed to fulfill 8 pledges made towards providing poorer ones with funds.
Today, over 7000 delegates from 194 countries converged for a two weeks at the magnificent Qatar National conference centre in Doha for the 2012 United Nations framework on Climate Change Conference UNFCCC or COP18.
The 18th session of these meetings began amidst warnings of calamity, experts warned that existing mitigation pledges are not nearly enough to limit warnings to a manageable 2 degrees celsius. UN climate chief Christiana Figueres speaking days ago says, ''a faster response to climate change is necessary and possible''.
In similar developments, the International Institute for Environment and Development IIED reveals that, the rich nations have failed to fulfill 8 pledges made towards providing poorer ones with funds.
The wealthier
nations in 2009 promised to provide poorer nations with 30 billion US dollars
by the end of 2012 , the finances were meant to serve as new and additional finance balance between support
for adaptation and mitigation activities
The report futher states that only 23.6 billion dolars of
the said amount has been given and only 20% of the amount allocated to projects
in these poor nations.
Less than half of the fast start fund is in grants while the
other half is given as loans meaning the poor countries are expected to repay
with interest.
Major concerns include the fact that wealthy nations have
failed to prove that their contributions are new and not derived from existing
grants.
Experts are saying when rich nations are not transparent
about when and how they would meet their financial pledges developing countries
are unable to plan adequate responses to climate change and make it difficult
for developing nations to take serious what the richer ones will say at the
UN climate change talks.
Further reports say, only two of the donors are remitting
their fair share of the fund. Norway has been ajudged the best , providing five
times their share of the fund; while the United States and Iceland have
contributed less than half their share.
The conclusion of several expert opinions is that, COP18 will test how much pressure developing countries can exert on the richer nations.
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