No-Hopenhagen? COP-out? The UN FCCC-ed up?

It's now just over a month since I got back from Copenhagen at what was the experience of a lifetime. The COP15, the event that was built up to be where world leaders decide whether to save us all, or sign a suicide pact. So, I've had some time for reflection.

Here are the main things I learnt from the mad house of the UNFCCC:

1. Every country is in it for themselves - they just have differing analyses of what that actually means. In the case of China, it appears they believed their economic growth to help them become a superpower in the future was more important than the climate which that will be based on. The US was similar in terms of the minor cuts they were willing to commit to. And countries like the Maldives realised that they needed a deal in Copenhagen to stop from drowning under rising seas. Capitalism is no small player in creating these differing world views, and as always the poor and vulnerable loose out, the rich and powerful who win, no matter how stupid they actually are. We need to keep pushing for a recognition that the collective good being put first will increase all our prosperity.

2. The UNFCCC process could work, and work well, if countries were not subject to the gross illogicalities I just described.

3. Carbon trading is worse than I thought. It could work well if it wasn't subject to the political process - but that's the case with most things! There are so many outs for rich but selfish countries like New Zealand to exploit (Clean Development Mechanism, REDD, and other such flexibility mechanisms) depending on the system (ie the one that the current NZ government supports) emissions could continue to sky rocket. No wonder Minister for Climate Change Issues Nick Smith is so keen on many of these things.

4. The solutions are out there, but it's up to the people to lead. And they are. This is too big to give up on, so lets keep working towards climate justice, and keep coming up with ideas. We're closer than we think, and there's a massive global movement on what Desmund Tutu called "the winning side" - the side where we get to keep a stable climate, and make a more equitable world! It was fantastic to see so many thousands of young people and Non-Governmental Organisations (NGOs) in Copenhagen supporting this winning effort.

5. There's a lot of smart people out there, but there's also some wackos... Climate change deniers can join the many other crazy conspiracy theorists and retire to their tight-knit communities of nonsense!

6. The Copenhagen Accord said and achieved very little. However, it is political will that is most important if we are to ever reach an agreement for a stable climate. Is there political will? More than we've ever seen. Is this enough? No.

7. But, with the Copenhagen Accord being the only thing to come out of Copenhagen, there seems to be even more uncertainty than there was before Copenhagen - and that was a huge amount. This uncertainty is bad for the climate, bad for us, and bad for business. Who knows what will happen this year?

8. The Green movement is needed now more than ever before.

I leave you with some pictures which contain memories which I will always cherish.

Flight of the Kiwis

“New Zealand stakeholder briefing meeting number one. Negotiators?”

“Present.”

“Stakeholders?”

“Present.”

“Right. Item one. What should we talk about?”

And thus the first New Zealand briefing of day two of COP15 began, just like an episode of Flight of the Conchords. Small office, laminated sign, faded flag, not many people. The only thing missing was a poster saying “New Zealand – ewe should come,” or something of the like.

New Zealand really shows its importance at the UNFCCC by having a tiny office positioned strategically in the far corner of the delegation offices (and being told to pay $24 if the wanted another chair). The stakeholder briefing meeting I went to this morning was small and informal – but should get bigger and more detailed as things go on. Nothing much has happened at COP15 yet, just openings of negotiations. The meetings really are a great opportunity though; an incredible advantage of coming from such a small country that basically all Kiwis are welcome to come and talk details with the bureaucrats about what's happening, and even argue about policy every day.

But we do have to remember that we're not that big a player, but we can have a great positive impact. However, currently our 10 to 20% emissions reduction (below 1990 levels by 2020) targets will not help the developed world reach the 25 to 40% cuts necessary to stop dangerous climate change – and they are highly conditional.

For New Zealand to go to a 20% target, it wants to see global targets set at a level where temperature rises are limited to 2°C (which New Zealand itself wont be going far enough to reach). There are four other demands, including wanting to be able to purchase offsets to be able to reach most of those emission cuts off shore – meaning we'd be paying others to do what we don't want to do, even though ultimately everyone needs to substantially cut emissions. We also want to be able to grow lots of trees tat home to achieve these offsets. Without these, and other conditions being met (many of which having a low level of probability of success) New Zealand's target will be much lower than 20%.

So New Zealand is very demanding for such a small player. In reality we should actively be a positive voice for climate change to protect ourselves, our Pacific neighbours who are drowning under rising seas, and everyone else from the worst effect of climate change. There is so much more we could do, and that would be a huge business opportunity for us – already being well and truly seized by countries like Norway who have experienced strong economic growth recently, and plan to be carbon neutral by 2030. What ever happened to Helen Clark's desires for NZ to become carbon neutral too?

There's so much we could do, we've got a really talented negotiating team here, and New Zealand has a good reputation of purity to live up to. Let's hope John Key has (another) change of heart and directs the New Zealand Delegation to push for a deal we could truly be proud of. That's what COP15 should be about for the humble but talented Kiwis.

I'm going to Copenhagen!

Kia ora everyone. Long time no post, I know. But you know the deal with these things.

Quick update since we last spoke: Haircut, university, got elected Environmental Officer for VUWSA (the students association at my uni), continued Co-Convening the Young Greens and now I'm off to Copenhagen next month.

Copenhagen? Yeah man. Copenhagen. It's where world leaders will be deciding the fate of the world, trying to get a global agreement on climate change, after commitment period number one of the Kyoto Protocol, which ends at the end of 2012.

Why you going, bro? Because world leaders need all the pressure they can get to make a deal that will lower the worst impacts of climate change from happening to us. I'm going as part of the New Zealand Youth Delegation (NZYD).

How can I find out more about this whole thing? Well, here's an article I wrote a few months ago for the student mag at Victoria University.

Can I give you money to help you get there? Yes please! We need lots of money to get there and pay for accommodation and eats. Go here now. Cheers! If you are in Auckland you can also go to our fundraising auction, where you can buy re-usable shopping bags painted by famous people like Robyn Malcolm - who will actually be there! Details are hmmmere.

And how can I keep up to date with your shenanigans at this insane event? Right here at zackarateisland.blogspot.com, where I shall be pumping out the posts again to save the world. Also through NZYD's website, Facebook... you know the story.

My cousin's even famous-er-er - therefore so am I

Kia ora whanua. I know it's been a little while since we last spoke, but I've been busy with university and Co-Convening the Young Greens you see, among other university shinanigans. However, I cannot honestly say I've been more busy than my cousin Phil.

No, that's not me on the unicycle, but yes he is a good looking guy. He's my Canadian equivilent, but is cooler than me. You see Phil Schleihauf is currently unicycling accross Canada for the charity Invisible Children which is dedicated to freeing the child soldiers who make up 90% of Joseph Kony's Lord's Resistance Army in Uganda, who are fighting in the longest running war in Africa.

Now, for those of you who don't know, Canada is a small country above the United States of America. Small in population that is, but large in size - the second largest country on Earth, after Russia. So it's a massive distance Phil will be riding, a lot longer than riding the length of our fair nation of New Zealand. So freakin kudos to him.

So follow his website if that kinda of thing floats your boat, but most importantly read about the Invisible Children. I had no idea about them, and I bet most of you (as informed as you are) wouldn't have heard of them either! And, of course, if you can, give them money. But at the very least learn about their story, and tell others that even though our corporate media ignores them, we will not.

My relationship with 2008: A spiel from the heart

And so it is that the year 2008AD was coming to an end, with just a few days and several traditional celebratory days remaining. That space in space around the sun beckons again which some cultures chose as their time for new beginnings and reflections. So, in that spirit, I shall now do what all good bloggers do, and blog.

How does one sum up a year? Well, for myself it has been a year of self-discovery, and discovering just some of what the world around has to offer. I have had no formal education whatsoever, but learnt so much. I've worked full time in an office. I've travelled alone, and travelled with strangers who quickly become new friends (significantly bulking out my friends list on Facebook). I've run for Parliament, learning a lot from New Zealand masters of Green politics.

One thing my cousin taught me while I was in Canada - one of those important things that you never forget, rather, dwell on at length - was the way the indigenous people of Canada measure individual success. For me it sums up two things really well. It reminds me that there are so many different ways of viewing the world out there already, let alone new philosophies to be thought up. It also, I feel, sums up well the way I think our culture needs to re-jig our priorities. My cousin told me that indigenous people in Canada use one's relationships as a measure of "success" - compared with our measure of money, stuff, and career success. Relationships with those around you, and also the world around are of huge importance to everyone's wellbeing. I have learnt a lot about relationships this year, of all types.

In terms of international affairs 2008 has been a particularly dramatic year. I remember thinking in 2004 that it was, for New Zealand at least, the year that I will see as the start of major weather events increasing in their ferocity. It was the year that we had all that flooding in February, and sure enough, plenty of extreme weather keeps coming. Two thousand and eight will certainly be remembered as crunch time. The sky-rocketing price of oil can not be ignored as a sign of intense pressures on our resources as we really start to live beyond our means. This being a failure of free-market capitalism, helping trigger another failure. Individuals running a system do in fact act with short term self interests as their primary concern, rather than for the greater good, even if the greater good will, eventually, advance their self-interests much further. Cue global financial crisis.

But, with the election of Barack Obama, there are signs of hope. No more Bush has got to be good for the world - he's done pretty well at screwing up as much as humanely possible. Now, I don't see Obama as a saviour, but I don't think anyone could possibly have been elected in that country and been able to make the changes we so desparately need. Not at the moment anyway. I think in Obama we got about the best we could possibly have hoped for. For me, the fact that he's black doesn't really matter so much (having grown up in an almost colour-blind environment). It's the fact that he's so multi-racial, and has had so many different experiences in his life. This seems to instruct his politics. He realises that if you want to move forward, you have to bring everyone forward, no matter what viewpoint or religion or philosophy they subscribe to. That is vitally important if we are ever to make the changes that really need to be made. Obama is ultimately going to be a failure - he wont enact a policy in the Middle East that is fair, he wont reform the US economy to a "New Green Deal" of the type that we really need, and he most certainly wont please everyone. But I do think that he will make significant progress on all fronts, and that's what we need not just in 2009, but long beyond that.

And so to my beloved New Zealand. What are we up to? National and ACT running the country? (With some Maori Party flavour in there.) So far all that that has meant is some very rapid backwards-running. I know I'll have to continue to invest in my future by investing my time with the Green Party. If right wing politics is the politics of fear, than Green politics is the politics of inspiration and vision, and that is what (with the help of Mr Obama) we need to use to continue to fight the good (non-violent) fight.

As for me, 2009 will be a year of more learning and growth (jeeze, is that all us young folk do?). I will be starting at university, most likely studying Environmental Studies and Economics (so watch out, I'll be able to spa it with the Business Round Table and people with similarily decrepit views and shatter their very reason for being). I'll also be moving out of the nest (yay!).

So to everyone who's read this - thanks! For those of you who flicked through to this final paragraph - go back and read it all! For my supporters on Facebook - thanks for continuing to grow in numbers. My ego needs stroking every now and again. For everyone - over the next couple of weeks, make sure you reflect, philosophise, and most importantly, work on your relationships. With friends, family, loved ones, yourself, your enemies, your garden, your cat and anything/anyone else you see fit. And make sure you do something a little crazy. Two thousand and nine is going to be a long year.

Should countries be responsible for "exported" emissions?

33% of China's carbon footprint blamed on exports

19:00 28 July 2008 NewScientist.com

Economists now say that one-third of China's carbon dioxide emissions are pumped into the atmosphere in order to manufacture exported goods – many of them "advanced" electronics goods destined for developed countries. "Export goods emissions" account for 1.7 billion tonnes of China's carbon dioxide. That represents 6% of total global emissions – the equivalent of Germany, France and the UK's combined emissions. A large share of these emissions – up to 25% – has been blamed on China's ever-growing export market, but this has not been quantified until now. Now Christopher Weber of Carnegie Mellon University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and colleagues have shown that the figure is larger still. Weber's team used a standard model of the Chinese economy, produced by the Chinese government. This model, which operates on the same principle as others produced by every national government, reflects how money has flowed in and out of different sectors of the economy since the 1980s. Matching the model to the dataset allowed the team to calculate that, in 2005, export sectors generated 1.7 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide – 33% of China's emissions.

An interesting study, and the focus of this week's poll. This issue was looked into at the Global Young Greens conference I attended earlier this year.

With huge amounts of products primarily consumed in developed nations now being manufactured in developing nations, this of course equates to an "exporting" of environmental impacts from the developed nations on to the developing nations. Should, in future global agreements on cutting carbon emissions, nations be responsible for emissions created from products they import, and not for products they export? Would this make things too complicated, in a field where it is already impossible to calculate exact carbon emissions? And, of course, the manufacturing nations benefit (to arguable extents) from the manufacturing being based in their countries. Should this be taken into account?

A very complex issue, but give your brains a bit of a stretch and vote in the poll to the right now.

Should developing nations be doing more to become sustainable?

As promised yesterday, getting back into the issues with a new poll (finally). This weeks is about developing nations.

Over the last two and a half months travelling around Latin America I have seen first hand what some (admittedly overall realitively wealthy) developing nations are like in regards to the environment. Brazil, for example, has a reasonably strong Green Party, and is a world leader in production of ethanol-based "biofuels", or "agrifuels" as the European Greens insist they are called. However, it is also one of the worst offenders in deforestation in the world, behind, only, perhaps, Indonesia (if memory serves me correctly). Although there were signs of an increasing environmental awareness (demonstrated by some advertisements playing up on people´s want to do something for the environment), there were many signs that Brazil was far behind my experiences in New Zealand, which I believe still has a long way to go as well. Plastic was one of the things that pained me most. Plastic bags handed out with everything, even if you were buying a single bottle of water. I learnt pretty quickly how to say "No bag thanks" in Portuguese. I also endured very strange looks from a supermarket bag-packer when I gave her my own reuseable bag (yes, you should take them travelling too). They also use plastic cups for everything, including beer, and piles paper napkins at all but maybe the fanciest restuarants (I´m assuming, as I never went to one that fancy). There were streets that looked like rubbish tips, and especially in busy cities, people handing you fliers at every corner. Furthermore, a city like Sao Paulo had public transport, it seemed, more out of necessity, rather than out of a Government preference for the more sustainable option. Cycling is a bit of a death-wish, and cars always have priority over pedestrians. You often need to be fast to cross the road.

Brazil is similar to Venezuela and Mexico from what I´ve seen. Except cars are bigger in Venezuela and Mexico, presumably because the two countries have lots of oil. Speaking of oil, and turning to other developing nations, the US Government in particular is pointing at countries like India and China for their skyrocketing emissions when nations are debating what to do about lowering emissions. They are also being partially blamed for record-high oil prices due to their increasing thirst.

The argument over consumption of oil though boils down to an important point. Developing nations are still significantly (and very significantly in many cases) poorer than developed nations, and as such have a lot more poverty. Lower incomes = a lesser impact on the environment through less use and wastage of resources. So even if attitudes to the environment are probably overall behind (though not necessarily that far behind) developed nation´s attitudes towards the environment, per capita developed nations still have far less of an impact on the environment than developed nations. Their priorities lie with economic growth far ahead of environmental protection. Shouldn´t they be allowed to develop so they are on par with developed nations, and can the world cope with the increased use of resources? Do developed nations have any liability for the damage already done, and to help distribute resources more fairly?

These are some of the issues in a very complex one. So with the above (and more) in mind, please vote in this weeks poll.

(The photo with this post was taken in the Gran Sabana, Venezuela. It is a national park in which only indigenous people are allowed to live, and was outside a settlement that tourists have to walk through to get to one of the many waterfalls in the areas. It is a sign meant to demonstrate how long it takes different types of rubbish to break down.)

Do I support the fair trade deal with China?

Well, what a week. What an overwhelming response to the poll. But it ended up with a 50-50 split between the yes camp, and the no camp (and I know who both of you two are methinks).

Anyhow, I'll just give my opinion now.

No.

The toss up between money and morality is such a despicable one. Do we need the extra money? No. Do the Tibetans and the Chinese people need their freedom? Yes. It's a very simple equation. And, of course, with peak oil and climate change looming we seriously need to reassess our ability to provide for ourselves (including food an clothing) as a very geographically-isolated nation. When will oil prices rise so much that it's more economical to produce clothing in NZ than important the goods from China? It's anyone's guess whether that will even happen or not, let alone when, but it reinforces the issue of sustainability needing to be the bedrock of any economic policy right now. We need to be asking the question - is this deal moving us further towards economic sustainability, or further away? Because if the answer is the latter, then we should not be going down that road. And though I cannot hope to do in depth analysis on the fair trade deal with China, I very much doubt that it is moving us any closer to being sustainable, even taking into account the "environmental" parts of the agreement (which are, in my understanding voluntary and potentially completely undermined by other parts of the deal which may prevent us from increasing our own environmental regulations).

And as for the human rights question: the argument for the deal is that staying in good relations with China is the only way that we can hope to have an impact on their human rights situation. That might be case, given that they are so much larger than us in every way, but since when has entering into a preferential trade deal been the way to keep up relations with a dictatorship? And what parts of the deal, specifically, are engineered to improve the human rights situation in China? Time and time again it is proven that you can justify anything as long as it is not directly morally repugnant on the grounds that it will help the economy. Furthermore, it is scary the types of underground ways the Chinese Government has started to infiltrate other countries in an attempt to silence its critics not only in China, but also abroad - Amnesty have uncovered some examples of these tactics (though you can search for that info yourself because I can't be bothered).

And, interestingly, a vigil outside the Chinese embassy in Fiji lead to the participants being arrested. Fijian government also snuggling up to China? Because, don't forget, we deal with the bad Governments in those two countries in completely opposite ways. One, we stand next to proudly in their country as we join our two economies in holy matrimony. The other we impose trade sanctions on and turn our backs, plug our ears and say "nanananana we're not listening".

Do you support the fair trade deal with China?

Though admittedly I haven't gone through the deal (that was made public on the day of the signing) with a fine-tooth comb (who has the time to do that?), here are a few things about the deal.

China has an abysmal human rights record. They have a single party system, and voices of dissent are oppressed with Chinese efficiency. Unions are destroyed if they ever start to form, and there is widespread use of child labour. But what does opening up our trade barriers have to do with this? And we can talk to them better now that we've given them preferential trade, right? Besides, we're going to make a killing out of this deal. Local manufacturers will be hurt, but they are almost gone already anyway, and they'll be given time to "adjust" before tariffs are removed completely (ie. move their manufacturing to China). We are an exporting nation, so will benefit greatly. We should be proud that we were the first nation to stand beside the senior Chinese Party officials and put our flag up next to the Chinese one to signify a uniting of two nations under the auspices of trade.

Please vote in poll now, or before it closes if you need time to think and read about it.

PS It's a bit of a fallacy to call it a "free" trade deal. No free trade deal is truly free - otherwise it would be a very simple document. An almost free trade deal is what it really is, with a few mentions of immigration and stuff.