‘SAVING’ THE KYOTO  PROTOCOL MEANS ENDING THE

MARKET MANIA

Current attempts to entice the US government to recommit to the

Kyoto Protocol are likely to further accelerate the corruption of the

Treaty. To save the Kyoto Protocol, talks should urgently shift 

focus from the current market mania, to discussing effective and

fair solutions to climate change, beginning with domestic

reductions of greenhouse gas emissions by the industrialised

countries.

At last November’s UN climate summit in The  Hague (COP-6),

Northern governments and corporations were only inches away

from being allowed to ‘fulfil’ their reduction commitments through

various inventive but seriously flawed market-based (‘flexible’)

instruments. This included creating global emissions markets,

encouraging a scientifically dubious trade in ‘carbon sinks’ (carbon 

absorption via trees, wood products and soil) for emissions, and

the promotion of nuclear energy. These escape clauses would have

allowed the industrialised countries to significantly increase their 

emissions (instead of reducing them by the average 5.2% as

agreed upon in Kyoto).

The debate since COP-6 has revolved around the US government’s

open rejection of the Kyoto Protocol. Other governments are so

eager to placate the US in order to get them back on board  that

they appear ready to compromise the Protocol’s environmental,

social and moral integrity. Therefore, there is a real risk that the UN

climate  summit in Bonn (COP 6, part 2) will result in an entirely

corrupted treaty that would unleash a global market in fraudulent

emissions credits and do nothing to help stabilise the greenhouse

gas emissions that cause climate change.

Many corporate ventures that might become eligible for emissions

credits - nuclear power plants, so-called ‘clean coal’ plants as well

as industrial agriculture and large-scale tree plantations (including 

genetically engineered varieties) - have extremely serious negative

social and environmental impacts. Investments in ‘carbon sinks’

(such as large-scale tree plantations) in the South would result in

land being used at the expense of local people, accelerate 

deforestation, deplete water resources and increase poverty.

Entitling the North to buy cheap emission credits from the South,

through projects of an often exploitative nature, constitutes ‘carbon

colonialism’. Industrialised countries and their corporations will

harvest the `low-hanging fruit´ (the cheapest credits), saddling

Southern countries with only expensive options for any future

reduction commitments they might be required to make.

Carbon credits are envisioned to be sold through a global

emissions market, a concept that suffers from fundamental flaws.

Firstly, allowing immediate trade in emissions permits (carbon

credits) in effect means granting unequal private property rights to 

the atmosphere. This system of property rights would consolidate

the historic overuse by Northern industry at the expense of the

South (80% of all CO2 emitted since 1850 has come from the

North).  A market without clearly defined property rights can never

function and the unfair property rights that underlie the currently

proposed emissions markets will eventually be rejected by those

losing out.

Moreover, the proposed emissions markets lack a workable

accounting system, another essential element of a functioning

market. A market which assumes that emissions cuts are

climatically equivalent to planting trees, constructing new ‘clean 

coal’ plants or engaging in other pseudo-solutions, is deeply

flawed. Global carbon stocks and flows cannot be quantified in the

way such a market requires. Unverifiable emissions credits would

flood the market, turning the trading system into a farce. The net

effect would be to subsidise greenhouse gas emissions and

exacerbate the climate crisis.

The fact that the property rights issue is unresolved and deeply

contentious and that the proposed accounting system is

fraudulent, should be sufficient reason to call off the launch of

global trade in emissions credits. Attempting to regulate (for

instance with ‘caps’ or trying to close ‘loopholes’) a market with

such fundamental flaws is bound to fail. If unleashed now, the

multibillion-dollar global emissions markets would develop their 

own disastrous dynamic. Given the bias towards corporate

interests by neoliberal governments and international institutions,

once these markets have been allowed to operate and expand, it

will be virtually impossible to close off the lucrative trade in 

fraudulent emissions credits.

The North has a moral obligation to make the deepest cuts in

greenhouse gas emissions, instead of using the South as a carbon

dump. In particular, transnational corporations and international 

financial institutions must be held accountable for their central role

in fuelling the climate crisis. Reducing fossil fuel use, which

ultimately means keeping fossil fuels in the ground, is the only

effective way to avoid escalating climate change.

Therefore:

• We demand that industrialised countries drastically reduce their

greenhouse gas emissions at home.

• We demand that industrialised countries do not seek to escape

their reduction commitments through market-based mechanisms

such as Emissions Trading, Joint Implementation or the Clean 

Development Mechanism.

• We call for a just transition to sustainable economies (through

policies that protect workers and vulnerable communities), as well 

as for support for countries and communities threatened by

catastrophic climate change.

• We call for an end to fossil fuel subsidies and a moratorium on

new oil exploration and drilling.

This statement is signed by :

ASEED Europe (Action for Solidarity, Equality, Environment and

Development)

The CornerHouse, United Kingdom

Corporate Europe Observatory (CEO)

CorpWatch, United States

EYFA, Europe

Fern, United Kingdom

Indigenous Environmental Network, United States, Canada &

Mexico Korea

Ecological Youth

Rainforest Action Network, United States

Southwest Workers Union, United States

Third World Network, Malaysia

Transnational Institute (TNI)

World Information Service on Energy (WISE)

World Rainforest Movement