Living the Dream

by admin | Nov 25, 2016 | MYD2016

(Bab Ighli, 11th November 2016) It’s day 5 of the conference and I’m living the dream. I’ve become a regular observer at YOUNGO and CAN Daily meeting, following G77 and China’s coordination meeting, as well as global stocktake (GST) informal meeting under the first session of the Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Paris Agreement (CMA1), and finally allocated time to attend the meeting of the Subsidiary Board for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) on Technology Development and Transfer.

I learnt about global warming 13 years ago, and a whole lot of climate change when I was in my second year of university. After graduation, I’ve never had a single doubt in pursuing an environmental related career due to my interest in climate change. I’m happy to work in the industry where my passion lies. Nevertheless, I never thought I could attend the G77 and China internal coordination meeting at 9am today which is also my fourth consecutive day in meeting room 4, and also witnessed the first ever Facilitative Dialogue (FD) on enhancing ambition and support held in Plenary Casablanca. I couldn’t be more excited to live this dream. I definitely didn’t think about this 6 months ago. The paper and documents from the G77 and China coordination meeting and FD which I’m currently reading is surreal to me.

The FD session prompted a whole new understanding of linkages between ambition and support in terms of Technology Transfer, financial support and capacity building, which mainly focus on achieving pre-2020 mitigation ambition. The Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions (NAMA) was heavily discussed as the mechanism is intended for developing countries to submit an application to officially seek technical and financial assistance from developed countries to fulfil their mitigation ambition. Instead, the agenda of the discussion seems skewed as the subject of differentiation, in other words, the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities (CBDR) was once again being ignored as developing countries urged serious approach from developed countries to fulfil their responsibilities in mitigating climate change.

In my opinion, the outcome of the FD simply came short, developed countries took advantage of the platform to showcase their ability in achieving mitigation ambition but were not sincere enough to channel these measures to support the developing countries which require enhanced financial support and climate actions, particularly those that are most vulnerable. It was a disappointment when the principle of CBDR has to be reiterated and to be reminded of the historical emissions and contributions to the present climate.

The day was concluded with the MYD 2016 team finally seizing an opportunity to catch up with Dr Gary Theseira over dinner. It turned out to be a meaningful one as the youth delegates were able to get a good grasp of the knowledge on the history of climate negotiations, the interesting discussion on literature, and most importantly getting to know him in person.

Captain Planet

PS, I have also met Captain Planet, a childhood hero of mine in front of Restaurant 1 at the conference. He has been summoned to perform desperate measures at this desperate time. What more shall I ask from a dream? Or should I?

Written by Kelvin Diong
Edited by Choy Moon Moon

Fossil Fuels and COP22

by admin | Nov 25, 2016 | MYD2016

Photo: Babawale Obayanju

The Conference of the Parties 22 (COP22) held in Marrakesh, Morocco this year has given fossil fuel companies a seat in the climate negotiations. A prime cause of climate change is the use of fossil fuel, which emits the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide to the environment. Carbon dioxide results in global warming. The historic first meeting of the parties, taking place now has given fossil fuel corporations a chance to voice out at side events organised in conjunction with COP22. These are the very organisations that have funded movements that promote climate change denial and show interest in extracting as much fossil fuel as possible.

Representatives from fossil fuel corporates such as Chevron, Shell and British Petroleum are given access to discussion at COP22, amid criticism from many. They are allowed to witness the discussions using their observer status at the negotiations, with the backing of many developed nations including the US, EU and Australia. The said countries were against measures to limit corporate involvement in the implementation of the Paris Climate Agreement.

These companies are also given a chance to organise side events at country pavilions and the civil society space known as “green zone” to “promote” their products. In an International Conference that aims to keep global temperature rise well below two degrees Celsius and plans to implement the Paris Agreement, nicknamed the COP of Action, giving access to the polluters of the climate a seat at the discussion table is ironic.

I believe that the fossil fuel lobby dilutes legislation concerning climate change. The lobby has had conflicts with international interests dating back decades. In my view, the fossil fuel lobby has seized COP22 as a business opportunity by using side event booths organised in conjunction with COP22 as platforms to voice out. Corporate Accountability International released the map below, which clearly marks how fossil fuel cooperates gain access to high-level meetings at COP.

Source: Corporate Accountability International

A petition calling for fossil fuel lobbyists to be removed from the UN climate change negotiation signed by 500,000 people who share the same views as I do was handed over to the US delegation. The petition initiated by Corporate Accountability International requests the UNFCCC to create a policy which will exclude the participants with conflict of interest from the negotiation process.

A side event at COP22 – Fossil Fuel Supply and Climate Policy acknowledged the conflict between climate change policy and the said industry. It was noted that despite the Paris Agreement, fossil fuel subsidies continue to grow. The Paris Agreement took decades to come into being and now it is threatened by polluting coporates from inside the negotiation rooms. Coal and oil belong under ground, not in the climate negotiation rooms of COP22.

Written by Dulanga Witharanage
Edited by Choy Moon Moon

Women at COP22

by admin | Nov 25, 2016 | MYD2016

A feminist walks into a bar… and she immediately notices the gender dynamics and participation of women in these ‘masculine’ activities.

I think it is only natural that the subject of your focus will attract your attention, also known as selective attention. For instance, a person who recently bought a yellow car might suddenly observe that there are more yellow cars on the road than before. Likewise, a feminist would immediately notice the gender dynamics in a workplace, meetings and decision-making; I am no different.

As a woman who is used to working at the top management level in organisations, I have experienced my fair share of dismissal, interruptions, assertions of authority and even my own false sense of diminished entitlement to the floor.

So when I attended informal consultations, and even informal-informal consultations (when I managed to ‘get in’), I took note of the number of women in the negotiation circle and their participation in the negotiations as a whole. After all, ‘gender equality and empowerment of women’ are recognised under the Paris Agreement (1/CP.21) among the things parties should ‘respect, promote and consider’ when taking action to address climate change.

I noticed that there was a high or balanced participation in CAN Daily meetings, side events and on the higher level, the consultations I attended. Even if there were gender disparities, they were only in numbers; women were active participants and often voiced their opinions, as was the case in the Young Delegates meeting I attended.

In CAN Daily meetings, there is almost always a woman on the chair; throughout other working groups and side events, I could see women actively participating in presentations, voicing out opinions in discussions and working behind the scenes as organisers. It appeared to me that gender was not only a non-issue, but there was also a greater cohesion between the genders, a safe space and working relationship.

On the higher level, in the SBI informal consultation on Capacity Building, 21 out of 37 negotiators were women, and some of the more vocal, key negotiators such as EU and US were women. I was fascinated by the way the South African negotiator defended her turf on behalf of G77 and China against the more dominant and difficult US, Japan, EU and Australia. She was confident without being loud and graceful even as she dug her heels in.

Now, I do recognise that in these consultations, gender means little since most of the positions are already agreed to beforehand and decided by the figureheads of respective countries or at least, influenced by various stakeholders. But even so, having these negotiators on the decision-making panel for the entire constituencies are inspiring and heartening to witness.

I found this photo so profound because I thought it signified the liberation of women through empowerment to enable them to break boundaries and reach the full height of their potential, like a butterfly breaking out of its cocoon

In MYD 2016 itself, 4 out of the 5 of us are girls; while Kelvin may sometimes stare at us blankly at our antics or resign himself to our countless cam-whoring, he adds value to our group with his knowledge and experience, and we add value with ours.

So perhaps the principles that are ingrained in that particular organisation matters – not to dismiss the whole issue of gender as if to start on a ‘blank slate’ and pretend it does not exist, but to establish values of respect among all members regardless of gender. Perhaps this is where some of my previous organisations lacked – establishing values of not only equality but respect to one another simply as human beings.

So ‘why do we need moustaches to be heard anyway’? I attended a climate action on that, in protest of the Trump victory. This underscores the point on women’s participation – it is not that they represent the women per se, as COP22 is focused on the broader climate change, but they include women’s narrative; to demonstrate that you don’t after all, need a moustache to be heard.

“Why do we need moustaches to be heard?” Campaign

Women are considered ‘vulnerable populations’ as they primarily constitute the majority of the world’s poor and are more likely to have their livelihoods threatened when climate change hits the natural resources they highly depend on. They also face social, economic and political barriers that hinder them from acting as effective coping and adaptation agents and puts them at a disproportionate disadvantage. It is thus important to not only recognise women’s contribution to the informal economy but to include them in the decision-making processes and create gender-sensitive policies to assist them in adapting to climate change.

I fully support feminist movements like these because until gender equality and equity are ingrained in our society and feminist climate actions and there is no longer need for ‘Women and Gender Constituency’ – and until ‘bar jokes’ about feminists go extinct.

Written by Nachatira Thuraichamy
Edited by Choy Moon Moon

References:

1. http://www.wcdrr.org/wcdrr-data/uploads/854/Women_and_Climate_Change_Factsheet_UNWomenWatch.pdf
2. http://kathmandupost.ekantipur.com/news/2016-11-08/women-and-climate-change.html
3. http://www.gender-gap.net/content/gap-update-gender-and-climate-change

Climate (Off) Track

by admin | Nov 25, 2016 | MYD2016

“It’s good if the US talks less and other countries talk more,” said Jesse Bragg, the courageous and bold American from Corporate Accountability International on today’s panel of Climate Track, a daily meeting session conducted by Climate Tracker to keep track on current climate news.

It was a day after the US election and people were still talking about it. Climate Track specifically dedicated a session to update their audiences on the latest findings on the US and climate change.

Andreas Sieber from Climate Tracker kicked off the session by explaining the infographic on What the US Election Mean for COP22. This comprehensive infographic answers basic questions on domestic mitigation, Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), Finance, Can Trump pull out?, Will the UNFCCC still have money?, and Diplomacy.

Jesse pointed out that it should be a mandate in the NGO world to urge the global north to step up and help out financially. We have to step forward without waiting as we do not know what Trump will do.

The session was moderated by Chris Wright from Climate Tracker, who pointed out a couple of reasons on how the US is being unsustainable and still largely dependent on fossil fuels. How could there be a just transition when a working group in Trump’s team, an official in Competitive Enterprise Institute, is funded by fossil fuel associations? Or the Energy Secretary being chiefly interlinked with Continental Resources, which tagline goes “America’s Oil Champion,”? Or even so, guess who’s the Interior Secretary? (Hint: Lucas Oil)

It is an inevitable fact the the US has been leasing an amount of land to oil and some companies want to broaden that and expand further.

“Kick Big Polluters Out” Campaign

At times like these, we have to amplify our voices. Movements like “Kick Big Polluters Out Campaign” is one of the many ways to achieve this.

Written by Jasmin Irisha Jim Ilham
Edited by Choy Moon Moon

Exposure and Opportunities at COP22

by admin | Nov 25, 2016 | MYD2016

(Bab Ighli, 10th November 2016) It’s the fourth day of COP22 and I’m truly treasuring every single moment of it. Attending YOUNGO and CAN meeting, as well as helping out at the Malaysian Pavilion is a daily routine. Having the opportunity to attend G77 and China’s sessions, sitting through the Ad-Hoc Working Group on the Paris Agreement (APA) agenda reporting, Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Paris Agreement (CMA1) informal meetings, and the technical briefing on Nationally Appropriate Mitigation Actions made my day. I regretted not being able to attend the youth session organised by the Secretariat of the UNFCCC on Youth and Future Generations Day. It was definitely a miss. However, MYD2016 managed to meet up with youth from other Asian countries, such as Singapore, Taiwan, the Philippines and China.

The APA and CMA1 informal sessions both in general lack of progress as most of the time, parties are demanding clarification and they’re conservative in proposing means to carry the meeting forward. Nevertheless, the APA informal meetings agenda on mitigation, adaptation communication, transparency of framework and support, global stocktake (GST) and implementation facilitation were accomplished although there was numerous reiteration by parties to avoid doubling the work from SBI and SBSTA. In the GST informal meeting, non-paper tools were provided as a guide for discussion. However, it was not well-received among the developed countries. There were also parties raising concerns over the matter of mandate to discuss the subject prior to the opening of CMA1 on the second week of the conference.

Bolivia as the spokesperson for Like Minded Developing Countries (LMDCs)

Thanks to the opportunity to join the informal meetings, I’ve observed that many countries are represented by not just experienced negotiators, but also young negotiators. Exposure to YOUNGO and meeting up other youth attendees at the conference have also given me the opportunity to be acquainted with many young party delegates. They are trained and equipped with technical knowledge about the climate negotiation. In the long run, this may be an advantage for the countries or blocs that these young negotiators or future negotiators represent when they take over the negotiation responsibility in the future.

The technical briefing of NAMA, together with the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) registry provided by the Secretariat of the UNFCCC gave an overview understanding and it could be accessed via the following web address:

1. NAMA Registry
2. NDC Registry

The day ended swiftly and I really treasure the exposure and opportunities presented at COP22. It was also a day to celebrate as Australia finally announced the ratification of both the Paris Agreement (PA), and the Doha Amendment.

Written by Kelvin Diong
Edited by Choy Moon Moon