Robert Stavins: Why Cancun trumped Copenhagen
Cancun Mexico view from the air via Grist.org
After the modest results of the climate change talks in Copenhagen a little more than a year ago, expectations were low for the follow up negotiations in Cancun last month. Gloom-and-doom predictions dominated.
But a funny thing happened on the way to that much anticipated failure: During two intense weeks of discussions in the Mexican resort that wrapped up at 3 a.m. on Dec. 12, the world’s governments quietly achieved consensus on a set of substantive steps forward. And equally important, the participants showed encouraging signs of learning to navigate through the unproductive squabbling between developed and developing countries that derailed the Copenhagen talks.
Unprecedented first steps
The tangible advances were noteworthy: The Cancun Agreements set emissions mitigation targets for some 80 countries, including all the major economies. That means that the world’s largest emitters, among them China, the United States, the European Union, India, and Brazil, have now signed up for targets and actions to reduce emissions by 2020.
Read more at Grist
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TckTckTck is the public campaign of the Global Campaign for Climate Action. The GCCA is an unprecedented alliance of more than 300 non-profit organizations all over the world. Our shared mission is to mobilize civil society and galvanize public support to ensure a safe climate future for people and nature, to promote the low-carbon transition of our economies, and to accelerate the adaptation efforts in communities already affected by climate change.View Author Profile
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