Tom Youngman

UKYCC Blog: What the FCCC!? Annex-tra thing to remember

Rather less exciting than my last publication, this time it’s a little piece explaining what the phrases ‘Annex 1’, ‘Annex 2’ and ‘Non-Annex 1’ mean when mentioned (as they often are) at UN climate change negotiations. Covers more interesting issue than it sounds like from that - historic emissions and responsibility for climate change, trade-offs between carbon cuts and development and the changing role of ‘BRIC’ nations such as India and China.

Extract:

One of the trickiest areas of climate change negotiation in the United Nations is differentiating between ‘developed’ and ‘less developed’ countries. The ‘historic emissions‘ of greenhouse gases by countries such as the UK, USA and Germany allowed them to reach the high level of development and wealth that they now enjoy. Less developed countries are unsurprisingly reluctant to pass up opportunities for development and improvements in well-being in the name of carbon emission reduction, especially when the historic emitters are still the largest per person polluters.

The UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) made sure this was accounted for when it came into force in 1994, dividing countries into two sections: Annex I and Annex II. The Annexes divide countries into groups based on how responsible they are for climate change and how able they are to reduce global emissions. The forty Annex I countries are ‘developed’ economies and economies ‘in transition’; Annex II is a subgroup made up of twenty-three developed economies.

…

Click here to read the full article.