EURO-LATIN AMERICAN PARLIAMENTARY ASSEMBLY

EURO-LATIN AMERICAN PARLIAMTARY ASSEMBLY RESOLUTION: Tackling climate change challenges together: for an EU-LAC coordinated strategy in the framework of the UNFCCC negotiations based on the Resolution of the Committee on Social Affairs, Human Exchanges, Environment, Education and Culture EP Co-rapporteur: LAC Co-rapporteur: Peter Liese (PPE) Carlos Baraibar (Parlatino) Saturday, 15 May 2010 Seville (Spain) AT\000000.doc AP100.539v03-00

EUROLAT Resolution of 15 May 2010 Seville (Spain) [based on the report of the Committee on Social Affairs, Human Exchanges, Environment, Education and Culture] Tackling climate change challenges together: for an EU-LAC coordinated strategy in the framework of the UNFCCC negotiations The Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly, having regard to the declarations made at the five summits of Heads of State and Government of Latin America, the Caribbean and the European Union, held respectively in Río de Janeiro (28-29 June 1999), Madrid (17-18 May 2002), Guadalajara (28-29 May 2004), Vienna (11-13 May 2006) and Lima (15-17 May 2008), having regard to the European Parliament resolution on climate change of 14 February 2007, having regard to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC, 1992) and its Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change (11 December 1997), having regard to the fifteenth Conference of the Parties (COP 15) to the UNFCCC and the fifth Conference of the Parties serving as the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (COP/MOP 5) held in Copenhagen, Denmark, from 7 to 18 December 2009 and to the Copenhagen Accord, having regard to the Thirteenth Conference of the Parties (COP 13) in the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and the Third Conference of the Parties or Meeting of the Parties of the Kyoto Protocol (COP/MOP 3), held in Bali, Indonesia, from 3 to 15 December 2007, having regard to the conclusions of the Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), published in Valencia, Spain, on 17 November 2007, and other studies commissioned by national governments or conducted by other United Nations bodies, having regard to the EU Climate and Energy Package approved by the European Parliament and the Council in December 2008, having regard to Article 16 of its Rules of Procedure, A. whereas the final result of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change does not lay the stabilisation of greenhouse gas concentration in the atmosphere at a level that would prevent the entire ecosystem from being at risk, B. whereas, according to World Bank estimates, developing countries are going to suffer 80% of the impact of climate change, even though they are only responsible for 30% of CO2 emissions; whereas emissions from all Latin American countries combined scarcely exceed 5%, as indicated at the last meeting of the Forum for East Asia-Latin America Cooperation (FEALAC), C. whereas according to an independent study, climate change already currently causes more than 300, 000 deaths every year; whereas developing countries account for nearly 99 % of these deaths and 98 % of the people seriously affected; whereas 90 % of economic losses due to climate change are suffered by developing countries, 1 1 Human Impact Report: Climate Change The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis (Published by the Global Humanitarian Forum Geneva 2009) AP100.539v03-00 2/8 AT\000000.doc

D. whereas the mitigation and adaptation efforts are of vital importance; whereas the industrialised countries have a historical responsibility for climate change; whereas the developing countries have contributed least to climate change yet are most affected by it; whereas the developing countries do not have sufficient funds available to combat climate change, E. whereas some Latin American countries such as Honduras and Peru have been ranked among the three most vulnerable countries to climate change in the world, along with Bangladesh and taking into account the notable impact of the processes of desertification and deforestation and the increase in phenomena such as cyclones and species extinction that affect Latin America to a large extent, as well as concrete, alarming and highly significant examples of the global threat posed by climate change, such as the state of the Amazon rainforest and the risk posed by Bolivia s glaciers, F. whereas the Copenhagen Accord is not ambitious enough to tackle the climate problem and the only formal outcome of the Copenhagen Climate Conference was to continue the process and try to find an agreement in Mexico in December 2010, G. whereas the United Nations World Food Programme has highlighted that, in Latin America, climate change is expected to further increase: the process of desertification; the frequency of droughts; the retreat of glaciers; and the intensity of tropical cyclones. These effects of climate change will have serious implications for agriculture, food security, water supply, public health, property, lives and ecosystems, H. whereas deforestation produces as much as 20% of global greenhouse gas emissions, and stemming deforestation has been identified as one of the most cost-effective ways of reducing these emissions, 1. Underlines that climate change mitigation is one of the most relevant issues, if not the most important one, for mankind and that it is crucial for the present and the future of the planet, the natural world and humankind to achieve substantial results in ongoing international negotiations; 2. Regrets that the Copenhagen Summit did not lead to the desired agreements to prevent dangerous climate change, leaving the international public feeling disappointed after it had had high expectations of the results that would be achieved at COP15; 3. Readily supports any forum or initiative for dialogue organised at international level but, taking into account the fact that climate change is a global problem, reiterates its belief that the United Nations should be at the centre of negotiations, decision-making and binding agreements at international level; 4. Urges the international community to reinforce the efforts to come to an effective binding agreement by December 2010 in Mexico; 5. Considers that it is also necessary to work on adapting to the now inevitable effects of climate change, notably in the most vulnerable areas such as coastal and mountainous areas, islands and archipelagos, and areas suffering from drought and water shortages; 6. Believes that the EU-LAC Bi-regional Strategic Partnership and all its members must make the mitigation of climate change, its causes and the growing vulnerability of countries such as those in Central America a top priority in their bi-regional political agenda to prevent the escalation of the current major climate catastrophe; 7. Considers that national and regional parliamentarians must be involved in the process; believes that Euro-Latin American Parliamentary Assembly (Euro-Lat) members must AT\000000.doc 3/8 AP100.539v03-00

commit themselves to concentrating their efforts on a successful outcome of the international negotiations with a view to achieving a binding international agreement in the general interest of the people, as well as encouraging public policy-making to promote the Clean Development Mechanism and adaptation to climate change impacts and, if necessary, legislating; 8. Emphasises that solutions lie in investment in energy efficiency and renewable energy, stemming of deforestation, a change in human behaviour towards a more sustainable productive and consumption model, political commitment and international solidarity in order to reduce per capita emissions. Theories like Malthusianism or Neo-Malthusianism, which suggest that the main problem is population growth, should not dominate the debate; 9. Believes that international agreements on climate policy will foster the stability and certainty which investors need to commit funds to a low carbon economy, and that increased cooperation and formal commitments between countries and regions can therefore facilitate global investment in clean energy, green jobs and a green economy; 10. Stresses that the financial and economic crisis should not be used as an excuse for failing to take action to mitigate climate change, since non-action and the failure of international negotiation would lead to a much more intensive and long-lasting crisis - not only economic. Believes, on the contrary, that the economic crises should be used as a challenge to invest in energy efficiency, renewable-energy, the protection of tropical forests and other global carbon sinks, and modern technology and so create jobs and sustainable growth, enhance competitiveness and reduce greenhouse gas emissions; 11. Emphasizes that especially poor countries and poor parts of the population are vulnerable to climate change and therefore the fight against poverty and the fight against climate change should not be seen as a contradiction; 12. Highlights that the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has estimated that emissions should decline before 2015 and be further reduced to less than 50-85% of today s emissions by 2050 1 ; 13. Stresses that the IPCC concluded that emissions from industrialised countries must be reduced by 25-40% by 2020 compared to 1990 levels, and by 80-95% by 2050, whilst there must be a substantial deviation from baseline in Latin America, Middle East and Centrally Planned Asia 2 ; in this regard, it is necessary for all countries to adopt mitigation programmes in line with UN proposals. Emission reductions should be subject to verification and monitoring in order to assess the implementation of mitigation programmes and their effect on overall emissions; 14. Underlines that the 2020 target is of crucial importance because if emissions increase too much climate 'tipping points' could be reached so that future generations would not be able to control climate change no matter how hard they try; 15. Welcomes the tremendous efforts made by some Latin American countries in the fight against climate change. In particular, welcomes the example set by Costa Rica's commitment to cut drastically CO2 emissions in order to become carbon neutral by 2021, the example set by Mexico reducing greenhouse gas emissions to 50% below 2002 levels by 2050 and it has a target for 2012, reduce emissions by 50 million tonnes a year between now 1 Contribution of Working Group III to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) 2 Ibid AP100.539v03-00 4/8 AT\000000.doc

and 2012 as well as the efforts made by Brazil to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 39 percent compared to business as usual; 16. Welcomes the efforts of some other developing and emerging countries, especially the commitment of the Maldives to become carbon-neutral already in 2019; 17. Stresses that the EU Climate and Energy Package, which includes the option to go for 30% reduction target compared to 1990 if other industrialized countries make comparable efforts, and emerging countries take a responsibility which is different from Annex-I countries, is still one of the most ambitious proposals by industrialised countries; but also welcomes commitments from Norway to reach a 30 to 40 % reduction and Japan to reach a 25% reduction; 18. Invites other parties under UNFCCC, and especially the United States, India, China and Russia, to follow the examples of Costa Rica, Mexico, Brazil, the Maldives, the EU, Norway and Japan; 19. Regrets that the commitments made by the US and China are far from being sufficient, and that they therefore did not contribute effectively to the success of the Copenhagen Conference; 20. Underlines that the US emits 20% of the world's emissions with only 4% of the world's population and that even plans that are presented in the Congress are not changing this figure significantly in the short term; underlines that China is the world largest emitter and the per capita emissions are already much bigger than those of most Latin American countries and other developing and emerging countries and China's commitment falls short compared to the commitment of other emerging countries and even some developing countries; 21. Urges the Parties to overcome disputes in other policy areas and confrontations between Annex-I and non-annex-i countries, and to form new alliances of climate friendly countries; 22. Stresses that even though an agreement on climate change mitigation is the most important and most challenging task, the international agreement must include the appropriate transfer of financial and technological resources from industrialized and emerging countries, especially to LDCs and small-island states for mitigation and adaptation efforts; 23. Welcomes therefore the concrete proposals made by Mexico, Norway, Denmark and the European Commission to generate the necessary funding; and welcomes the significant but not sufficient progress achieved in Copenhagen with the creation of the "Copenhagen Green Climate Fund"; 24. Expresses its moderate satisfaction with the agreement reached in Copenhagen to allocate 30 billion dollars for the period 2010-2012 to mitigation and adaptation measures in developing countries and understands that this is merely a first step in the commitment to reach 100 billion dollars by 2020. Requests, in any event, immediate clarification of how this funding will be split between the donors and how it will be divided up between the beneficiary countries; 25. Stresses that both international aviation and shipping must be part of the international agreement under UNFCCC. The agreement should include the same binding reduction targets as for industrialized countries and a substantial amount of the allowances should be distributed by auction, and that a substantial part of the income from the auction is earmarked in advance to emission reduction measures and adaptation measures in less developed countries, a measure that would apply the polluter pays principle, thus generating additional funds for climate change mitigation and adaptation, especially in AT\000000.doc 5/8 AP100.539v03-00

LDCs and small-island states; deeply regrets that there was no progress on this issue in Copenhagen and urges the international community to reinforce efforts to get a successful outcome that leads to significant reductions in emissions from aviation and shipping in Mexico; 26. Undertakes to urge the authorities attending the First LA-EU Civil Aviation Summit, to be held in Rio de Janeiro on 25-26 May 2010, to intensify civil aviation cooperation between Latin America and the EU, create the conditions required to facilitate civil aviation trade between Mexico and the EU, especially where air navigation is concerned, and promote safer, efficient, and sustainable transport; 27. Recommends that the distribution of the financial resources under UNFCCC should benefit from the existing principles and guidance in development cooperation, such as good governance. In particular, democratic scrutiny over financial transfers is of crucial importance, and welcomes the progress made in this respect in Copenhagen; stresses nevertheless that financing related to climate change mitigation and adaptation in developing countries should be additional funding and should not come from existing development budgets, which will require the international community to develop innovative funding mechanisms; 28. Points out that the exploitation and wide use of renewable energy sources, such as solar, wind, and geothermal energy, are a major alternative means of meeting energy demand and mitigating the effects of climate change, and therefore recommends that resources, scientific cooperation and technology, public policy-making and policy implementation, and incentives to private investment be brought to bear, along with every type of measure enabling renewables to feature much more prominently in the make-up of the Euro-Latin American and Caribbean energy pattern; 29. Notes the proposal of the government of Ecuador on the Yasuni project and asks all relevant parties to further examine the best way of supporting it, respecting the principles mentioned above; 30. Emphasises the crucial importance of preventing further deforestation of tropical forests. Support must be afforded to Latin American countries through programmes and mechanisms which channel funds to protect tropical forests, such as the United Nations REDD programme. Options for investing in forests should be fully explored and implemented as appropriate, as should effective systems for monitoring levels of deforestation; 31. Believes that a crucial part of the international agreement should be to stop deforestation globally by 2020 and to stop the illegal logging of wood, through immediate measures to combat illegal logging and illegal trading of wood. In this regard, the Euro-Latin American Assembly suggests to all its components that they adopt and apply measures similar to those introduced by the EU on a total ban on imports of illegal wood from third countries; as well as to implement, in conjunction with the governments and indigenous communities of the Americas and European farmers, reforestation plans for indigenous species; 32. Highlights the importance of linking the different emission trading systems at global level within the framework of the global emission rights market under the auspices of the UN; recognizes that condition for this is that the schemes have binding emission caps for significant sectors of the economy which are consistent with the necessary reductions to achieve the 2 objective, which means a domestic reduction of 25-40 % of the emissions from the 1990 level by 2020 from the industrialized countries and a reduction of 15-30% compared to business as usual from emerging countries, have reliable monitoring, reporting AP100.539v03-00 6/8 AT\000000.doc

and verification rules; insists that flexible mechanisms must be limited; asks for the members of the EU-LAC Countries to make proposals for applying voting rules in the UNFCCC/ KP framework based on significant majorities regarding several criteria, if appropriate, to enable speedier progress in the negotiations for a binding international climate agreement which is in line with scientific recommendations regarding emissions reductions needed to maintain climate change to 2 compared to pre-industrialised level; 33. In this respect calls for the EU-LAC Bi-regional Strategic Partnership to serve as a framework for negotiations leading to an integrated global carbon market for emission trading. An important step should be the establishment of an EU-Latin American Emission Trading Scheme - if possible including the United States of America; 34. Calls from a clear commitment from the states to reduce emissions from various sectors such as agriculture and stockbreeding, transport, as well as emissions from construction, small-scale industry, etc.; 35. Insists that the continued development of renewable energy sources in Latin America should be supported by the highest possible levels of knowledge sharing and technology transfer from other countries; 36. Underlines that biofuels can make an important contribution to the transfer to a low carbon economy, but good management of biofuel crops is vital to prevent deforestation and adverse effects on food security and biodiversity. A sustainable approach to the production of biofuels is essential. The rights of indigenous peoples should be fully respected when affecting land use change relating to the production of biofuels; it must be underlined that 80% of strategic ecosystems are located in indigenous territories, for example in the Amazon, in the Andes or at the coast; stresses that effects on food supply should be carefully examined to avoid that problems of scarcity of food would be worsened; underlines that biofuel production in a lot of Latin American countries already respects these principles; 37. Proposes that the EU-LAC Bi-regional Strategic Partnership should work to create mutual standards for biofuel production as well as the quality certificate for the product, defining and agreeing on the mechanism and the institution responsible for issuing the certificate. Joint ventures between European Import and Latin American and Caribbean Export should be encouraged. Governments should be supported in the foundation of sustainable biofuel policies and priority should be given to the principles mentioned above; 38. Recommends that the EU-LAC Bi-regional Strategic Partnership should work for the process of harmonising all other multilateral and bilateral agreements with the most ambitious requirements in terms of the reduction in greenhouse gas emissions; 39. Calls on the parties to the Partnership to participate willingly in the meetings to prepare for COP16 in Mexico so that a global, binding agreement to combat climate change can at last be reached; 40. In view of the COP 16 in Mexico City, urges all parties to work on the basis of the Copenhagen Accord and the commitments to emission reductions already made by the European Union in order to reach an ambitious and legally binding agreement that meets the 2 degree target; 41. Underlines the need to begin the work and negotiations immediately so that the next Conference on Climate Change, to be held in Mexico at the end of 2010, can produce concrete agreements that lead to the signature of a new instrument that reflects the needs of all; AT\000000.doc 7/8 AP100.539v03-00

* * * 42. Instructs its Co-Presidents to forward this resolution to the Council of the European Union and the European Commission, and to the parliaments of the Member States of the European Union and all the countries of Latin America and the Caribbean, the Latin American Parliament, the Central American Parliament, the Andean Parliament and the Mercosur Parliament, the Secretariat of the Central American Integration System, Caricom, the Secretariat of the Andean Community, the Committee of Permanent Representatives of Mercosur and the Permanent Secretariat of the Latin American Economic System, the United Nations Secretary-General and the UNFCCC Secretariat. AP100.539v03-00 8/8 AT\000000.doc