The
UNFCCC will convene
at Bali to set the post-Kyoto roadmap in five interrelated meetings:
COP-13, CMP-3,
SBSTA-27, SBI-27,
and Resumed AWG-4.
Overall agenda
An international agreement needs to be found to follow the end of the Kyoto Protocol’s first commitment period, which ends in 2012. In order to avoid a gap between then and the entry into force of a new framework, the aim is to conclude a new deal by 2009 to allow enough time for ratification.
The “Bali roadmap” would establish the process to work on the key building blocks of a future climate change regime, including adaptation, mitigation, technology cooperation and financing the response to climate change. But it would also need to set out the methodology and detailed calendar of work for this process.
A major step forward was taken at the G8 summit in Heiligendamm in June, where the G8 leaders agreed to negotiate a post-2012 deal within the United Nations framework, with the goal to have an agreement in place by 2009. Significantly, this was supported by the Group of 5 countries with emerging economies: China, India, Brazil, Mexico and South Africa.
In September, the United Nations Secretary-General hosted an unprecedented high-level event on climate change in New York, attended by over 80 heads of state or government. This was an expression of the political will of world leaders at the highest level to tackle climate change through concerted action, and they gave a clear call for a breakthrough at the conference in Bali. It was followed by the Major Economies Meeting on Climate Change and Energy Security in Washington on 27 and 28 September, where the United States government clearly voiced its desire to contribute to the UNFCCC process.
The abbreviations refer to:
- Conference of the Parties (COP), Thirteenth session.
- Conference of the Parties serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (CMP), Third session.
- Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA), Twenty-seventh session.
- Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI), Twenty-seventh session.
- Ad Hoc Working Group on Further Commitments for Annex I Parties under the Kyoto Protocol (AWG), Fourth session (resumed from August Vienna session)