Nobody doubts the EU's role in the battle against climate change. The EU has been leading the way for many years now and EU institutions and member states are in broad agreement on the issue. As one might expect, the Green movement argues that the EU's position does not go far enough - the specific details of things like burden sharing for the new green policies among member states, remain to be thrashed out. The most recent European Council made progress on this, deciding on guidelines and procedures, and I understand that it is not easy to strike a balance between what is desirable and what is feasible. We have been providing regular and objective reporting on this in our newsletter.
It is generally agreed that any positive outcome at global level in the near future will be largely down to the efforts of the EU. That said, I would like to muse on two areas that I feel give rise to perplexity.
The demographics cannot be denied. The question of demographics is sometimes mentioned in the scientific world or raised in connection with specific issues, but I am not aware of a single word being uttered on the issue in the various official documents. For thousands of years, humanity has viewed Mother Nature as infinite and eternal. We know only too well these days that the natural world is neither infinite nor eternal and it is human beings that have contaminated the air, water and ocean, along with chopping down forests and forcing ever greater numbers of species of plants and animals into extinction. No politicians, however, ever talk about the fact that nothing will halt this destruction of the environment if human beings do not stop reproducing so fast. It is as if there were a political or religious taboo and one should not talk about population control.
Research shows that growing more food in Africa (and elsewhere) will not reduce the risk of starvation because the human population is growing far more quickly than food production. Official documents and programmes never mention this. Some recent research indicates that the demographic explosion will stop in a few decades time and world population will have stabilised by the end of the century. This is quite possible, but in the meantime, the problem is well and truly with us. There are no one-size-fits-all solutions but that does not mean we can blissfully ignore the issue. Growth in world population has to be taken into account, otherwise the debates and research will be pointless and the programmes being planned could well prove useless. Humanity needs to reduce its carbon footprint but cutting carbon emissons will not in itself stop the gradual destruction and extinction of animal and plant-life on planet Earth. This is not a problem facing any one continent in particular, or one race more than another. It is a threat facing humanity as a whole. Population growth among human beings has already had a shocking impact - I will be returning to this in future columns.
Finding the money is only one part of the issue. The second area of perplexity is the way that debate has become dominated by the question of finance. The essential objectives of the future world strategy seem clear - reducing harmful emissions, using clean energy sources, saving energy, safeguarding forests and other natural habitats, protecting plant and animal species from extinction and re-introducing sustainable farming for food. In this connection, far more will be achieved by a change in behaviour than by subsidies as such. Subsidies are crucial if they are used to bring about changes in behaviour. At the moment, however, all the battles are about grabbing more funding for funding's sake and as usual, this is a fierce fight that leaves one with the impression that the main aim of all the stakeholders (potential funding beneficiaries, big international bodies, multinational companies and so on) is to get their hands on as much as they can. This leads to a mushrooming of accusations of waste, fraud (funding often being hived off for military purposes) and other abuse. I will be returning to this in more detail.
Funding is needed for action, of course. Some views and some of the strong criticism of the position the EU is setting out leave one with a bad taste in one's mouth, smacking of a race to grab subsidies, especially because the amounts being fought over are nothing like the funding provided to help in the event of disasters and famine, or general development aid as such. If the EU and its member states stick to their promises on aid, then the extra funding to tackle climate change issues should be earmarked for specific projects, whose achievements can be measured and be subject to precise conditions. The EU is right to demand that the other big global bodies should also contribute their fair share to this.
(F.R./transl.fl)