Ambiente - Salute - Diritti Umani - Nutrizione - Agricoltura

Architect of California's landmark recent bill SB 350 on climate change and renewable energy, to speak about the climate leadership and what California model means for energy access, climate equity and success in Paris.

Senator Kevin de Leon, architect of California’s landmark recent bill SB 350 on climate change and renewable energy, will speak about climate leadership and what the California model means for energy access, climate equity and success in Paris.

California has bet on a low-carbon revolution focused on jobs, prosperity and energy access. Silicon Valley and the US clean tech industry are in the innovation vanguard. What are the lessons for the UK – and from the UK? With COP21 in Paris round the corner, this GLOBE session asks what are the expectations for a Paris Accord and climate action in 2016?

Kevin de León (D-Los Angeles) is the first Latino elected President pro Tempore of the California State Senate in more than 130 years. One of the highest-ranking Latino democrats in the United States, Senator de León has been a trailblazer in the Californian Senate leading the state’s low-carbon energy transformation with Governor Jerry Brown.

Climate change, environmental justice and energy access have been key themes of Senator de León’s presidency, and with his Senate Bill 350 (SB 350) signed into law on 7th October 2015, Senator de León has enacted California’s most far-reaching climate change and clean energy legislation. In the teeth of a record-breaking drought, Senator de Leon brought business, political and community leaders behind a bold and far-sighted plan to address environmental and economic challenges together generating jobs, prosperity and climate security by 2030.

The landmark SB 350 bill will set a 50 percent renewable energy standard for the state’s utilities and doubling of building energy efficiency, both by 2030 – taking the state to meeting its goal of 80% GHG emissions reductions by 2050.

More at: http://focus.senate.ca.gov/climate

Members of the New Zealand Parliament held the inaugural meeting of GLOBE New Zealand and elected Dr. Kennedy Graham MP as a Chairman.

Draft statutes, based on models of other national chapters and adapted to New Zealand circumstances were discussed and adopted.

Kennedy Graham MP described the background and historical development of GLOBE International, from the early 1990s to the present day. He described the published work on national environmental legislation undertaken by GLOBE staff and consultants, which had proved to be informative and useful to parliamentarians and staff.

Hon Phil Goff recalled his cabinet experience as Minister for the Environment in the 1980s, and his engagement on climate issues in the Clark cabinet of the 2000s and more recently as Opposition Leader. He supported the concept of cross-party dialogue as the anchor of national consensus on climate policy.

Tracey Martin MP described the experience she had in a recent visit to Tuvalu, whose livelihood and even survival as a nation is at risk through sea level rise. For effective global and national policy on both mitigation and adaptation, much would depend on better education.

MPs discussed the mission statement of GLOBE (article 4), incorporated in the draft GLOBE New Zealand Statutes, and affirmed that this would be the main objective of GLOBE New Zealand’s work. They then signed the Statutes as founding members, and declared GLOBE New Zealand to be established.

MPs agreed to establish an Executive Committee as required under the draft Statutes and elected Dr Kennedy Graham MP as Chairman.

MPs agreed that the initial focus of GLOBE New Zealand should be on the international negotiations ongoing under the UNFCCC, leading up to and after the COP-21 in Paris. The state of the negotiations, pre- and post-Paris, and their implications for New Zealand, would be a natural focus for MPs. This could include the future peer review process for the INDCs, and the future negotiations over the rules for implementation of the Paris Agreement, including national reporting and accounting.

It was agreed that a Work Plan for 2016 should be drawn up and submitted by the Executive Committee to the second meeting of GLOBE New Zealand.

GLOBE delegates from Colombia, Guatemala and Peru travelled to Santiago de Chile to share their national experiences pushing for climate change legislation at the international seminar hosted by the Faculty of Law of the University of Chile.

GLOBE delegates from Colombia, Guatemala and Peru, including GLOBE Colombia President Alfredo Molina Triana MP and GLOBE Peru President Dr. Daniel Abugattás Majluf MP travelled to Santiago de Chile to share their national experiences pushing for climate change legislation at the international seminar hosted by the Faculty of Law of the University of Chile in the framework of its Climate Week.

At present Chilean legislators, including former Environment Committee President and GLOBE Chile Focal Point Daniel Melo MP, are keen to support the development of a national General Climate Change Act in Chile.

In this context, the seminar was organised by NGOs Adapt-Chile and (CR)2 with the support of the Chilean Environment Ministry and the British Embassy in Chile, in order to analyse the options for climate legislation in Chile alongside delegates from civil society, academia, municipalities, the public sector, business and international bodies. It was implemented under the project “Proposal for a legal and institutional framework to address climate change in Chile».

Former Chilean President Ricardo Lagos delivered the opening speech, in which he emphasized the need to rely on a legal framework on climate change as “the challenge is about the survival of human beings on Earth”. He also shared his views on the latest national contributions tabled ahead of Paris: “China, responsible for 15% of world GHG emissions, announcing the creation of a carbon market for 2016 is a watershed for national commitments on climate change”.

Deputy Environment Secretary Marcelo Mena recalled President Michelle Bachelet's commitment to decouple growth from GHG emissions and achieve a reduction of 30% by 2030, while noting that failure to act would cost the country over 2,5% of its GDP according to the OECD.

Uk Ambassador Fiona Clouder stressed that “the dilemma between tackling climate change and economic growth is a false dilemma”.

Project co-Director Paola Vasconi noted that “tackling climate change implies a shift towards a society and an economy less dependant on fossil fuels and more resilient. This requires the involvement and participation of all sectors and stakeholders, if we want to progress towards the formulation of a Climate Change Act.”

GLOBE International is delighted to congratulate the former vice-president of GLOBE, Rafael Pacchiano Alamán, on his recent appointment as Mexico’s new environment minister by President Enrique Peña Nieto.

Minister Pacchiano is a member of the Ecologist Green Party of Mexico (PVEM) and served in the Mexican Congress from 2009 to 2012 representing Querétaro. He takes over the role of environment minister as the government prepares for two major upcoming international summits: the Sustainable Development Summit in New York later this month and COP21 in Paris in December.

Mexico was the first developing country to adopt comprehensive climate change legislation in 2012 and continued its tradition of climate leadership by becoming the first developing country to publish its post-2020 climate change action plan in March 2015 - the so-called INDC (Intended Nationally-Determined Contribution), which all UNFCCC member states are expected to submit ahead of the UN’s climate talks in Paris in December 2015.

Minister Pacciano becomes the latest member of the GLOBE International network of parliamentarians to be appointed to a cabinet position in their national government.

In 2014, India’s prime minister Narendra Modi appointed GLOBE India president, Prakash Javadekar as his environment minister, GLOBE India's distinguished founder Suresh Prabhu as Cabinet Minister in charge of Railways, and Rajiv Pratap Rudy as Minister of State for Parliamentary Affairs.

In October 2014, Isabella Lövin, the former Vice-President of GLOBE EU (European Parliament) was appointed Sweden’s minister for international development cooperation.

2015 is a watershed year for decision-making on global sustainable development. This is why GLOBE is calling for a new approach: ‘Coherence and Convergence’ between the four UN summits.

With four major UN processes taking place, each of which could lead to four different frameworks for action. It could be a recipe for disaster or a new way of addressing sustainable development in the round. This is why GLOBE is emphasising a new approach: ‘Coherence and Convergence’ between the four UN summits.

As UN-watchers will know, 2015 is a key decision point for four separate international processes: the World Conference on Disaster Risk Reduction (Sendai, March), the Financing for Development Summit (Addis Ababa, July), the post-2015 Sustainable Development Goals (New York, September) and COP21 on climate change (Paris, December). In the words of UNDP Administrator, Helen Clark, 2015 represents a “generational opportunity for change”. Put another way, 2015 is the ‘mother of all years’ for institutional learning on how to manage risk better as a global community.

GLOBE International has developed a unique ‘Coherence & Convergence Approach’ to the 2015 Summits. It distinguishes us from our peers and places the emphasis squarely on the need for improved coordination between these processes, their outcomes and the monitoring and reporting frameworks adopted. The GLOBE approach is strongly aligned with the UN’s Global Development Framework, and seeks to build stepping stones between each Summit in Sendai, Addis, New York and Paris. Only such an approach will ensure that the different legislative frameworks emerging from each of these summits will stand any chance of coherent and effective national implementation from 2016 onwards.
 
As GLOBE’s work has demonstrated over the years, legislative chambers have a key role in driving democratic national debate on risk management and governance. In this most pivotal of all years, legislatures must build cross-party consensus for action and create the political conditions for convergent international agreements to emerge from these four major UN summits. This will increase the chance of effective implementation once adopted.

The challenge, however, is that most legislators are unaware of this unprecedented cycle of four major processes offering a unique opportunity for legislative and policy alignment. At most, legislators may be involved in one or two processes, but on parallel tracks. Work in governments is also typically proceeding on parallel tracks. Fragmentation, not coherence is the norm. Gender is also a cross-cutting dimension in each of these summit processes and the Beijing+20 review process has underscored the need for gender to be fully integrated into institutional and policy response and delivery.

GLOBE has been calling attention to this awareness gap and the need for a strategy of effective education and communication for legislative opinion-formers with partners.

One result is been closer cooperation with GLOBE partners, UNEP and UNISDR (UN Office for Disaster Risk Reduction). We are aligned on the need for coherence and integration among the four major UN conferences, but recognise that this far from a commonly-shared approach. Vested interests may yet prevent the alignment sought. A concerted effort is now required to prevent the 2015 processes degenerating into battles over turf and further cementing of silos.

UNEP is supporting GLOBE’s Coherence & Convergence approach and a joint discussion paper calling for integration of the 2015 processes will be published in October 2015. In an effort to build a dialogue with other parliamentary networks and partners, the paper will be shared with the Inter-Parliamentary Union (IPU), the Association of European Parliamentarians with Africa (AWEPA), and the Commonwealth Parliamentary Association at key meetings in the last quarter of 2015.

National parliamentary and stakeholder dialogues on the key messages ahead of COP21, the concluding process of 2015, will also be facilitated by the GLOBE International secretariat.