Well, things here at the UNFCCC are wrapping up… at least here in Bonn. CAN- International took the opportunity in the last few hours of the negotiations to hold a press conference reflecting on the last two weeks. PJ and I will be wrapping up our own reflections in the next week – we have a pretty big backlog of podcasts and posts to get up and will continue to work on those when we’re back in Canada. It’s been an amazing opportunity to be here, thanks for watching along with us. Keep checking back for those podcasts and other updates.

Anyway, back to the Press Conference…

Bill Hare of Greenpeace International spoke about the big picture – what do the events of the last two weeks mean for the next stages of the Kyoto protocol and what needs to happen for the process to be a success.

Overall, the parties have failed to make any progress any nearly all the agenda items – steps which are vital for the negotiations in Copenhagen in 2009 to be a success. In particular, Annex 1 actions for the next period and new mechanisms to aid participation by developing countries were lacking. Bill Hare warned that unless the pace increases and political roadblocks are removed quickly, there is a major risk of failure.

At every stage there have been low points, but in his fifteen years of experience the agenda has never been bigger while the progress has never been slower at these kind of negotiations in terms of substance.

This delay, he stated, is due to a pattern of unconstructive tactics, the “usual suspects,” Canada, Australia, the US and Japan, are objecting to straight-forward proposals, nitpicking, and generally attempting to slow negotiation and prevent real progress. He called on these countries to put forward constructive proposals that will solve big problems such as bunker fuels and developing country engagement rather than pushing for all old loopholes that were fought against in the creation of the Protocol.

The next speaker was Cynthia of the Nairobi based NGO the African Centre for Technological Development on issues of adaptation. Speaking as a citizen of a developing country, she reiterated that the process has been very slow progress and the we need action now to be ready for the development of the next stage.

In regard to the amount of funding allocated address adaptation needs in developing countries she noted that there have been two positive proposals. Both Norway and Switzerland have put forward concrete proposals for discussion. A disappointment has been that other developed countries haven’t really responded or put forward alternatives. Whatever plan is eventually adopted; it must be ensured that developing countries will be the ones that actually benefit from the adaptation funds.

Li Yan of Greenpeace China spoke about the productive proposals that developing nations have made over the last two weeks. These creative and constructive ideas on how to meet urgent need for mechanisms for tech transfer and investment are examples of the initiative that developed countries need to take. She highlighted Mexico’s ideas regarding a world climate change fund and Brazil’s ideas for tech transfer.

Catherine Gutman of WWF International closed the opening statements with a call for more leadership and political attention. She warned that it can’t be left to bureaucrats to work through these difficult decisions. There were very good ideas in week one, but week 2 lost momentum and ambition. In particular, the European Union’s participation was insufficient. The EU has an opportunity to build a positive dynamic with developing countries and send a strong political signal.

Media presence was up for this press conference and included all the major news wires. Maybe the most interesting thing about their questions is what they reflect about what the media see as being of interest to their readers. Notably, they asked about possible alternative processes to include the more reluctant parties to the process… The G8 summit will be taking place in Japan this July and is merged with discussion of the Major Emitters Meetings (MEM, such an innocuous acronym for such as insidious idea), reporters inquired whether the ENGOs were optimistic about the outcome of the meetings and whether they could form an alternative process to engage the major emitters…. And the answers were “no” and “no”.

For all its flaws, the UNFCCC process gets the major emitters and the “victim states” at the table together. Without the constant reminder that failure to take action on climate change will result in the loss of some countries and devastating impacts for others, targets for major emitters would likely be less ambitious and therefore less effective. Winston Churchill has been quoted as saying that “… democracy is the worst form of government except all the others that have been tried”. As with democracy, this may be a flawed process, but the best we’ve got. Equally, it is also up to participating countries and their citizens (that’s you), to guide the process to a positive outcome.