POZNAN, Poland, December 5, 2008 (ENS) – For the first time, a solar-powered car has traveled around the world, arriving at the UN climate conference in Poznan Thursday with the United Nations’ top climate official Yvo de Boer onboard for the last few meters to mark the historic moment.

The solar taxi pulls up in front of the
Poznan conference hall. December 4, 2008
(Photo courtesy Louis Palmer)

Owner and driver Louis Palmer, a Swiss schoolteacher, will keep his “solar taxi” at the conference until it closes on December 12, offering rides to delegates, ministers and the press, before he heads back to Switzerland.

The solar taxi has been on the road for almost 18 months and has covered around 54,000 kilometers (33,550 miles) through 38 countries to claim a world record. Palmer undertook the trip to demonstrate that clean technologies are available now to curb global warming.

Inside the conference hall, countries, UN agencies and nongovernmental organizations are making commitments and launching publications in an effort to limit climate change.

Earlier this week, Brazil set an ambitious target of reducing its deforestation rate by 70 percent over the next 10 years. Brazil is the world’s fourth largest emitter of global warming pollution, and about 80 percent of Brazil’s global warming emissions come from clearing of the Amazon rainforest and the Atlantic coastal forest.

At Poznan today, the World Resources Institute and the Environmental Investigation Agency launched a partnership to combat illegal logging worldwide and clean up timber supply chains. These efforts are intended to limit climate change, which is linked to deforestation because trees absorb the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide.

The partnership focuses on a 100 year old U.S. wildlife trafficking law known as the Lacey Act, which was just amended to include plant products, including timber and wood.

“The Lacey Act, if enforced, has the potential to send a powerful signal around the world that the U.S. is serious about curtailing illegal logging. Increasingly, illegal logging and deforestation contribute to climate change,” said Jonathan Lash, president of World Resources Institute, a Washington, DC based research and advocacy organization.

Said Alexander von Bismarck, executive director at Environmental Investigation Agency, based in Washington and London, “The bill marks the first time that a major consuming country has made the trade in illegally logged wood a crime. It provides a precedent-setting tool to change the face of a $1 trillion industry, reduce deforestation, and improve forestry governance.”

A side event organized by Friends of the
Earth presents a critical analysis of REDD:
international finance, human rights and
false promises of carbon markets. (Photo
courtesy Earth Negotiations Bulletin)

December 6 is the official Forest Day for delegates at the UN climate conference, where both organizations will be holding events to explain the links between deforestation and climate change.

Close to 20 percent of greenhouse gas emissions are a result of deforestation, climate experts calculate. At Poznan, negotiators are seeking to advance plans to fund a mechanism called Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation, REDD, as part of the post-2012 climate deal that is the object of this UN conference.

Today at Poznan, the UN Environment Programme, UNEP, released the first atlas with maps pinpointing overlaps of high carbon emissions and high biodiversity.

The research gives preliminary indications of where investments to cut emissions from deforestation can aid in combating climate change and also help the conservation of biodiversity, from amphibians and birds to primates.

UNEP Executive Director Achim Steiner said, “At a time of scarce financial resources and economic concerns, every dollar, Euro or rupee needs to deliver double, even triple dividends. Intelligent investment in forests is a key example where climate benefits and ecosystem benefits can be achieved in one transaction.”

Steiner said a successful REDD mechanism must ensure that local and indigenous people can benefit.

The Great Apes Survival Partnership is set to launch pilot activities to test the potential of achieving these “multiple benefits” from REDD in Central Africa and Southeast Asia, said Steiner.

Experts are examining how investments in conserving carbon-absorbing forests on the Nigeria-Cameroon border may also conserve the habitat of the critically endangered Cross River gorilla. Only 250-300 animals remain.

Delegates at Poznan (Photo courtesy ENB)

And in Indonesia, national and local authorities, communities and the oil palm sector will be engaged to reduce emissions that result from clearing the carbon-rich peat-swamp forest, where endangered orangutans cling to survival.

Electronic copies of the atlas are online at www.unep.org/pdf/carbon_biodiversity.pdf and at www.unep-wcmc.org. A more detailed atlas is expected in 2009 ahead of the UN climate meeting in December in Copenhagen where the final post-Kyoto climate agreement is expected to be finalized.

Agreement on a post-Kyoto climate regime will require the support of the business community, which issued encouraging signals today.

Environment Business Australia issued a statement saying that the organization believes cuts in greenhouse gas emissions of 40 percent against today’s baseline are possible. “We would support the Government beginning with a soft start of 25 percent cuts by 2020 but anything below that would be squelchy rather than soft,” said the business group.

“Without immediate and meaningful action to tackle climate change, the biggest economic and security threat that has ever faced humanity will likely evolve to irreversible levels,” said Environment Business Australia.

Not all is serious at Poznan. Delegates bring
a smile to the face of UNFCC chief Yvo
de Boer, right. (Photo courtesy ENB)

EBA suggests commercially viable approaches that will help build new markets, new industry sectors and new employment such as, “Increasing energy efficiency across all sectors of the economy; scaling up sources of renewable energy to supply baseload energy – potentially making Australia a regional hub by 2030 for minerals processing and manufacturing fueled by mega-clean energy parks; making buildings and cities carbon neutral; improving public transport and taking car tailpipes off the road with electric or hydrogen vehicles; recycling materials.”

Yet, despite encouraging signals, there are also obstacles to progress at Poznan – most related to the global financial crisis.

Friends of the Earth International Climate and Energy Campaigner Stephanie Long said industrialized countries are “dodging the issue of funding poorer countries’ adaptation to climate change.”

“Poorer countries face an increase in storms, floods, famines and droughts due to climate change, yet the pot of money that rich countries have put aside to deal with this is almost empty,” she said.

“The Adaptation Fund was finally agreed and established one year ago. Yet to date, developed countries have pledged less than US $300 million to it, a tiny fraction of the US $86 billion the UN says is needed,” said Long.

At the same time that funds are drying up, the situation of small island states is becoming desperate. At least six Caribbean islands – Haiti, Dominican Republic, Dominica, Jamaica, Martinique and Saint Lucia – were on Thursday ranked in the top 40 countries experiencing extreme weather impacts by the 2009 Germanwatch Global Climate Risk Index.

Germanwatch is an independent nongovernmental organization that monitors trade, environment and the relationship between developed and developing countries.

Delegates at Poznan (Photo courtesy ENB)

According to Germanwatch climate modeler Stefan Rahmstorff, Caribbean countries needed to push industrialized countries to address their emissions as the small islands would face the effects of inaction.

“Fundamentally, small countries which don’t contribute to the problem should press those developed countries to help them with their adaptation measures. Those causing the emissions should be the ones that help to deal with issues,” he said after presenting a paper on the effects of rising sea levels due to climate change recorded since 2007.

This week in Poznan, delegates continued their discussions to develop a shared vision of a future climate change agreement. Finding adequate financial resources, technology transfer, and prioritizing adaptation wer emphasized.

South Africa, speaking for the African Group of countries, said a shared vision should address all elements of the Bali Action Plan reached at last year’s UN climate conference in Indonesia.

The European Union said a shared vision requires efforts by all parties. The United States said a shared vision should be optimistic, pragmatic and reflect evolving scientific and economic realities.

The Philippines, speaking for the G-77/China Group, said a shared vision must meet all the commitments that parties have agreed to under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.
Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk, left, and UNFCCC Executive

Secretary Yvo de Boer at Poznan
(Photo courtesy ENB)

Representatives of the Climate Action Network, a worldwide network of 430 nongovernmental organizations, told Poznan delegates that global emissions must peak and begin declining within 10 years to avoid the worst effects of global warming.

Close to 11,000 participants, including government delegates from 186 Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and representatives from business and industry, environmental organizations and research institutions, are attending the two-week gathering.

Opening the meeting on Monday, Polish Prime Minister Donald Tusk pointed to the urgent need for progress at Poznan. “Scientists share the view that warming in excess of two degrees Celsius will result in irreversible changes to nearly all ecosystems and the human communities,” he said.

“We shoulder the responsibility to prevent changes that could lastingly disturb the symbiosis between humankind and nature.”

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VIENNA, Austria, October 14, 2008 (ENS) – Organized environmental crime is a serious and growing threat across the world, according to a new report by the undercover Environmental Investigation Agency. The London-based NGO today presented its report to a United Nations meeting on transborder organized crime in Vienna with an urgent call for action.

The report warns that environmental crime generates tens of billions of dollars in profits for criminal enterprises every year, and it is growing.

EIA campaigns director Julian Newman said, “Our report shows how organized criminals are looting the planet for a quick profit. It is time for the international community to step up and meet this threat head on.”

An investigator examines a leopard
skin in Nagchu, Tibet Autonomous Region,
China, August 2005. (Photo by Debbie
Banks courtesy EIA)

Environmental crimes are illegal acts which directly harm the environment, and include the illegal trade in wildlife, smuggling of ozone-depleting and global-warming substances, illicit trade in hazardous waste, illegal fishing, illegal logging and the associated trade in stolen timber.

EIA, which has exposed environmental crime using undercover methods for 24 years, says its recent experience indicates environmental criminals are becoming more organized, building up networks to operate across international frontiers and using sophisticated techniques to move illegal goods around the world and launder the proceeds.

The report, “Environmental crime – A Threat to Our Future” was presented to the fourth session of the UN Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime, UNCTOC, at an event organized by EIA.

Antonio Mario Costa, executive director of the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, spoke at the launch of EIA’s report.

“At a time when climate change and environmental sustainability are such high priorities, it is shocking to think that there are criminals profiting from the destruction of our planet. This is not a victimless crime. On the contrary. Since we share one planet, damage to the environment anywhere in the world hurts us all,” said Costa.

Environmental crime is often perceived as victimless, yet in reality all of us are affected, EIA says. These crimes lead to deforestation and habitat destruction, depriving communities of their livelihoods; cause ecological problems such as flooding; foster corruption and bad governance; and contribute to climate change, and at the same time generate tens of billions of dollars in profits for criminal enterprises.

Addressing delegates to the UNCTOC conference today, Costa linked organized crime with many forms of environmental destruction.

“At a time of great concern about climate change,” he said, “let’s recognize that organized crime is an environmental threat, from mafia control of garbage disposal and the dumping of hazardous waste, to the destruction of primary forests, illegal logging and the trafficking of endangered species.”

“Above all organized crime is also an economic issue,” Costa said, “it exploits resources like blood diamonds, precious metals, or by bunkering oil. Piracy and banditry disrupt trade and prevent aid delivery.”

Most of all, organized crime is a development issue, said Costa, citing reports on corruption in Africa, the Caribbean, Central America and the Balkans, that show “a correlation, even causality, between weak rule of law and weak economic performance.”

Saying that the UN system needs to train more skilled people to fight corruption, Costa and Interpol chief Ron Noble today announced the joint establishment of the International Anti-Corruption Academy.

The new academy will open next autumn in Laxenburg just outside Vienna, specializing in anti-corruption education, research, and professional training.

Indonesian customs officers inspect a seizure of
smuggled cylinders of ozone-destroying
CFCs produced in China. Tanjung Priok
port, Jakarta, Indonesia, 2004. (Photo
by Julian Newman courtesy EIA)

The EIA hopes it will make a difference in combating organized environmental crime, which is often linked with corruption.

The EIA report states, “Individuals in corporate or official positions of authority and power view environmental crime as a chance to cash in.”

Examples of this can be found in the case studies of the EIA report, “signing and forging import and export certificates; facilitating the transport of illicit goods and ‘turning a blind eye’ are all examples of the institutionalized corruption described.”

“Far more serious, and yet just as common,” says the EIA report, “is the complicit, longterm involvement of individuals from the police, army, government and intergovernmental organisations. Cocooned by familiar bureaucracies, weak legislation and poor enforcement, corrupt officials can thrive through environmental crime. Furthermore, corruption may be preventing the true cost and extent of environmental crime from being properly assessed or effectively addressed.”

Although many international bodies such as the UN General Assembly, the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime and the World Customs Organization have recognized environmental crime as serious and transnational, EIA believes it is not taken as seriously as other forms of organized crime because countries lack the political will to provide the resources to carry out enforcement.

The EIA is urging governments, police forces, customs and United Nations agencies to recognize environmental crime as a serious time-critical problem, and work together to mount a “substantial, committed and sustained global response.”

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BRUSSELS, Belgium, September 24, 2008 (ENS) – In advance of the Europe-India summit in Marseille next Monday, the European Parliament today passed a resolution calling on both parties to renew efforts to save the wild tiger, and to place the issue on the summit agenda.

The resolution calls on both Europe and India to redouble efforts to tackle the organized gangs behind the trafficking of tiger parts, and to work together to protect forest habitats.

In June, the government of India established a dedicated agency for tackling wildlife crime, the Indian Wildlife Crime Control Bureau.

Wild tiger in Ranthambhore National Park,
India (Photo by Anup Jindal)

The parliamentary resolution, “Welcomes the foundation of the Indian Wildlife Crime Control Bureau, while remaining deeply concerned about the plight of the wild tiger, and calls on India to protect tigers from habitat loss and trafficking by transnational criminal networks.”

Baroness Sarah Ludford, Liberal Democrat Member of the European Parliament for London, who has campaigned on the issue, said, “By setting up the Wildlife Crime Control Bureau, India has taken an important step towards improving enforcement and tackling the networks behind illegal tiger trade.”

“By raising this issue we are calling for the European Union to offer technical and financial assistance, and to ensure that the issue gets maximum political support,” said Ludford.

The resolution calls for specific EU assistance for this conservation effort in the form of technical expertise, financial support and the reinforcement of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species, an international treaty that lists all subspecies of tigers as endangered and prohibits trade in live tigers or their parts.

Currently, there may be as few as 2,500 tigers left in the wild, of which just over half are in India, says the Environmental Investigation Agency, a nonprofit group based in London, UK and Washington, DC, which works to combat environmental crime.

Wild tigers in Karnataka, India
(Photo by Paul Mannix)

These few thousand tigers are the only ones left from the 100,000 wild tigers that are estimated to have lived at the beginning of the 20th century, according to the IUCN’s Cat Specialist Group.

These remaining tigers are threatened by demand for their skins and body parts from China and East Asia, and habitat loss due to forest clearance and illegal industrial development.

Currently the main demand for tiger products comes from China, where bones and body parts are used in medicine; while skins are used for home décor, clothing and non-financial bribes.

Recent undercover work by the Environmental Investigation Agency, found whole tiger skins on sale in China for RMB 100,000 (US$15,000).

Despite widespread evidence of the serious and organized nature of wildlife and environmental crime, enforcement efforts in many parts of the world remain inadequate.

Still, conservationists are optimistic, pointing out that if the right measures are taken tigers can recover rapidly.

Alasdair Cameron of the Environmental Investigation Agency said, “Protecting the tiger is not just about protecting a species, but about protecting the forests it lives in and the ecosystems which depend on it.

“In many cases we know what we need to do, but it requires political will,” said Cameron. “India has taken the lead in developing a 21st century approach to wildlife crime, we need other countries like China to do the same.”

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