Bali

NUSA DUA, BALI -- Expect humidity with increased carbon emissions might as well be the weather forecast yesterday when the United Nations Climate Change Conference opened in the posh Nusa Dua tourist enclave in Bali, Indonesia.

Expect heavy traffic and loads of contradictions might have been an advisory as well.

More than 10,000 people from 190 countries, including five heads of states, environment ministers, industry lobbyists, and civil society and environmental campaigners are taking part in the event, which seeks to create a new treaty to replace the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol.

I was stuck in traffic on my way to Nusa Dua yesterday morning and almost came in late for the conference opening and the 9:00 am media stunts to take place in front of the Bali Convention Center where the conference is being held. I arrived two minutes after nine, nervous and pleased at the same time because I thought I would be stuck on the road forever, inside a Blue Bird, the local cab, the fare for which costs an arm and a leg.

Riding a bicycle to the site makes sense – in fact, hundreds of bikes are being provided by the UNFCCC for the delegates for free. By biking, one can get past the traffic jam caused by the huge SUVs carrying government officials and all sorts of posh delegates who, to be sure, will not be taking part in the parallel Civil Society Forum activities. But one can also get serious sunburn from riding exposed to the sun in hot Bali weather. One can get sick as well from the pollution caused by the increased number of fossil fuel-guzzling automobiles on the streets, which have added to the already high number of motorcycles, the locals' main mode of transport, -- which adds up to the greenhouse gas emissions and environmental stress.

Say Bali and the word paradise comes to mind – if you say Bali years ago, that is. Today, Bali stands for paradise lost. Intense tourism, pollution, deforestation, warming weather, the 2004 Indian Ocean quake that triggered massive tsunamis in many parts of Asia, as well as the terrible terror bomb attacks in 2002 and 2005 have reduced it into one of those popular island getaways, which require one to first read a travel advisory if one is planning to go there.

This week until next, Bali is in the center of the global discussion of a future climate regime. The Bali meeting will have to produce ways to reach a consensus on climate adaptation and mitigation, transfer of technology from developed to developing countries and financing scheme to curb and overcome the impacts of climate change. This is taking place while logging, most of it illegal, destroys thousands of hectares of land in Bali and all over Indonesia, adding up to the accumulation of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.

Indonesia has one of the world's largest areas of rainforests. Massive illegal logging and burning of forests have stripped it of more than 70% of its original forest cover. As a result, Indonesia is now the world's third biggest emitter of greenhouse gases, next to the United States and China. Today, the Jakarta Post bannered a story on Indonesia's state minister for the environment Rachmat Witoelar's optimism that a consensus would be reached during this conference. Witoelar said many governments have warmed up to the idea of creating a new agenda for negotiating solutions for the warming of our world.

But while others have warmed up, the US remains frosty to the idea of drastic emission cuts. The US is seen as the biggest obstacle to forging a new pact with binding limits on emissions. George Bush has stated that they are keen on a common, long-term goal decades in the future without specific targets or limits. Curbing greenhouse emissions, he said, must be ""in a way that does not undermine economic growth or prevent nations from delivering greater prosperity for their people."

It has been seventeen years since the first global climate treaty was signed by almost all the world's nations, which set voluntary goals for curbing the emissions of greenhouse gases. The Kyoto Protocol, the first legally binding treaty signed by most of the world's leading greenhouse gas producers, was ratified in 1997 as an addendum to the original pact, setting mandatory limits on emissions for the industrialized countries that ratified it. The US refused to ratify the Kyoto Protocol citing drastic emission cuts would harm its economy and that China and India are two of the world's major emitters, which should also curb their emissions.

Today, seventeen years later, those countries that ratified Kyoto have largely failed to meet their targets. And the US remains as pig-headed about setting specific targets as before.

The UNFCCC, however, has stated that any long-term policy response to climate change must be acceptable to all, including the US. The debates and compromises are on.

Yesterday, GCAP's Ben Margolis was interviewed twice and twice he was asked for his opinion on the US position. It seems that the biggest issue here, which dominates discussion and which the media is picking up at the expense of drowning the voices of groups vulnerable to climate change, is what is the framework for negotiations that is acceptable to the US.

lani villanueva