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UN States in a Row over Climate Funding

Experts worked through the night for a consensus

Dec 11, 2009 07:37 GMT  ·  By
Speaking at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony, US President Barack Obama said that an agreement was vital this year in Copenhagen, and that nations needed to work hard to achieve that goal
   Speaking at the Nobel Prize Award Ceremony, US President Barack Obama said that an agreement was vital this year in Copenhagen, and that nations needed to work hard to achieve that goal

Officials representing the 190+ countries that are attending the 2009 UN Climate Change conference, held in Copenhagen, have worked through the night, in an attempt to come to a decision about how to fund poorer nations in the international struggle against global warming and climate change. At the forefront of the discussions were experts from the European Union, which needed to decide precisely how much the bloc would contribute to the general fund. On the first day of the summit, leaders from European countries have decided to contribute as much as $9 billion, or 6 billion euros, to such a fund.

The issue now is the fact that there are many Eastern European countries that should contribute, such as Romania and Bulgaria, but that cannot afford to do so. “We have [EU] member states with [International Monetary Fund] programs, with huge deficits. This is on a voluntary basis, and already more than half of the states have provided figures,” Fredrik Reinfeldt, who is the Prime Minister of Sweden, said yesterday during a news conference. At the time when he made the statement, neither France nor Germany had revealed how much money they would contribute to the fund.

The discussions raged on through last night, officials say, in an attempt to hammer out a deal that would include as many EU countries as possible. “We will have a better figure tomorrow than we had tonight,” Reinfeldt said at the press conference. The money that will be collected in this fund will be given to poorer nations afterwards. These states will use the aid between 2010 and 2012 to help them mitigate some of the immediate effects of global warming, including rising sea levels, deforestation, water shortages, and desertification.

From the figures announced thus far, the BBC News reports that the United Kingdom is the largest contributor to the new fund, with approximately 883 million euros. Closely behind is Sweden – the nation that currently holds the EU presidency – with 765 million euros, followed by other states. All the funds will be spread out over a three-year period (2010-2012). “I call upon you – put a figure on the table. We demanded this in the European Parliament resolution in November,” Jerzy Buzek, who is the president of the European Parliament, told EU representatives.