Carbon finance
Protectionism in Green Garb
IPN Opinion article
The US Waxman-Markey energy bill claims to be about reducing greenhouse gas emissions but its hidden consequences include subsidies and protectionism for US firms plus trade war with the rest of the world. Even its core intention is made irrelevant by the current and future emissions of China and India. Aris Taristides explains some of the threats to other countries and to the USA itself of damaging trade, especially in a time of recession.
Attacking patents halts progress
IPN Opinion article
The UN's latest climate talks, in Accra, heard much talk about waiving patents on 'green', low-carbon and renewable products which will, somehow, magically, help fight climate change. The real barrier to new technology in most developing countries, however, is high tariff barriers ñ and these barriers are generally higher the poorer the country. What is worse, countries that ignore intellectual property rights chase away the foreign investors so badly needed for growth and for the transfer of technology.
What's killing the poor is poverty, not climate change
IPN Opinion article
There is a growing idea that rich countries should slash imports from poor countries whose antiquated factories are heavy carbon emitters: this eco-protectionism is in fact good old-fashioned protectionism and would hit the poor hardest. What hurts the poor right now is not climate change but poverty: growth is the only way out.
Protectionism harms consumers and the environment
IPN Opinion article
Proposals to restrict imports from countries which do not reduce greenhouse gas emissions are simply protectionism. They would decrease world trade, disproportionately harming poorer countries, and favour the status quo by rewarding inefficient producers and thus delaying the adoption of cleaner, resource-saving technologies.
A dose of reality needed on climate change issue
IPN Opinion article
Britain's Department of Health says we face killer heatwaves and the Royal College of Physicians president says "the effects of global warming on health could eclipse those of smoking, alcohol and obesity." But more people in the UK routinely die of cold than from heat. And the cure for diseases is not cool temperatures but prosperity.
UN Climate Plans vs. The Poor
IPN Opinion article
Despite the breakdown of UN climate-change talks in Bali last December, the same themes were still being pushed at the late August week's meeting in Ghana--but now developing countries have begun to question the effects on the world's poorest. They must fight for greater realism in the climate debate: their livings and even their lives depend on it.
Hot air and human health
IPN Opinion article
The WHO has overstated the health implications of climate change in order to call for strict caps on carbon emissions. By undermining economic growth, this would have very serious consequences for health in developing countries.
Cap and Blockade
IPN Opinion article
A seventh EU member state has decided to take legal action against the Commission, highlighting the absurdity of the growth-retarding Kyoto Protocol and similar "cap and trade" schemes, which would be enormously expensive and relatively ineffective at addressing climate change.
