{"id":1601,"date":"2011-11-29T09:17:43","date_gmt":"2011-11-29T09:17:43","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/?p=1601"},"modified":"2011-11-29T09:19:07","modified_gmt":"2011-11-29T09:19:07","slug":"welcome-to-durban-a-world-of-uncertainty","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/2011\/11\/welcome-to-durban-a-world-of-uncertainty\/","title":{"rendered":"Welcome to Durban: a world of uncertainty"},"content":{"rendered":"

By: Maggie Rees<\/p>\n

20,000 people, 75 degrees, interviews, meetings, and more meetings.\u00a0 Durban is certainly overwhelming and exciting.\u00a0 It\u2019s so funny how we are right in the middle of all the action and still have no idea what\u2019s actually going on.\u00a0 Times like these you realize how essential press briefings are.\u00a0 Yesterday, November 28, 2011, I attended a press briefing by Climate Action Network International (CAN).\u00a0 Along with CAN, Oxfam, World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) International, and the Union of Concerned Scientists were in attendance.\u00a0 Discussed were the main concerns for this years COP.<\/p>\n

Tim Gore, from Oxfam, brought up the fretfulness of food production, particularly in Africa and areas such as Afghanistan.\u00a0 With an increase in extreme weather events flooding poses a severe problem for food production.\u00a0 Cattle are dying, crops are not sustaining, and food cannot be produced.\u00a0 Just two nights ago in Durban, there were fatalities due to excessive flooding.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>Along with this, Tasneem Essop from WWF International described her thoughts about what needs to be accomplished in Durban this year.\u00a0 Tasneem is mostly hoping for certainty: certainty in actions, a timeline, finances, etc.\u00a0 With risk of losing the Kyoto Protocol it is essential to have assurance in a next move for climate negotiations.\u00a0 A legally binding agreement with a strong timeline is what it would take.\u00a0 Something with assured finances, like the Green Climate Fund, is necessary.\u00a0 However, it needs to be known where the money is coming from, how much money there is, and what it will be used for.\u00a0 Loopholes need to be eliminated.\u00a0 Countries should not be able to weasel their way out of agreements or emission reductions.\u00a0 If all else fails, an adaptations committee is essential.\u00a0 Before it is too late, countries need proper adaptation strategies.<\/p>\n

The Union of Concerned Scientists was in agreement.\u00a0 According to representative Alden Meyer, this is possibly the most unpredictable COP yet.\u00a0 There is so much uncertainty lingering around, it is impossible to give expectations or predictions about what might happen.\u00a0 Kyoto is obviously one of the main volatile aspects.\u00a0 Will there be a new Kyoto? Will it wither away?\u00a0 Is there another approach, such as bottom-up?\u00a0 There are so many questions, and have yet to be answers.\u00a0 The main developed countries are ultimately the deciding factor.<\/p>\n

Among all the confusion, unpredictability, and franticness, it seems that I am not the only person that is uncertain about what is going on.\u00a0 But it was only the first day\u2026there is still much learning to do, on all accounts.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

By: Maggie Rees
\n20,000 people, 75 degrees, interviews, meetings, and more meetings.\u00a0 Durban is certainly overwhelming and exciting.\u00a0 It\u2019s so funny how we are right in the middle of all the action and still have no idea what\u2019s actually going on.\u00a0 Times like these you realize how essential press briefings are.\u00a0 Yesterday, November 28, 2011, I attended a press briefing by Climate Action Network International (CAN).\u00a0 Along with CAN, Oxfam, World Wildlife Foundation (WWF) International, and the Union of Concerned Scientists were in attendance.\u00a0 Discussed were the main concerns for this years COP.
\nTim Gore, from Oxfam, brought up the fretfulness of food production, particularly in Africa and areas such as Afghanistan.\u00a0 With an increase in extreme weather events flooding poses a severe problem for food production.\u00a0 Cattle are dying, crops are not sustaining, and food cannot be produced.\u00a0 Just two nights ago in Durban, there were fatalities due to excessive flooding.
\nAlong …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":450,"featured_media":1606,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19448],"tags":[42616,34192,25703,42618,42617],"class_list":["post-1601","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-climate-change-2","tag-can","tag-cop17","tag-maggie-rees","tag-oxfam","tag-wwf-international"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1601","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/450"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1601"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1601\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/1606"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1601"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1601"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blogs.dickinson.edu\/cop17durban\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1601"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}