ENVIRONMENT BULLETIN-JAPAN: Greens Watch Japan in Climate Change Talks

By Suvendrini Kakuchi Reprint | | Print |

Suvendrini Kakuchi

TOKYO, Nov 7 1998 (IPS) - The Japanese government, which steered talks on a climate change protocol in 1997, is under pressure to show greater leadership at this year’s meeting on the reduction of greenhouse gases in Argentina.

Non-governmenta ampaigners say Tokyo has a chance to brush up on its environmental record, given what many call its lacklustre implementation of plans to reduce emissions of greenhouses that warm the earth.

“Japan has not done enough toward achieving the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions it pledged in Kyoto last year. This year’s conference is a crucial opportunity to show the world it is sincere toward environmental protection, ” said Noriko Oyama of Greenpeace Japan.

This despite the favourable reviews that Japan got when it made headlines for the sale of world’s first hybrid car powered by electricity and gas. Japan is also known for a thriving, if modest, solar energy programme.

These, sceptics say, are well and good but are the not the same as achieving a definite reduction in the emissions of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas produced by the burning of fossil fuel.

Japan has promised a 6 percent reduction of its greenhouse emissions, which include nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide, methane and hydrofluorocarbons, from 1990 levels between 2008 and 2012.

Responsible for around 6 percent of total carbon dioxide emissions, Japan is the fourth largest emitter in the world.

Last week the Keidanren, Japan’s largest business conglomeration reported that 28 branches of industry — including automotive parts manufacturing,lectronics, gas and oil — reported 3.3 percent higher carbon dioxide emissions than in 1990.

Japan is also lagging behind in other areas to curb pollution. In October, the Environment Agency reported Japan is unlikely to meet its year 2000 target for reducing nitrogen dioxide that pollute the air.

Still, Japanese officials attending this week’s fourth conference of parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, in the Argentinian capital of Buenos Aires, are to argue that Tokyo has taken key steps to achieve the target it set as host of the Kyoto meeting in December 1997.

“Japan has stepped up efforts in its energy-saving campaign, putting more emphasis on less polluting energies such as nuclear energy and other alternatives. We are also adopting stricter standards for polluting industries,” Masahiro Aoki, in charge of public relations at the Ministry of Trade and Industry, said in a recent commentary.

“There is a collusion of interests among countries that are divided between developing and developed. There is even conflict among developed countries, a situation that takes ime to deal with,” he pointed out.

Under the Kyoto Protocol, major industra countries promised numerical targets for reduction of emissions of greenhouse gases. That marked the first time that 34 industrialised countries are bound to cut emissions by an average of 5.2 percent by 2012.

The Buenos Aires meeting, which is attended by more than 163 countries and ends next week, is supposed to work out details for the Kyoto accord’s full implementation.

Attention is focusing this year on commitments by developing countries, which had been a bone of contention in the 1997 Japan meeting. At the time, industrialised nations had to state their commitments first since they produce the bulk of heat-trapping greenhouse gases.

Now, developing countries are under pressure to develop a voluntary reduction target for slashing emissions, though critics have expressed the fear that this could be used as a weapon to deprive poor countries of the same industrialisation drive that powered the growth of now-industrialised nations.

Pointing out that countries opted to go easy on this subject last year, the Japanese media is urging Japan to take the leadership in this sector.

“As a leading contributor of official development aid, Japan should do its best to persuade developing countries to join international efforts to cut greenhouse gases. It could offer related technology and propose joint projects toward reduction,” the ‘Yomuiri Shimbun’, Japan’s leading daily, said Monday.

Among the three leading negotiators, the European Union, Japan and the United States, Tokyo, given its closer ties with the developing world, would probably be most effective in getting an agreement from such countries, the paper argued.

Analysts expect Japan to side with the United States in advocating a practical solution to global warming by getting developing countries to comply with their own target reductions.

“Japan will work diligently to achieve its targets set in Kyoto while calling for more participation from developing countries,” stated Kenji Manabe, head of the Environment Agency.

This is unlikely to be an easy quest, however, since the U.S., the world’s largest carbon-dioxide emitter, is being bitterly criticised by developing countries

Still, Washington points out that China is the second largest polluter and will soon equal and overtake the U.S. unless forced to meet a reduction. The U.S., however, remains way ahead of China in per-capita production of greenhouse gases.

Japan took a non-controversial stance on the issue in Kyoto, but is not expected to maintain this position this time.

There is another major difference for Japan this year: It is wallowing in a deepening recession, and is more concerned with a recovery rather than reducing the emission of gases, especially if this process is expected to slow economic growth.

Greenpeace’s Oyama says she is concerned that Japan trailing not only in reductions target but in the development of renewable energy — a sector particularly feasible for developing countries struggling to reduce carbon dioxide production.

“Japan’s support for nuclear technology is not going to reduce global warming because it is based on the need for more energy. Investment in solar power is still 1 percent of the total government energy budget,” she pointed out.

“We are worried that in Buenos Aires developing countries will not have a chance to gain important environment-friendly technologies from Japan and other industrialised countries,” Oyama added.