From poverty to power - Oxfam-Québec

5 THE INTERNATIONAL SYSTEM CLIMATE CHANGEin developing countries in late 2007. Whatever approach is finallyadopted, fairness demands that rich countries explain how they willmake good on their obligations and commitments to help the vulnerablecountries meet the costs of climate adaptation. 223THE MITIGATION CHALLENGEWhen the UN Climate Convention was signed at the Rio EarthSummit, in 1992, the international community looked forward toaction by rich countries that would bring their emissions back downto 1990 levels by 2000. Today, as daily news reports chronicle howclimate change is beginning to threaten food supplies and overrunthe adaptive capacity of natural ecosystems, it is clear that theinternational community’s efforts to address the climate threat arefailing – at least relative to the ultimate objective of the Convention.Globally, greenhouse gas emissions must fall sharply and fast.Ultimately, the questions, ‘How far?’ and ‘How fast?’ are politicalquestions that the international community must answer, mindfulthat with each answer political leaders accept a degree of risk that poorpeople will bear most directly. Global cuts in the vicinity of 80 per centbelow 1990 levels by mid-century are necessary in order to preserve areasonable chance of keeping global warming below 2ºC. Even withthis dramatic drop in emissions, the world still faces as much as a onein-threechance of catastrophic climate change. 224 Each day, week,month, and year that passes while emissions continue to rise is a stepcloser to potentially irreversible changes that lie across the 2ºC threshold.Each delay in beginning to bend the emissions curve downwards makesreaching the 80 per cent target more expensive – and more unlikely.In 2006, former World Bank chief economist Sir Nicholas Sternestimated the costs of stabilising carbon emissions at around 1 percent of global GDP by 2050 – an enormous amount, but ultimatelytolerable, and dwarfed by the 5–20 per cent of global output that Sternestimated would be the cost of inaction. 225 His influential review madea strong case for urgent action, arguing that mitigation ‘must beviewed as an investment, a cost incurred now and in the coming fewdecades to avoid the risks of very severe consequences in the future’.The report concluded that:‘Tackling climate change is the pro-growthstrategy for the longer term, and it can be done in a way that does not411