Cooperation is the key to fight against climate change
At the Melting Ice Conference in Tromsø, northern Norway, the buzz word during these last few days of the Norwegian Chairship of the Arctic Council seems to be cooperation.
More specifically, according to Former Vice President and Nobel Peace Prize recipient, Al Gore, and Minister of Foreign Affairs, Jonas Gahr Støre, co-operation is defined by Circumpolar co-operation with other geographical areas of the world that will undoubtedly be affected by melting ice; the use of scientific research to mitigate and stem the most serious consequences of climate change; and the involvement of Indigenous peoples who have had stewardship over the Arctic for thousands of years.
Melting Ice
One-and-a-half years in planning, the idea for the Melting Ice Conference now taking place in Tromsø was first conceived between Foreign Minister Støre and Mr Gore when he received his Nobel Peace Prize in Oslo in 2007. At the same time, Minister Støre takes this opportunity to once again highlight the seriousness of addressing climate change in the run-up to the COP15 - Copenhagen • United Nations - Climate Change Conference in December 2009.
With passion and verve, one after the other Foreign Minister Støre and Mr Gore hit hard with their presentations regarding the impact of melting ice in the Arctic. Mr Gore even showed a dramatic presentation of an Alaskan climate change researcher igniting methane from a frozen Alaska lake. They argued that not only will it have great ramifications for the Arctic environment and peoples, but will also effect global climate as a whole.
Minister Støre argued that what is happening in the Arctic is the world’s “clarion call” that significant action is required to stem the global warming, with Mr Gore echoing this sentiment by asserting that “the situation in the Arctic can be seen as a warning to the rest of the world.”
The co-operation task
The daunting question is, of course, how the world, and in particular international regimes such as the Arctic Council and the Barents Euro-Arctic Council, will respond to this clarion call and these warnings. Mr Gore and Minister Støre, argue that strong international, national, and local level policies to “reduce global emissions of greenhouse gases; reducing short-lived climate drivers [soot and methane] rapidly and effectively; proactive efforts at adaptation; and intensified research” may slow global ice melting, but that adaptation to climate change is likely inevitable. In this the industrialized world including Norway, must play a key role, Minister Støre argued.
The meetings continue on Wendesday at the Sixth Ministerial Meeting of the Arctic Council when the Arctic Council Chairship will be transferred to Denmark and Chaired for the next two years by its Minister of Foreign Affairs, Per Stig Møller.
For BarentsObserver,
Aileen Espiritu, the Barents Institute