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Negotiations on what became the UN
Framework Convention on Climate Change were launched in December 1990 by the
UN General Assembly. An Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee (INC) was convened
to conduct these negotiations, which were concluded in just 15 months. The Convention
was adopted on 9 May 1992, and opened for signature a month later at the UN Conference
on Environment and Development in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. It entered into force
on 21 March 1994, after receiving the requisite 50 ratifications. The Convention
now has 186
Parties and is approaching universal membership.
Since the adoption of the Convention, Parties have continued to negotiate in
order to agree on decisions and conclusions that will advance its implementation.
They have done so first in the INC, and then, since the Convention’s entry into
force, in the Conference of the Parties (COP) and its subsidiary bodies, the Subsidiary
Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA) and the Subsidiary Body for
Implementation (SBI).
In addition to this ‘routine’ work on advancing the implementation
of the Convention, Parties launched a new round of negotiations at COP 1 (Berlin,
March/April 1995) to strengthen the commitments of Annex I Parties. These negotiations
resulted in the adoption of the Kyoto
Protocol at COP 3 (Kyoto, December 1997). The Kyoto Protocol, however, left
many of its operational details unresolved and referred these to the COP and subsidiary
bodies for further negotiation. The Kyoto Protocol was signed by 84 Parties, and
has received some 39
ratifications. Many Annex I Parties, however, stated
that they needed to have a clearer picture of the operational details of the Protocol
before they could ratify it.
At COP 4 (Buenos Aires, November 1998), Parties adopted the
so-called "Buenos
Aires Plan of Action", setting out a programme of work both to advance
the implementation of the Convention and to flesh out the operational details
of the Kyoto Protocol. This programme of work was conducted in the subsidiary
bodies and at COP 5 (Bonn, October/November 1999), with a deadline of COP 6 (The
Hague, November 2000). However, Parties were unable to reach agreement on a package
of decisions on all issues under the Buenos Aires Plan of Action at that session.
Nevertheless, they decided to meet again in a resumed session of COP 6 to try
once more to resolve their differences.
At COP 6 part II (Bonn, July 2001), Parties finally succeeded
in adopting the Bonn
Agreements on the Implementation of the Buenos Aires Plan of Action, registering
political agreement on key issues under the Buenos Aires Plan of Action. Parties
also completed their work on a set of detailed decisions based on the Bonn Agreements,
which were forwarded to COP 7 for formal adoption. Work remains outstanding on
a small number of decisions, however, and these were referred to COP 7 for further
negotiation.
COP 7 will meet in
Marrakesh in November 2001, together with the fifteenth sessions of the SBSTA
and SBI, which face heavy agendas of routine work. At COP
7, Parties are expected to formally adopt the detailed decisions completed
at COP 6 part II, and also to finalize those decisions where work remains outstanding.
These include decisions on Kyoto Protocol issues that will be recommended for
adoption to the COP serving as the meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol
(COP/MOP) at its first session after the Protocol enters into force. Agreement
on these issues should pave the way for Annex I Parties to ratify the Kyoto Protocol
and thus bring it into force. Many have expressed a wish for the Protocol to enter
into force in 2002, coinciding with the tenth anniversary of the Convention’s
adoption and the "Rio+10" World Summit for Sustainable Development (Johannesburg,
September 2002).
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