Equity to be the base of negotiations on climate change

Ahead of the Rio+20 Earth Summit, India today said the principle of "equity" - equal per capita rights to the atmospheric space - should be the "base" for future negotiations on climate change.

"We feel that equity should be the base for our engagements to achieve poverty eradication and economic and social development, be it under the Convention or under Rio+20," Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan told an international workshop on equity and climate change here. Rio+20 or the Earth Summit 2012 (June 20- 22, 2012) will focus on two specific themes a green economy in the context of poverty eradication and sustainable development and an institutional framework for sustainable development.

"Equity is one of the central issues in climate change negotiations. It is one of the key principles of the Convention. Its importance has gone up further after the negotiations at Durban," Natarajan said. The workshop was attended by climate officials from BASIC countries -Brazil, South Africa, India and China and Ghambia, Mauritius, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Qatar, Argentina, Thailand and Swaziland.

Observing that the term equity figures in the context of global peaking of emissions and not of actions or responsibilities of the parties, she said, "for building an arrangement that fulfils the objectives of the Convention and meets the emerging challenges, we need a greater degree of clarity and definition in our approach."

Recalling an agreement in Durban that a workshop on equity would be held in Bonn this year, the Minister said that the workshop on the issue should not be an end in itself and it should also "feed into the negotiations and help us devise a strategy that can protect the interest of the developing countries in general and sustainable growth in particular."