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Cabinet of Ministers churning out agencies to flog Kyoto emission quotas

15.06.2007    source: www.civicua.org
Present plans for creating yet another agency would appear to reflect the Government’s concern to rake in profits from selling emission quotas at the expense of real implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, and needless to add, at the expense of our shared planet

Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers is presently considering Regulations on creating a second agency empowered to oversee the implementation of the Kyoto Protocol. This is despite the fact that the Ministry for Environmental Protection has long had a department which effectively carries out this task.

So is this the government’s recognition of the need to save the planet or a wish to move the sale of emission quotas into a greyer part of the economy?

The official coordinator for the implementation of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol is the Ministry for Environmental Protection. There is a supervisory council over it, chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Andriy Klyuyev, and an action plan passed by the relevant resolution.

This kind of structure makes it possible to officially ask for information, work plans and reports on the activities of the Ministry in using State funds, as well as to take part in decision making.

According to the draft of the new Regulation under consideration in the Cabinet of Ministers “On creating a National Agency for Environmental Investments, a new executive agency is to be created which will take on all the duties on implementation of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the Kyoto Protocol and will answer directly to the Minister for Environmental Protection. The agency will be given various powers, allowed unlimited use of a budget for fulfilling this mandate, the right to create State funded enterprises, organizations and institutions, the right to represent the Cabinet of Ministers at international negotiations, and all of this without any external control over its activities.

Environmental groups believe that the Government perceives implementation of the Kyoto Protocol purely as about the sale of greenhouse gases emission quotas, or at best as the adoption of projects for joint implementation. In fact Ukraine’s main duty is to introduce a policy for reduction of emissions in the areas of energy, transport, industry, agriculture and forestry.

They believe that Ukraine’s extra emission quotas are simply justifying lack of action by the government and the focus on the sale of such quotes is fostering corruption.  If Ukraine adhered to the strict international commitments on reducing emissions, this would stimulate the development of renewable sources of energy, energy conservation in industry, and would speed up reform in communal services and transport. The economy and the population would only gain from such a policy.

The Ukrainian National Environmental Centre

[email protected]
www.climategroup.org.ua
8 044 494 03 54,
8 095 273 26 73

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