US trying to make good on REDD Pledge

Reuters reports on the MEF talks (hyperlinked in blog title):

Excerpt:
At Monday's meeting, the United States issued a document to participants that said its climate-related appropriations for 2010 total $1.3 billion and that the Obama administration has requested $1.9 billion for fiscal year 2011.

The funds include support for the U.S. administration's pledge to provide $1 billion for the U.N. program Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Degradation.

World Leaders meet in London on climate, REDD advances slightly again

The latest hope for a breakthrough in international climate change negotiations happened this past week in London. There was some progress overall and more signals that some funding mechanism for REDD must be kick-started before the compliance market arrives....see below excerpt from the official communication.

At a dinner of the Leaders’ representatives, it was noted that developing countries are developing ambitious REDD+ plans and financing their own efforts. The need for urgently and significantly scaled up international finance for REDD+ was discussed, ahead of linkage to the market. Such finance could be for capacity building, to leverage private sector investment and for payment by results, accommodating different national circumstances. It was suggested that existing institutions propose investment instruments and how to improve coherence.

For more background, please see:
http://www.grist.org/article/2009-10-21-london-MEF-brown-climate-talks/

Obama will chair MEF climate change session

If BusinessGreen reporting and BBC reporting (in title link) are true, then this Thursday we will find out how weak or strong President Obama can be on climate change. According to both stories, President Obama has asked to chair a key climate change session in the MEF (which is running parallel to the G20 meeting). Hopes are running high for an agreement on key climate change issues this week in Italy. There is a growing sense the UNFCCC process needs some clarity and direction from either the G8 or G20 and the MEF is where that will happen. Maybe these talks in Italy will be President Obama's first (and quite dramatic) foreign policy success? Imagine if he could get all the countries to agree on the basic ambitions and language to help the UNFCCC focus?

We shouldn't get our hopes up too high - other news outlets are reporting major diplomatic problems and low expectations. And the diplomatically unappealing talk of a "chairman's summary" if things can't get hammered out. Such a summary would indicate there wasn't agreement...