A Final Plea for COP16

Tim Hall | December 10, 2010.

Dear Governments at Cancun,

As the final day of the COP16 Climate change negotiations looms on us, think back to this time last year.

The hope, the momentum, the spirit and the belief that we can act on the greatest crisis facing humanity.

But then you let the world down. All of you were to blame.

You have now let the world down every year for the past fifteen years.

Now it looks like you’re going to let us down again.

You know the science. You know the danger. You know the stories. You know the people affected.

Yet your actions remains weak.

You know the damage to your economies. You know the damage to your people. You know the damage to your legacies.

Yet you bicker and delay.

You know your children will have a heavier burden for every day of your inaction. You know of this suffering and you know we are to blame.

Yet you still can’t compromise.

This year you lowered our expectations, told us to only expect small, but necessary, gains. You told us Cancun would be a vital stepping stone to bigger things at Durban COP17 in 2011.

That’s OK, provided you hold up your end of the bargain. Provided necessary progress is made at every opportunity.

But so far you have failed on even that. It is now the final 24 hours and negotiations are still in a deadlock. You still haven’t agreed on steps to fight climate change. The modest ‘balanced package’, comprised of a fund to oversee climate aid, ways to slow deforestation, steps to help poor countries adapt to climate change and a mechanism to share clean technologies, remains unfinished.

You appear ineffective and illegitimate as our leaders.

This is the last chance to make significant progress at Cancun. No matter how small, if it doesn’t happen here it is too late. Enough won’t happen next year or the year after at the pace required. Climate change is already the reality.

Today is your chance to move the world forward. Please, for the sake of the humanity, do something.