Day 10 UNFCCC

The day started with the usual YOUNGO meeting, and afterwards some action.

A UKYCC, Young Friends of The Earth and Bund Jugend joint project: Push Europe (http://pusheurope.eu/), have planned an action, where all youth participated including the IFMSA.

 

We all lined up in front of the European meeting with a CV, and asked for green jobs and a greener economy. The campaign is really big and aims toward a EU meeting in October, where the EU may discuss to target to 30% of reduction instead of the original 20%. To support the campaign please go to their webpage, and fill out, what kind of community you would like to live in.

 

The YOUNGO as a constituency is able to intervene in both opening and closing plenary in both tracks. The youth will intervene on forests in SBSTA and on various topics in SBI. Leo and I have helped drafting the closing intervention on article 6 and further more an intervention on health adaptation on National action Plans, which will be read out by Leo. One of our main points here is to raise awareness on health and speak the voice of future generations. It is evident that our health will be affected by climate change, and therefore we need adaptation programs, addressing the vulnerable at the national and regional levels.

 

After finishing drafting our intervention and having it successfully submitted just in time we attended a side event by the German Federal Ministry of the Environment, Nature Conservation and nuclear Safety and the WHO regional office for Europe; Health as a priority in a changing climate – impacts and responses.

 

The side event was absolutely amazing and informative on health adaptation programs in 7 countries funded by the German Federal Ministry and the topic was very relevant, as yesterday it came out from the World Bank that the health care costs from impacts of climate change will be in the range of between 2 and 5 billion USD. Currently there is very little funding available and the need is tremendous, so we are happy this issue is being touched.

 

The introduction was given by the WHO Regional Office for the Europe, and they made some very interesting point on the importance of climate and health having more attention in this process. It is emphasized that we need to see this issue from a personal perspective and ask us self the question, how climate change will impact on various levels from water scarcity to housing.

 

Afterwards the floor was given to Alexander Nies, German Federal Ministry for the Environment, Nature Conservation and Nuclear Safety (BMU), who spoke about the collaboration and the 7 adaptation projects in south east Europe and Asia, funded by Emission Trading, with a availability of 120 million per year and the importance of early adaptation.
The floor was then given to a representative from each of the countries, talking briefly about their projects ranging from early warning system, clean water implementation, environmental friendly hospitals with a supply from solar energy. One of the key focus in each project is capacity building, training and public awareness, which stand complexly in line with our knowledge drawn from article 6.

 

Afterwards the microphone was opened for questions. Leo put in a question which was applauded by the Chair: “In the World Health Assembly a few weeks ago, a resolution about intersectoral dialogue passed to strengthen the communication between various governmental agencies to fulfill the basic need of the population in terms of health. However, the health sector seems to suffer from the difficulty to talk into other sectors to put health on the agenda for the action program against climate change. I wonder if there is any successful story or experience among the panelist that can be shared?” The Minister of Health from Macedonia and Albania both answered that they have taken up the opportunity of a climate change related disaster (such as heat wave, flood, drought or etc.) occurrence to emphasize the importance of climate change and health with the other departments. Awareness of the general public as well as the media were also drawn to a larger scale due to the catastrophe. It seems that we still need some lessons to learn before we can actually take serious action.

Yours truly,
Charlotte

 

Day 9 UNFCCC

Today is another very busy day for the IFMSA here in Bonn. As usual there is the YOUNGO meeting at 8.30, where we meet other youth organizations and have very interesting discussion on various issues that concerns the youth.

 

Afterwards we meet with the EU negotiator on article 6 to discuss implementation of article 6, and how Europe could support developing countries in this process.

The meeting took place in the garden, which was very informal and relaxed. We had prepared a lot of questions, and he answered the very thoroughly. We talked about the future and next steps of the implementation of Article 6, the necessary funding support and how we could create collaboration with the youth and EU.

 

From my perspective the meeting where very informative and we shared a lot of views with EU, so we look forward to any further discussion especially when they open the submission for civil society.

 

We spent the rest of the day trying to catch up on various other updates from the different bodies. We attended a meeting on the Kyoto Protocol, COP/CMP presidency and the steps towards Durban and a briefing in Long-term Cooperative Actions. All of these were very informative and an amazing recapturing on what is happening in the different tracks of the negotiations. We are trying to keep track on every thing that is happening here, but UNFCCC is a very dynamic process, and a lot of the meeting are closed, so these briefings were absolutely amazing.

Very best,

Charlotte

Day 8 UNFCCC Bonn

The second week is completely full while the negotiators from the parties are trying to make up the time they lost for the first week, there are a lot of very interesting things relevant to us that have happened. We are still working hard on two very important issues; Article 6 and health as a climate sensitive sector. Just to remind everybody, Article 6 is the article in the original convention, which speaks about education, public participation and raising awareness.

 

In terms of article 6, YOUNGO participated in an informal meeting with all the parties on the terms of references, and the result looks quite positive.

 

To just name a few of the important points relevant to the IFMSA:

 

-       SBI invites all relevant parties and intergovernmental and non-govermental organizations to submit views to the Secretariat. (Last time the Secretariat opened for submission, IFMSA and Medsin-UK made a joint submission emphasizing non-formal education, and the medical students were mentioned as a strong group to take leadership in this regard, in a synthesis report by the Secretariat.)

-       Further more it was agreed upon to have a workshop in Durban on Article 6 and the implementation in least develop countries. This is absolutely great, since LCDs are especially where education is lacking.

-       Development of the CC:iNet, where a lot of materials and best practice are shared.

-       Straitening of national focal points.

 

Before the meeting Leo, Jamie (From UKYCC) and myself were playing detectives, trying to find the negotiator from EU, US and Japan to collaborate on our views. We managed to get a meeting with the European negotiator on article 6 tomorrow, which is amazing.

 

In terms of education, training and public participation it is absolutely crucial, that the implementation of all these decision are followed up, so we are working together with other youth organizations on how to make sure this will be done. Tomorrow we will talk to EU negotiator specifically about this.

 

Besides being very involved in this process we attend a few of the negotiation sessions. For instance we went to workshop on response measures and trade, where WHO gave a presentation on health impacts of climate change and adaptation measurers.

All the best,

Charlotte