Difference between revisions of "Stalemate"
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=Overview= | =Overview= | ||
After the great recession and the subsequent volatile economic activity, the participating nations remained determined to achieve economic growth. The economic uncertainty kept the focus of the public voice and major corporations towards a quick recovery and growth. In 2020 China is the largest economy of the world and continues to grow at a stable pace. Scarred by a series of financial dips; EU and USA struggle to keep up with the Chinese growth juggernaut. India has surpassed Japanese GDP and is closing the gap. Climate and crop yields are very chaotic but still no conclusive evidence linking this to global warming is yet available. The economic growth came at the cost of massive depletion of resources and a growing concern today in 2020 is the future access to resources. With heightened fear of conflicts over resources, the world now is again getting polarised with China and USA leading two groups. Climate change negotiations fail without any result as no group is willing to lose ground to the other. | |||
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= | =2010= | ||
''28-November-2010 | |||
The fears of a double dip economic recession have come to reality. The US fed and European bank struggle to jump start the collapsing economic activity. Markets are still uncertain over the future performance by the EU block. Due to the economic uncertainties of the west and a dwindling consumption in the globe, IMF has reduced the projected GDP growth of China and India in 2010.<br><br> | |||
The 192 participating nations came together at the Cancun COP16 to negotiate climate change reductions with their own specific agenda. While as the under-developed want more money, the developing and the developed nations want a quick economic recovery and subsequent growth. OPEC block also intensified lobbying and funding to avoid an accord in the COP 16 meet. The Chinese premier again snubbed the other heads of nations and missed the negotiations all together.<br><br> | |||
The careful speech made the US president Barak Obama indicated the huge pressure of the industrial lobby and US scepticism over taking up any emission reductions. Putting the blame of current state of climate; India, Brazil, South Africa took sides with China and maintain their demand of massive reduction commitment from US and EU. With current state of economy and no commitment from US, EU saw a decreasing support from European nationals to push for emission reductions. With their own financial woes, Europeans no longer wish to suffer economically by taking emission reduction commitments. However, recent report confirm that major corporations see global warming as an opportunity and are spending huge fortunes on green R&D. Only time would tell what comes out from this research and how readily is it adopted.<br><br> | |||
The fires of Russia and flood in Pakistan are history. Lack of public interest on climate change and heightened focus on economic well being reduced the pressure on the negotiators to end with a strong accord. Even after 11 days of relentless fighting, the voice of the island nations remains unheard and their fears grow as no clear outcome emerged from the Cancun summit. The Cancun summit ended with noting of another accord and no concrete action plan. It appears that the world awaits a massive catastrophe to take action. | |||
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= | =2011 - 2013= | ||
<br> | The fears of a head turning revelations by IPCC report were floured today after the presentation of the IPCC chief. Although there had been some minor natural disasters spread across the globe, none was potent enough to raise alarms on the affects of climate change. It is a general notion now that earth has tremendous healing powers and any major effects of climate change would require a lot more time.<br><br> | ||
<br> | There were signs of economic recovery in mid-2010 but the world entered a full scale depression in the early 2011. Ironically, the characteristics of this depression were similar to those of the Japanese one. As the fiscal impetus from the governments was removed, the world saw a dip. The same pattern has been repeating itself for the last three years. Experts now are certain that this is due to the repayment of debt by corporate to match their balance sheets. No one had ever imagined that the sub-prime mortgage crisis would have such a long lasting impact on the western economies. American citizens again voiced their opinion of a quick economic by electing a republican president. As promised by the new US president, the focus of US would still me a more stable and robust economic growth.<br><br> | ||
The Spanish and the Italian bond yields have sky rocketed as those of Germany remain stable. Markets fear a repeat Greece for Spain and Italy in near future. Greece itself is struggling to stay on track of the proposed budget reductions in 2010, causing worries and internal disagreements within the EU. The inconsequential COP summits in the past causing the delay in decision making coupled with serious economic woes have caused the softening of EU stand on taking up emission reductions. The support and the willingness of frustrated Europeans for emission reductions have almost vanished. Sceptical businesses and cities are moved ahead cautiously while investing in green technology during this period. Cities like Shanghai commissioned several green initiatives while those like London made no such efforts. <br><br> | |||
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West focussed on economic recovery, EU losing steam and a BASIC block adamant on growth caused a repeat of Cancum at the negotiations in 2013. No consensus on emission reductions is reached and the leaders of the world return to fire up their economies. | |||
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= | =2014 - 2018= | ||
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<br> | It took 10 painful years for the world to recover completely from the subprime crisis of 2008. While the west was recovering from the financial crisis, the Chinese and the Indians raced ahead with growth. Today the Chinese GDP is head to head with US and European GDP. India overtook Japanese GDP 2 years ago and continues to inch closer to US and EU. China is the largest green house gas emitter accounting to close to 30% of global emissions, US emits about 25% and India follows at 20%, of the global green house gas emissions. It is incredible to see that the environment has actually paid the price of re-emergence of global economic well being.<br><br> | ||
With the current global political canvas, it was easy to predict the disappointing outcome of the climate change negotiations. What was surprising is the sudden change in the US position. Looking back on negotiations in last 8 years, US has always put economic growth in front of any environmental benefits and has been instrumental in turning any concrete steps into superficial accords. On the surface it may appear that the recent US push for stricter legal controls for green house gas emission reductions is to do with a change ideology, a deeper analysis indicates other motives. The US growth rate is almost a third that of China and US population is a fraction compared to the Chinese. Stricter controls for China indicate a considerable reduction in their future growth and thus give US a chance to catch up. Chinese saw the intent and vetoed the agreement in the negotiation. India too is facing a lot of hammering in the global image but as it turns out image is no longer important.<br><br> | |||
It seems that corporations and cities would have a big role to play, rather than UN or governments, in avoiding the global warming. | |||
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= | =2019 - 2020= | ||
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<br> | The exploration of almost all of the unexploited areas in Africa is picking up pace. It was reported that the last largest remaining deposit of uranium has been located in a remote part of Liberia. Geologists confirm that certain areas in Africa hold key mineral reserves and probably last few deposits of oil on the planet. Climate change is no longer a critical issue, scramble for Africa is the new topic of contention.<br><br> | ||
The decisions are made by two competing groups of nations while the UN just exists as a superficial body. The last hopes of any accord between the parties at the COP summit were shattered today when the talks collapsed. Any initiative to restore the planet to its pre-industrial state rests entirely in the hands of people and initiative of major corporations from the world. The political impetus to the same is no longer a hope.<br><br> | |||
= Timeline = | = Timeline = | ||
[[File:Deadlock. | [[File:Deadlock.JPG|300px|thumb|left|Chain of events]] | ||