Last week's Bonn negotiations saw the world move closer to a climate agreement at COP21 in Paris, writes Ruth Davis. The current text includes important proposals on climate finance; accelerated decarbonisation of the global economy; and a 5-year cycle of ever higher national emissions targets.
'Climate Smart Agriculture' advocates were out in force at the just concluded climate talks in Bonn, writes Pavlos Georgiadis. But their finely crafted corporate message presents a real threat to genuine agroecological solutions to the interlinked food, farming and climate crises.
Climate Smart Agriculture sounds like a great idea, write hundreds of civil society organisations worldwide. But in truth it's a PR front for international agribusiness to promote corporate agriculture, pesticides and fertilisers at COP21, with a heavy dose of greenwash. Countries must resist the siren calls - and give their support to true agroecology that sustains soil, health, life and climate.
'Unbearably tardy' climate negotiations have ended in failure, writes Henner Weithöner. Without even a draft text at this late stage, the chances of a meaningful deal emerging from the crucial UN summit in Paris are looking paper-thin.
Promises made by governments to cut their greenhouse emissions come nowhere near stopping global warming rising above the 2C danger level, writes Alex Kirby. And in many cases the laws and policies needed to deliver them are absent.
Based on current performance tropical forests, the world's most biodiverse ecosystems, are set to be reduced to species-impoverished fragments by the end of the century, writes Simon Lewis. But it's not inevitable. Decisive action by the world's governments in Paris in December could secure desperately needed change.
Nuclear energy is a failed technology that's never been safe, affordable or effective at reducing carbon emissions, writes Peer de Rijk. But that won't stop the world's nuclear lobbyists from thronging to COP21 in Paris determined to secure a place for nuclear power among the 'solutions' to climate change. We must make sure they fail.
If you're expecting COP21 in Paris to save the world's climate you're in for a disappointment, writes Alex Scrivener. For governments, climate is secondary to the really big issues - like endless economic growth and ever-increasing corporate profit. But there's still plenty campaigners can do to shame politicians, businesses and investors into meaningful action.
Renewable energy is all go in China, as set out in its climate pledge this week, writes John Mathews, with huge growth planned for wind and solar. The one big loser - coal exporters who can expect falling sales volumes in coming years. Wake up Australia!
Carbon trading has a remarkable record of failure: rewarding polluters while causing no discernible reduction in global emissions. If the COP21 UN climate negotiations in Paris are to achieve anything of value, first they must ditch the false solution of carbon markets. And thanks to Pope Francis, the idea is firmly on the agenda.
As Paris prepares for COP21 in Paris, Marc Brightman finds that the city is in the grip of a benign but ignorant authoritarianism that is ready to trample on much-loved green spaces like the Bois Dormoy, reclaimed from dereliction by the multicultural local community, which represent real solutions to the global problems of food, climate, the future of our cities, and our place in nature.
China's success in driving down its fossil fuel burn will raise chances of a success at this year's Paris climate talks, writes Kieran Cooke - but first the world must appreciate the changes China is making, and how clean energy is catalysing a broader economic transformation.
UN climate talks in Bonn ended today without the progress needed to secure agreement at the Paris COP in December - shortly after the G7 issued aspirational climate promises devoid of action, and heedless of warnings that Germany is already suffering the impacts of climate change.
With barely six months until the Paris climate conference begins, negotiating texts remain a morass of alternative wordings, square brackets and legal uncertainties, writes Illari Aragon. With deep divisions between countries on major points of principle, negotiators are meeting next week in Bonn to thrash out differences - but it's far from certain that they will be able to do so.
Yeb Sano, Philippines climate negotiator at the COP19 Warsaw climate talks, spoke for the entire poor and climate vulnerable world as his country was ravaged by Typhoon Haiyan in 2013. But he was mysteriously absent from Lima in 2014 - signalling a major national policy reversal in which the Philippines are giving everything away - and receiving nothing in return.
How much of the mainstream media coverage given to COP21 and the Paris Agreement mentioned the mysterious exemption given to the US's massive military and security machine? None, writes Joyce Nelson. Not only are these emissions entirely outside the UNFCCC process, but a 'cone of sillence' somehow prevents them from even forming part of the climate change discourse.
The Warsaw 'COP-19' climate negotiations were a widely acknowledged failure. But Assaad Razzouk sees a small silver lining among the dark clouds. There is a real prospect of effective action on climate in the run up to COP20 in Paris, 2015.
In 2011 the US firmly ruled equity out of climate negotiations, writes Chukwumerije Okereke. But in the Lima climate talks the poor countries put the moral dimension where it belongs - at the heart of any future climate treaty.
COP20 has just laid the foundations for a non-agreement in Paris in 2015, writes Assaad Razzouk - thanks to the pernicious influence of fossil fuels, poisoning debate and subverting serious climate action. Now there's only one earthly power big enough to fight back.
After a second extra day of climate talks in Lima, an agreement has been cobbled together. Deadlines have been set for the world to come up with plans to curb emissions and adapt to climate change - but has been no progress on the key divisive issues, and the prospects of an effective mew treaty in Paris next year remain remote.
Peru, notorious for its brutal exploitation of forests, oil and minerals, theft of indigenous lands and murder of eco-defenders, is an unlikely host for the COP20 climate talks, writes Alexander Reid Ross. Except that Peru's actions reflect the corporate land-grabbing agenda manifest in the false solutions on offer in Lima this week. It's a time for resistance, not compromise!
As Peru prepares to host UN climate talks, Global Witness exposes the murder of Peruvian eco-defenders - 57 killed since 2002, including indigenous leaders protecting their forests from illegal logging ignored by police and Government.
Efforts to tackle climate change have failed to make the slightest difference to the exponential increase in CO2 emissions, writes Mike Berners-Lee. The US-China deal at last offers hope that things could change - but to make it work other countries must come on board, and promises must transform into binding commitments.
Climate negotiators in Bonn are hammering out the basis of a new global agreement - but have they got it all wrong? Taxing carbon consumption, rather than trying to regulate emissions, could stimulate the low carbon revolution the world needs.
