Local view for "http://purl.org/linkedpolitics/eu/plenary/2002-10-10-Speech-4-040"
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"en.20021010.1.4-040"2
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"Mr President, ladies and gentlemen, I would like to start by expressing my thanks for the valuable and constructive contributions to a very interesting debate. This is not the first time and, believe me, definitely not the last time that we will discuss measures to counter climate change.
Allow me to begin by placing this debate in a wider context, that is to say, what we know about climate change. We are well aware that climate change is taking place. The rise in temperature we have measured during the twentieth century is the biggest for a thousand years. We know that the snow cover in the northern hemisphere has decreased by 10% since the end of the 1960s. We know that the thickness of the polar icecap had decreased by 40% in just a decade. Researchers – and we have assembled the world’s leading climate researchers – say that, to deal with climate change, we will have to go much, much further than the Kyoto Protocol. We will therefore need to take measures that go further than those we have discussed up to now.
We have ratified the Kyoto Protocol and are now in fact working, within the EU, on three different fronts. We are acting on the international scene by encouraging countries on the outside, such as the US, to sign up. It is important to continue pushing for good conditions and for the achievement of those objectives of the Kyoto Protocol that are within reach. We must, however, be credible here at home too, and that is why we have set up the European Climate Change Programme. Together with all the various interested parties, we have identified those measures we need to take here at home in order to meet our commitments and combat climate change in a cost-effective manner. The trade in emissions rights is one such instrument.
I will just add that we all realise that there is a cost in meeting the commitments under the Kyoto Protocol, but it will also be to our cost if we refrain from acting. To do as others do and sit on the sidelines or refrain from doing anything cannot be considered as a contribution to the creation of equitable conditions. It is necessary to remember this. The trade in emission rights is thus one of the instruments we will need in future.
We have just been talking about large emission sources, but we also need to review the traffic system and take effective measures in this connection in future."@en1
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