Summary for policymakers - COP23, Bonn, November 2017

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publications

OIF/IFDD SUMMARY FOR POLICYMAKERS

COP23, Bonn, November 2017

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Presentation

The Negotiations Guide and the Summary for Policymakers: Essential Francophone publications to share the necessary knowledge and to allow national delegations and each one to have a detailed analysis and means of action

The Francophone Institute for Sustainable Development (IFDD), a subsidiary body of the International Organization of La Francophonie (OIF), is working to improve understanding and understanding of the issues and challenges of climate change negotiations. Publishes a Negotiations Guide, which is also the subject of a Summary for Policymakers (see the Negotiations Guide). These documents are widely disseminated upstream of each Conference in digital format and during printed conferences. For several years they have been translated into English to meet the demands of English-speaking countries and partners, because such detailed reference documents do not exist beyond the French-speaking world at the moment.

At the 23rd Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, these documents were prepared by ENERGIES 2050 for the Institute of La Francophonie for Sustainable Development (IFDD).

ENERGIES 2050 has provided editorial direction, co-ordination and is one of the principal authors of the Negotiations Guide and Summary for Decision Makers. These documents provide readers with a history of the negotiations and present an analysis of the various issues to be negotiated in Bonn as well as an overview of the Conference’s expectations and a wealth of useful information in the form of the technical sheets.

Go to our page dedicated to COP23

Extract from the OIF/IFDD website (translated)

The reality of climate change is a widely shared fact. However, in spite of international negotiations, it has to be said that the progress made in recent decades has still been too modest in view of the many challenges and the urgency to act. The agreement reached at the 21st session of the Conference of the Parties (COP) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Paris in December 2015 is of crucial importance to the climate negotiations process. While insisting on the different national realities, in accordance with the founding principle of the UNFCCC of common but differentiated responsibilities, the Agreement reaffirms the necessary strengthening of the ambition and measures to be taken for the development of our societies along low-carbon, resilient and mutually supportive trajectories. However, the challenge of implementation remains unresolved and the next steps are crucial to transform the collective vision and ambition into reality on the ground.

Since the adoption of the Paris Agreement, much progress has been made in Marrakech (COP22, Marrakesh, November 2016) and Bonn (under the aegis of the 46th session of the permanent subsidiary bodies, May 2017) and the COP23 contribution will be central to continuing the ongoing work. With the adoption of the Paris Agreement in December 2015, followed by its entry into force less than a year later in November 2016, the international community has met two major challenges. Now it remains to operationalize the objectives, confronting the challenges of implementation. On all the points under negotiation, it is essential that the “spirit of Paris” present since the adoption of the Agreement be maintained in Bonn. The aim is to ensure that the ambitions of the international community are based on confidence and sustainability, while the Parties agreed in Marrakech to postpone certain final decisions on the operationalisation of the Paris Agreement until December 2018, at CoP24.

In order to help negotiators better understand the challenges of COP23, this guide presents, in Part I, the major issues under discussion. Part II proposes a synthetic deciphering of the Paris Agreement and the challenges involved in achieving its objectives, focusing on the work carried out by the permanent subsidiary bodies and the Ad Hoc Working Group of the Paris Agreement. Finally, Part III provides a brief history of the climate negotiations, a presentation of the UNFCCC structure and the main negotiating groups and their positions.

This document has been prepared by ENERGIES 2050 on behalf of the Institut de la Francophonie pour le développement durable (IFDD) and does not necessarily represent the views of any of these organizations, nor those of the COP23 Presidency.

This document is updated on the basis of information available on 3 October 2017.