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WTO’s Lamy Presents Overview of Climate Crisis
Published Wednesday, November 04, 2009 at 05:15 AM
Calling the world climate crisis – urgent and a top priority – World Trade Organization Director-General Pascal Lamy told an Ottawa, Canada audience that - climate policy makers tell me the world has never been closer to a global deal. Both developed and developing countries alike want to tackle climate change. But Lamy warns, - it is the details of how they do so that remain to be closed. The WTO leader says climate negotiation has my full support. But, part of that support will continue to manifest itself in not reducing the climate agenda to one on trade.

When it comes to cap-and-trade schemes, Lamy believes - some have either already introduced, or may introduce, various flexibilities to reduce the compliance pain for their industries. The free allocation of pollution permits is one such example, and could be WTO-related. At the same time, - others are contemplating - border adjustments, - of various sorts, for the future. These measures may, according to Lamy, take the form of a requirement upon importers to purchase pollution permits at the border, or of carbon tax, to encourage exporters to account for their emissions.

Options of this nature are embodied in European climate directives, and in some of the bills currently being contemplated in the United States with the Waxman-Markey and Boxer-Kerry bills being the most recent. These - border measures – according to Lamy, - stem from the philosophy that since the Copenhagen Summit may fail, the - first-movers - on climate change must themselves take action to level the carbon playing field. They must offset the competitive disadvantage that their industry may suffer from enduring the costs of climate mitigation.

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