New Zealand, in step with many other countries, has voiced its grave concern over the United States' abandonment of the Kyoto Protocol on greenhouse gas emissions. There was good reason for disappointment, and not only because President George W. Bush's decision left the fight against global warming in tatters.
New Zealand stood to be a leading beneficiary of one of the protocol's cornerstones, the international trading of emission credits. Countries would have been able to sell excess emission credits to others that found it more difficult or expensive to reduce their emissions. New Zealand, boasting few smokestack industries, increasingly resplendent in carbon-sink pine forests and with most of its power hydro-based, eyed a quota trading regime from a position of strength. Now, however, it must guard against any impulse to strike out alone and hastily ratify the protocol. That would be a recipe for competitive weakness.
The Minister of Energy seems aware of the danger. New Zealand will not, says Mr Hodgson, take what would amount to futile unilateral action. Effectively, he is scrapping the Government's original plan to ratify the Kyoto Protocol by the middle of next year. Without the credit trading regime, New Zealand, in fact, has nothing to gain.
But Mr Hodgson will need to stick to his guns. There is bound to be pressure from those who believe our clean, green image would be enhanced by ratifying the protocol - thereby binding the country to cutting its emissions of greenhouse gases back to 1990 levels over the next 10 years.
Ratification would, at best, amount to a worthless gesture. At worst, however, it could be extremely damaging. New Zealand's position must be kept in perspective. It creates about one-fifth of 1 per cent of the world's greenhouse gas emissions. Anything done here will have little impact on the global picture.
