Environment chiefs from the world’s top industrial countries pledged “strong political will“ Monday toward cutting greenhouse gas emissions in half by 2050, declaring that developed nations should take the lead in battling global warming.
The statement by ministers from the Group of Eight nations, however, stopped short of pledging firm commitments for mid-century or a midterm goal for 2020, which many countries argue are crucial to saving the planet from environmental crisis provoked by rising temperatures, AP reported.
Aimed at setting the stage for decisive action at the G8 summit in Toyako, Japan, in July, the joint communiquŽ also recognized rich nations’ obligation to provide technology and financing to help developing countries fight global warming.

Ichiro Kamoshita (c) JapanÕs environment minister and chairman of G8 environment ministers meeting, delivers a speech during the closing ceremony in Kobe, western Japan on May 26.

“The major outcome was on climate change: we strongly expressed the will to come to agreement at Toyako so we can halve emissions by 2050,“ said Japanese Environment Minister Ichiro Kamoshita. “Advanced nations should show leadership to reach this goal.“
The statement cited the need for global gas emissions to peak within the next 10 to 20 years, and it called on developing countries with rapidly increasing greenhouse gas emissions to work to curb the rate of increase.
The ministers, however, made no mention of a scientific recommendation that rich countries make reductions of between 25 percent and 40 percent by 2020 to avoid the worst effects of warming. European nations, the UN climate chief and environmentalists had clamored in Kobe for progress toward such a reduction pledge by G8 countries, arguing that failure could endanger UN-led talks aimed at concluding a new climate change pact by the end of 2009.
“Without a mandatory midterm target for developing countries, it will be very difficult to get agreement“ by that deadline, said Matthias Machnig, the delegate from Germany. Still, he conceded that ministers in Kobe had “made a step here today--a small one, but an important one.“
The European Union has pledged a 20 percent emissions reduction by 2020, and has offered to raise it to 30 percent if other nations sign on. The United States, however, has not committed to a midterm goal, demanding commitments from top developing countries such as China first. Japan has also not yet set a 2020 target.
Kamoshita and Scott Fulton, deputy assistant administrator at the US Environmental Protection Agency, argued that it was premature for them to set midterm targets, and they said such commitments should be the result of negotiations leading to the climate pact in 2009.
“At this point, I’m not sure if it’s appropriate for us to cite specific figures,“ Fulton said.
The United States is the only major industrialized country not to have ratified the Kyoto Protocol global warming pact, which commits 37 nations to cutting emissions by an average of 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. Washington has argued that the pact would hurt its economy, and is unfair because it does not obligate developing nations to also cut emissions.
During a news conference after the concluding meeting of ministers from the G8 nations--the US, Britain, Japan, Germany, Italy, Canada, Russia and France--divisions were apparent between Germany and the United States.
Machnig forcefully described Germany’s commitment to cutting gases by 40 percent by 2020, several times turning in Fulton’s direction as he spoke.
Fulton, who also called for commitments from heavily polluting emerging economies, defended US action on climate change, citing billions of dollars spent on research into global warming and other anti-warming steps. “We’ve not been sitting on our hands by any means,“ he said.

The United States has effectively given Persian Gulf Arab oil producers the go ahead for making changes to their dollar-pegged foreign exchange policies, by recognizing inflation as a problem, Merrill Lynch has said.
In a report entitled ’US Green Light for the PGCC’, the US investment bank said the United Arab Emirates and Qatar will probably move to a currency basket in the next few months, with their respective currencies appreciating five percent before the end of the year, TradeArabia reported.
Saudi Arabia is unlikely to follow until late next year, Merrill said in the report received on Sunday.
Citing a US Treasury report to Congress that for the first time mentioned currency and inflation issues in the six-member Persian Gulf Cooperation Council, Merrill said the United States government had become more confident about the outlook for the dollar and therefore did not necessarily need Persian Gulf support for its currency.

The global food situation is serious and prices of essential food items are unlikely to come down dramatically in the near term, an official of the Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO) said on the sidelines of a conference in Abu Dhabi on Sunday.
Food and Nutrition Officer at the FAO’s regional office in Cairo, Fatima Hachem, told Gulf News that as the prices of essential commodities rise, people in the low-income group, worldwide, are finding it increasingly difficult to afford to buy these items for themselves and their families.
“There have recently been food riots in many places around the world, mainly in some of the African countries and Haiti,“ Hachem said.
Hachem said factors that have contributed to the food crisis include the drought in Australia, major diversion of corn output for producing ethanol instead of it being used as food, increase in global crude oil prices that have led to higher agricultural production and transportation costs, and an increase in the middle-class population of China and India that’s increased the demand for food.

South Korean police detained 37 protesters during a rally here early Sunday against the government’s decision to resume imports of US beef, officials said.
The detentions came when police dispersed hundreds of demonstrators who had held a candle-lit vigil in central Seoul amid public concern about the safety of the beef.
Seoul police chief Han Jin-Hee told Yonhap news agency that he was considering arresting some of those detained, saying they had refused to disperse, occupied streets and attacked policemen. “Police, in talks with prosecutors, will decide whether to seek arrest warrants tomorrow for the masterminds of the illegal acts,“ Han told Yonhap.
Hundreds of demonstrators, including students, continued to rally later Sunday at roadsides, denouncing the police action and President Lee Myung-Bak.
“Impeach Lee Myung-Bak!,“ they chanted repeatedly, jabbing their fists into the air. Police troops were watching the rallying crowd.

Hundreds of thousands of people in Argentina have attended rival rallies by farmers and the government, in a dispute over higher taxes on exports.
The farmers--who are profiting from high global commodity prices--say a new regime of taxes, export limits and price caps on their produce is unfair, BBC reported.
But President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner told a rally her policies were aimed at redistributing wealth to all. The ongoing row, including two strikes, has led to a shortage of produce.
The two rallies coincided with the Revolution Day public holiday--when the country unites to mark the founding in 1810 of the movement that led to its independence from Spain.
But instead, there was a deep split as tens of thousands of farmers and their supporters gathered in the city of Rosario to call on the government to lower export taxes.
Farmers on tractors filled the main square, where they waved national flags and listened to music celebrating rural life before the main farm leaders spoke.
In March, a three-week farmers strike led to food shortages across the country.