By Hope Imaka – EMTV Online
With less than one week before the 21st Conference of the Parties (COP21) of the climate treaty, Corporate Accountability International have today released a new report, “Fueling the Fire: The corporate sponsors bankrolling COP21”.
The report exposes the filthy track record of corporations sponsoring the climate talks, which are scheduled to be held in Paris from November 30 to December 11, focusing on the environmental destruction and public policy interference of the leading COP21 sponsors.
Sponsors include fossil fuel conglomerates Engie (formerly GDF Suez) and Suez Environment, as well as global banking giant BNP Paribas and French utility Électricité de France (EDF).
According to various public marketing generated in the lead up to COP21, “…the 21st Conference held in Paris, aims to secure the first universally recognised accord to try to limit temperature rise to degrees Celsius…” https://youtu.be/WuriLuPSvZA
By detailing the corporations’ abuses to the environment and aggressive lobbying to undermine environmental policy, the report lays bare the conflict of interest inherent in allowing such a sponsorship to exist.
As stated in the report, “On November 30, 2015, the world will meet in Paris to negotiate a new agreement for tackling climate change. Organised through the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), the 21st Conference of Parties (COP21) will seek a legally binding agreement on climate action, namely greenhouse gas emission reductions, by all countries of the world.
“However, with major industrial polluters using their deep pockets to influence climate policy at every level, how will a meaningful agreement be secured?”
In May, more than 60 organisations launched a global campaign to kick big polluters out of climate policy. To date, more than half a million people have called for the implementation of existing legal precedents to protect climate policy from the interference of the emissions-intensive industries. The coalition will deliver these demands to the Parties in Paris in a week’s time.
For governments to achieve a historic agreement, lobbying efforts by fossil fuel and emissions-intensive corporations must be prohibited.
