Standing alone on Kyoto

Pro Kyoto groups try to portray the US as the only holdout to the Kyoto Protocol, and hence saving the planet.

Owen McShane points out that amongst APEC, New Zealand is in fact the only country likely to actually you know tax people more to do something.

“Signing the Kyoto Protocol has made us the Apec outcast. The United States and Australia have refused to ratify the accord. Japan has “accepted” but it is a Clayton’s commitment. Russia has signed, but doesn’t have to do anything for at least five years. Canada is trying to weasel out of its commitments because it exports so much clean gas to the US.

China, Singapore, Brunei, Hong Kong, Taiwan and South Korea are all classed as developing countries and hence too poor to be expected to sign. So, too, are Chile, Indonesia, Malaysia, Mexico, Papua New Guinea, Peru, the Philippines, Thailand and Vietnam. We are one of the “super rich”, unlike such “desperately poor” economies as Singapore and Hong Kong. “