“System change, not climate change”
International conference
Safi (Morocco) 4th and 5th November 2016
15 years ago, Morocco hosted the COP 7. This year the Conference of Parties on Climate Change prepares its 22nd edition, again in Morocco. What happened during those 15 years? Not much.
COP 3 in Kyoto (1997) relied on the market to control carbon emissions. The Kyoto Protocol, which did not enter into force until 2005, confirmed that the market mechanisms are failing to reduce these emissions : they have been increasing 2% per year (5th IPCC report).
A new agreement was reached during COP 21, held in Paris in 2015: keep the temperature increase below 2 ° and try to limit it to 1.5. A huge step forward? Not really, since it was not given proper means of achievement. It is a mere statement of intent.
22 years of meetings and negotiations to achieve this poor result! What will happen in Marrakech? Probably not much. States continue to bet on voluntary commitments by the countries without establishing any control mechanisms or sanctions. Corporations continue to make law in the conference lobbies, and blind faith in technological solutions prevail over all other considerations. The COP conferences became places for business negociations between corporations and governments. Meanwhile, the climate warming goes on. Thus the MEDCOP 22 held in Tangier from 17 to 19 July 2016 ahead of the COP 22 ended with the signing of contracts between the Moroccan government and transnational companies.
As for Morocco, the different sector policies – Green Plan for agriculture, Halieutis plan for fisheries, Azure Plan for Tourism, Emergence Plan and slogans as Performing Ecosystems for industry and energy-, as well as the signature of free trade agreements with the United States and the European Union, all move towards over-exploitation of natural resources, increased trade, expansion of free zones and export-oriented productions, far from any perspective of preserving nature and climate. Morocco, on the eve of COP, highlights its pharaonic mega-projects in the solar field, but continues to develop fossil fuels, especially coal.
Climate change is a reality that affects us, we inhabitant (s) of Morocco, Maghreb, Africa and the entire world, in our daily lives. Extreme episodes, extreme cold and heat waves, droughts and floods are increasing, glaciers are melting, sea levels are rising, groundwater tables are polluted and emptying. Are we going to wait silent the climate, social, ecological looming catastrophe? Or that cohorts of climate refugees fleeing the rising waters or conversely drought and desertification, hunger; swell the exodus of people fleeing bombings, wars and conflicts (Afghanistan, Iraq, Yemen, Syria, Palestine, Libya…).
No, it is urgent to stand, to analyze the real causes of climate change and to point responsabilities. To think together about the necessary alternatives. Not the false solutions of the green economy that seeks how to turn the climate crisis into a new source of profit. Real solutions can only be achieved through an alternative model of society, working in new ways to produce, consume, live, eat and live with nature. We must demand urgent and immediate measures, let the sources of fossil fuels in the ground, relocate production and consumption, in order to defend common goods, etc.
Solutions exist!
We invite you to participate in a two days meetings and mobilization organized by ATTAC CADTM Morocco in SAFI (150 km from Marrakech) on 4 and 5 November 2016, with the following theme : “System change not climate change.”
These activities will also be in support of the Moroccans’ struggles to defend their water, their territories, their environment, including the mobilization of inhabitants of Safi, already heavily affected by pollution from Morocco Phosphore plant, which now wants to impose a coal power station. A symbol of the double language of the authorities who talk about green development and continue to invest in “dirty” energy.
ATTAC CADTM MOROCCO
October, 2016
