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Hilary Benn's diary February 2009

Environment Secretary Hilary Benn wrote this diary during his trip to Kenya and Antarctica. He attended the Governing Council of the United Nations Environmental Programme in Nairobi and visited a number of schemes and projects; he then went to Antarctica to look at climate change research there.

Friday 20 - Saturday 21 February 2009

Our study tour visit to Antarctica has been delayed because of bad weather. They have to have an alternative airfield open – there are only a couple of places to land for long-haul flights – but at the moment the Russian airfield has high winds and poor visibility. 

So we decided to use the time to discuss the climate change negotiations. Thanks to the Norwegians – and Erik Solheim the Environment and Development minister in particular – this involved ministers and negotiators from the EU, China, Russia, India, the USA, Indonesia, Algeria and Papua New Guinea.

nick stern and dr pachauriThe discussions were pretty frank. The truth is that all countries understand the urgency of the task - if anyone was in any doubt then two presentations from Dr Pachauri of the IPCC and Nick Stern [pictured] made the point – but they also worry about the cost to their economies of taking the action necessary. And yet, as Nick Stern famously showed in his report, the cost of doing nothing is much higher.

Two questions dominated; what contribution will each country make to dealing with the problem and how, especially for developing countries, will these changes be financed? The former is tough because developing countries want and need to grow to improve the lives of their citizens, and yet even if all the rich developed countries were to stop all emissions tonight, the world would still be facing dangerous climate change because of the concentration of gases already in the atmosphere and rising emissions from the emerging and developing economies. It has been really worthwhile getting this group together, however. 

In the morning we went to Kirstenbosch botanical gardens to hear Guy Midgley talk about climate change in South Africa. He said that fruit growers were already being affected; they need winter chills to help the crop in summer, but winters are becoming less cold. Malaria could spread much more widely across southern Africa. There will be an increased risk of fires. And the warming of the ocean will affect its ability to absorb carbon. Pretty sobering.

At the end of the day we went to Robben Island. Having read Nelson Mandela’s extraordinary autobiography, it was pretty sobering to see the small cell where he spent a large part of his 18 years in prison. I asked the former inmate who showed us around whether he was bitter. “ No. Not at all.” He replied “Bitterness is a cancer and it eats you up. I have freedom now – and after all that’s what I was fighting for”.


Hilary Benn

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Page last modified: 24 February 2009
Page published: 24 February 2009