At the 2019 international climate change meeting convened by the United Nations (COP25), the “Bolivian Platform against Climate Change demanded that the Government begin to work in a participatory manner with civil society.” The regulation of carbon markets in Article 6 of the Paris agreement was a major topic of discussion at this meeting. “This mechanism is rejected by indigenous and environmental groups because they consider it a false solution to the climate problem.” The Bolivian Platform Against Climate Change along with “NGOs such as Cipca, Unitas, Cejis, Inti Illimani, Practical Solutions and Jubilee Foundation… has asked the Bolivian Government to change its Nationally Determined Contributions (NDC) and leave false solutions to climate change” such as the planned megadams and biofuels. “
“Martín Vilela, a member of the Bolivian Platform against Climate Change, explained that the NDCs of Bolivia contemplate commitments that propose the change of the energy matrix with alternative energies generated by mega-hydroelectric plants (such as the Chepete-El Bala and Rositas projects). For this, large dams must be built which, it is known, are large emitters of greenhouse gases (GHG); Therefore, it is not a real solution to climate change. He also noted that the generation of energy through agrofuels is another false solution. And it is that for the production of these it is necessary to expand the agricultural frontier; which implies greater deforestation and, consequently, the increase in GHG emissions, among other problems associated with biofuels.
“Members of the PBCC and other NGOs also reject commercial forest plantations that are contemplated in the Joint Forest Adaptation and Mitigation Mechanism, designed by the previous Government and which is part of the NDCs, agrofuels, mega-dams and energy nuclear. They demand that the new contributions be elaborated in a participatory manner with all the actors of Bolivian civil society.
According to Vilela, the NDCs in Bolivia do not measure greenhouse gas emissions. It ensures that they respond to the objective of the Paris Agreement (lower greenhouse gas emissions), because the actions and goals set will rather increase emissions and affect the poorest populations, among other impacts.
The request of the Platform and NGOs is for Bolivia to update its NDCs and to assume responsibility for protecting ecosystems, particularly forests, avoiding private land grabbing and dangerous market mechanisms and integrating the proposals of the communities they face. the impacts of extractive policies and climate change…”
The Bolivian Vice Minister of Environment and Climate Change, Carlos Fernando Rivadeneira previously “told Guardiana that the current government neither ratifies nor rejects the commitments contemplated in the NDCs of Bolivia that were elaborated by the management of Evo Morales, which establish an alternative mechanism to those of carbon markets than in COP 25”
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