Norway’s Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg will attend the climate conference held in Bali, Indonesia from December 3-14, 2007 together with the newly appointed Minister of Environment and Development Cooperation, Mr Erik Solheim, as well as Minister of Finance, Mrs Kristin Halvorsen.
This is the second visit of Prime Minister Stoltenberg in 2007. In March he visited Banda Aceh and Jakarta, where he also had talks with President Yudhoyono. The two leaders will have an encore this December, when they meet in Bali for new bilateral talks.
The Prime Minister has made it clear that climate change is a major political challenge in our time. All countries must contribute by reducing emissions in order to limit humanly induced climate changes. The Government has stated that Norway shall be a leading nation in environmental policy. Norway will press for a more comprehensive and ambitious climate agreement to succeed the Kyoto Protocol. Norway will follow up its commitments and reduce emissions nationally as well as internationally.
“It is imperative that we reach a comprehensive post-Kyoto agreement. The new agreement must be firmly anchored in the UN, and it must include all major emitting countries and all major sectors. When we meet in Bali in December we should agree on the roadmap for the coming negotiations”, Prime Minister Stoltenberg said in his statement at the United Nations General Assembly, 62nd Session.
Minister of Finance, Mrs Kristin Halvorsen, who will meet with Indonesian finance minister, Sri Mulyani Indrawati, at a special meeting for finance ministers, has also a climate portfolio. Her office has, following a tender announced in September, received offers from about 10 different Clean Development Mechanism (CDM) projects in Asia, Africa and Latin America. The volume offered totals about 4 million CERs. This is the first small step in a series of purchases and the Ministry of Finance will step up their efforts in this area in the coming year.
The former Minister for Minister of Development Cooperation is also coming to Bali. His responsibility increased when he replaced Minister of the Environment, Helen Bjørnøy (SV), as well as continuing to carry out the responsibility for development affairs at the Ministry on Foreign Affairs. It was the first time in Norway that a minister was appointed to run two ministries at the same time.
