Principles of international environmental protection - Introduction to International Environmental Law - page 118

to accept the outcome from the negotiations, and - in certain countries -
whether its parliament is prepared to ratify the agreement.
The 1992 Rio environment conference included the principle of common
but differentiated responsibilities in the Rio Declaration. Principle 7 states that
industrial nations bear a wider responsibility for the health of the Earth's
ecosystem because they have historically contributed signifi cantly more to
environmental degradation. The developed countries also acknowledge in
Principle 7 that due to their greater technological and fi nancial resources they
should take primary responsibility for this joint environmental work.
Consequently, the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities
appears in nearly all global environmental agreements.
The 'polluter pays' principle is another that is based partly on the same idea
as common but differentiated responsibilities. The idea is very reasonable:
should not the originator of an environmental problem or damage be liable
for compensation, and also for the return of the environment to its previous
state where possible? The polluter pays principle has evolved chiefl y in
Western countries and it has been developed primarily by the Organisation
for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). The term 'polluter'
can refer to a group of states, a state or a private business. The OECD
connects the principle with the notion that a company should include all the
true costs of a product in its prices, including any expenses that it may incur
from polluting the environment (which would otherwise be 'externalized' -
that is, the cost is borne by someone other than the company, and not
necessarily in monetary terms). The polluter pays principle is often referred
to in connection with agreements of strict liability (see Chapter 6 , 'Strict-
liability agreements', p. 178).
These principles - common but differentiated responsibilities and polluter
pays - are also expressed in the introduction to the UN Framework Convention
on Climate Change. The principle of fairness is very clear: developed countries
have largely caused climate change 35 and are primarily responsible for most of
the current emissions; furthermore, they have the greater fi nancial and techni-
cal resources in order to cut their greenhouse gas emissions. 36
The entire UN climate regime was, in fact, constructed upon these princi-
ples. In the 1992 convention, the industrial nations undertook to provide
fi nancial and technical assistance and to generally take actions to cut green-
house gas emissions; these nations are listed in Annexes I and II. By the 1997
Kyoto Protocol, the industrial nations committed to undertake legally binding
reductions in emissions, while the developing countries have no binding
reduction duties; all countries share the responsibility to prevent climate
change, by virtue of the climate regime.
The principle acts as the basis of the climate regime, but it is facing increas-
ing criticism now that China has overtaken the United States as the world's
greatest emitter of greenhouse gases. The basis of fairness still remains: histor-
ically, China has only made a small contribution to climate change, although
its greenhouse gas emissions per capita today exceed the levels of many