Madam Speaker, I would like to take this opportunity to thank the hon. member for Red Deer for his motion to discuss the goals for carbon emission reduction.
The seventh Conference of the Parties, also known as CoP, currently is being held in Marrakesh. The purpose of the session is to finalize the text of the Bonn agreement which was reached at CoP six this past July. As the Prime Minister has said, the Bonn agreement opens the way for Canada's ratification of the Kyoto protocol next year, following full consultations with provinces, territories, stakeholders and other Canadians.
The public input on the ratification decision and the approaches that the Government of Canada could use to meet our targets and commitments will be the focus of these consultations. Work is currently under way to design this process. I want to be clear that the process will build on a large number of consultations that have been and will continue to be conducted by the federal government since the original Kyoto agreement which was signed in 1997.
For example in 1998, federal and provincial energy and environment ministers established the national climate change process. This initiative created 16 issue tables involving 450 experts from industry, academia, nongovernmental organizations and the government. A number of climate change initiatives in the federal government's action plan 2000 on climate change have drawn extensively from the results of this work already undertaken.
In addition, joint meetings of federal, provincial and territorial energy and environment ministers are held regularly to discuss various approaches to meeting our Kyoto target. Through our public education and outreach activities, the federal government has been reaching out to Canadians, both through door to door and national campaigns, working to ensure that Canadians have the information they need to participate fully in climate change discussions.
The government feels strongly that a rich discussion involving government, industry, interest groups and Canadians is critically important. Let me say unequivocally that the government's goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions are realistic. We are committed under the Kyoto protocol to reducing our emissions to 6% below 1990 levels by the period between 2008 and 2012. That amounts to a 200 megaton reduction per year by 2010.
Similarly our plans for meeting that goal are realistic. The Government of Canada has invested $1.1 billion in climate change initiatives through budget 2000 and action plan 2000. Together with the sinks component of the Bonn agreement these could deliver about one-half of the 200 megaton reduction that we need to reduce emissions to meet our said target.
We currently are developing additional initiatives to take us the rest of the way to our Kyoto target. The consultations that the government will be undertaking will focus on different policy approaches for achieving this goal. These consultations have been and will continue to be based solidly on sound science. Indeed the science of climate change has advanced considerably in recent years. We now understand better how climate systems function and we have a greater confidence in our models for making projections.
Last January the world's best climate scientists, including many from Canada, worked together through the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and released the third assessment report on climate change. I would like to quote directly from that report. In it, the IPCC said “there is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activity”.
Because of that human activity we can expect average global temperatures to rise anywhere from one and a half to six degrees Celsius by the end of this century. In Canada we could see even greater temperature increases in some regions. I want to be very clear that we understand the huge impact that this seemingly small change could have in average temperature.
Let me remind hon. members that during the last ice age average temperatures were only five degrees cooler than they are today. A simple five degree increase in average temperature was enough to melt the vast ice sheets that covered this continent.
Science tells us there will be dramatic consequences to the increases in temperature that we are facing. There could be more severe weather events such as thunderstorms, heavy rain, hail and tornadoes. These could take a heavy toll on human lives and property. Longer and more intense heat waves could make air pollution even worse in urban areas. We could see more droughts like the one that spread virtually from coast to coast this past summer which would affect agriculture and increase the risk of forest fires. Dryer conditions may also affect the quantity and quality of our drinking water.
In summary, sound science is the basis for sound policy. Canadian scientists have an international reputation for excellence in climate science and in modelling future climate through general circulation models. In budget 2000 the Government of Canada created the Canadian Foundation for Climate and Atmospheric Sciences to improve our understanding of climate processes and improve our ability to predict future climate. This will help Canadians in various sectors in all regions of the country adapt to the changing climate.
However, sound science is just one part of the picture. Sound economic analysis is also critical. Economic study underpins all of our efforts to achieve Kyoto and its targets in the most cost effective manner possible. Through the national climate change process the government has been working with the provinces and the territories to undertake extensive analytical work on a number of fronts. We are examining, among others, the economic implications of different policy options for meeting our goals, trade and competitiveness implications, and the role of major economic instruments such as domestic emissions trading.
Sound science tells us we need to act. Sound economic analysis tells us our goals for reducing emissions are indeed realistic and that we can seize opportunities by acting.
The Government of Canada will be consulting with Canadians over the next several months based on this science and this analysis to gain their input on the best policy options for meeting our Kyoto target. There is one thing we can be sure of and that is that we are committed to meeting our Kyoto target. We believe that Canadians will support us in that goal.