The 2009 G8 Summit – different or not?

 

by Marcus Rowntree

The 2009 G8 summit was different to previous summits for a number of reasons but more importantly, this article asks, what difference will the summit really make for tackling poverty and climate change?This year’s summit was held in the small and earthquake stricken town of L’Aquila in central Italy. This was a strange location because of its limited accommodation - requiring world leaders to sleep in shared dormitories and the press to camp or commute. It could also have been seen as an unwise location considering survivors of the recent earthquakes are still camped there in temporary accommodation. Nonetheless this last minute change of site signalled an eagerness to show solidarity with the dispossessed.

A truly significant difference this year was that it is now President Obama representing the USA - a figure whose political outlook has consistently provided a remedy to the USA’s recent poor standing in world opinion. Perhaps even more importantly, this G8 summit was the first to be held now that the world is clearly in the grips of an economic recession - a consideration that could have potentially transformed the G8 countries’ priorities.

The G8 are of course not unfamiliar with recession, having been formed in the context of the oil crisis and global economic recession of the early 1970s. Nor was this the first summit at which Obama could make his mark - in fact he even hinted that there are now too many global summits each year which begs the question that the G8 summit may have outlived its usefulness.

Despite its creaking credibility, significant agreements were made. There was $20bn pledged to help boost food supplies in the developing world and agreements among both developed and developing nations that global temperatures must not be allowed to rise beyond 2C. Steps were also made to bind China and India into limiting their emissions and the USA reiterated commitments to cut emissions by a whopping 80% by 2050. This list of agreements could by no means have been taken for granted prior to world leaders’ descent on L’Aquila.

With all such gestures, however, there is a justifiable concern as to whether these commitments will be honoured. There are even questions as to whether they really would be the tangible changes that they claim to be. For example, it remains to be seen whether increased food aid would be financed by a decrease in aid for another aspect of development. Meanwhile with commitments on climate change aiming for dates as far away as 2050 for energy reductions there is a long time to wait to see how the USA adheres to its promised 80% reduction in emissions.

Looking back on previous G8 commitments, Max Lawson of Oxfam says that European G8 countries made the biggest promises at Gleneagles in 2005 but apart from the UK they are not on track to implement the aid increases they said they would by 2010.

It seems that there is one difference that will be crucial for the G8 summit if it is to remain relevant. This is that the commitments of its members must be more reliably met in the future. Whether L’Aquilla 2009 really was that different remains to be seen.

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