Poor Countries 'needs carbon cut' to control global warming

People in developing countries will need to make big cuts in greenhouse gas emissions if "dangerous" climate change is to be avoided, a report warns.

Researchers at the Third World Network calculate that even if rich nations make deep cuts, the developing world will face per-capita reductions of 60%.It suggests this would pose challenges to these countries' development.

Meanwhile, another report warns that current proposals for cutting developed world emissions do not go far enough.

"They're grim if we go for a 50% [global] cut by 2050, and we may need more - I think we only went for a 50% figure so as not to scare politicians."

Halving global emissions by 2050 (relative to a 1990 baseline) would mean that they are unlikely to rise more than 2.5C above the pre-industrial average, according to calculations by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

A number of countries, including the UK, want to keep their own emissions in 2050 80% below the 1990 baseline.

If the entire industrialised world took on this commitment, the Third World Network calculates, developing nations would have to cut their emissions by 23% in order for the world to hit its 50% target.

But because the populations of developing countries are growing, this 23% figure translates to a per-capita cut of 60%.

If the developing world made a more modest commitment, to keep its per-capita emissions constant at 1990 levels, population growth would still mean that the total emissions from these countries would double by 2050, scuppering any chance of a global 50% cut.

The EU has staked a claim to that lead by vowing to cut its emissions by 20% by 2020, or by 30% if there is a global deal.Mr Obama has proposed a more modest goal - bringing US emissions down by 2020 to the level they were at in 1990.

The analysis by the Global Climate Network suggests these pledges are not enough to halve global emissions by 2050, even if they are implemented.

There is, it says, a "mitigation gap"

"But we have got to find an equitable way of doing that."

The clear message from putting these two reports together was, he said, that richer nations will have to get finance and clean technology into the developing world if they want to turn the goal of a 50% cut into reality.