In 1997, the United States joined more than 100 other countries in signing the Kyoto Protocol, which stipulated that signatories must significantly reduce carbon-dioxide emissions from 1990 levels. If Congress ratifies the agreement, the United States will commit itself to cutting its emissions by 7 percent before 2010.
Some Clinton administration officials and scientists, however, claim that the United States will come nowhere near that goal unless countries are given credit for their carbon-dioxide-absorbing trees and plants. Though the proposal has some merit, its implementation would drastically limit the Kyoto Protocol’s lofty purpose: to reduce emissions and curtail human-induced global warming.
Representatives at the Kyoto convention all formally agreed that global warming is an important issue, human activity — especially within developed countries — is a significant cause of the global climate change, and it is in every party’s best interest to decrease carbon emissions.
The U.S. proposal would dangerously remove emphasis from those goals. The large swaths of forested land in nations like the United States and Canada — which the plan would unfairly favor over small, European countries — would deter those countries from substantially raising environmental standards and lowering carbon-dioxide levels.
Although offering incentives to countries for maintaining their forests gives the proposal some value, the detrimental effects to emissions-reduction efforts negates these possible benefits.