Welcome remarks for “Japan’s 1st National Workshop on Economics of

Climate Change and Low Carbon Growth Strategies in Northeast Asia”

Prof. Hironori Hamanaka

Chair of the Board of Directors
Institute for Global Environmental Strategies

Distinguished guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,

My name is Hironori Hamanaka, Chair of the Board of Directors of the Institute for
Global Environmental Strategies (IGES).
It is my great pleasure to welcome all of you and make a few remarks for this important
meeting, named “Japan’s 1st National Workshop on Economics of Climate Change and
Low Carbon Growth Strategies in Northeast Asia”.

Climate change is one of the most serious and urgent challenges for human beings. To
address this issue, the international community has been implementing the United Nations
Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the Kyoto Protocol. Now, the attention of
the international community has moved to the discussion on steps to address climate
change beyond 2012. The Conference of the Parties, at its 15th session, took note of the
Copenhagen Accord last December, and by now more than 70 countries, both developed
and developing, have submitted their targets and actions to mitigate climate change. These
are important steps that have been taken under the Accord.

Ladies and gentlemen,

Asia seems destined to be a centre of global efforts to address climate change. Most of
Asian economies have experienced the rapid growth in the last decades, and they are
expected to grow further. Their energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions are
projected to increase steeply, which means significant repercussions for global mitigation
efforts. On the other hand, the vulnerability of the region to the negative impacts of
climate change, due to relatively large and poor populations with low adaptive capacity, is
well-known. The architecture of the future climate regime, therefore, has considerable
implications for sustainable development in the Asia region.

Against this background, the Asian Development Bank initiated the so-called Mini-Stern
Review, Economics of Climate Change in Asian. The first round was conducted in 2008
and 2009, and its focus was on Southeast Asia. It was my pleasure that IGES was actively

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involved in the first round of the Mini-Stern Review. The Report was published last year,
and caught significant attention from all over the word. The Report confirms that the
region of Southeast Asia is highly vulnerable to climate change and demonstrates that a
wide range of adaptation measures are already being applied. The report also shows that
the region has a great potential to contribute to greenhouse gas emission reduction, and
that the costs of inaction could be very high to the region and globally. The basic policy
message is that efforts must be made to apply all feasible and economically viable
adaptation and mitigation measures as key elements of a sustainable development strategy
for Southeast Asia.

The new round of the Review focuses on Northeast Asia, including China, Japan,
Mongolia and Republic of Korea. This is a very timely exercise, because all the four
countries are very much keen on tackling climate change through various mitigation and
adaptation actions. Indeed, the four countries pledged mitigation actions under the
Copenhagen Accord.

Let me talk a little bit about recent developments in Japan. Japan is committed to the 6%
emissions reductions compared to the 1990 levels under the Kyoto Protocol, and now
expected to meet the Kyoto target. Japan also pledged the mid-term target under the
Copenhagen Accord. That is to reduce its GHG emissions by 25% compared to the 1990
levels, premised on agreement on ambitious targets by all the major economies. To
achieve this ambitious target, all possible measures must be employed. With this regard,
Japan’s Cabinet endorsed the Bill for the Basic Law on Tackling Global Warming last
month and sent it to the Diet. The draft Basic Law stipulates mid and long-term emission
reduction targets, and consists of three policy pillars: the establishment of a domestic
emissions trading scheme, environmental tax, and a feed-in-tariff scheme for renewable
energy resources. In the process leading up to the Cabinet meeting in March to take a
decision on the Bill, there was heated discussions within the Government as to whether the
capping under this emissions trading scheme should be based on absolute volume or
relative emissions such as GHG emissions per economic output, and the final decision was
that while basically the former should be applied, the latter could be applied in certain
cases.

Preceding the national government, Tokyo Metropolitan Government has started its cap &
trade scheme in April this year to meet its emissions-reductions target of a 25% reduction
by 2020 compared with the 2000 levels. Tokyo has mandated large business
establishments to reduce their emissions by 6-8% by 2014 and 17% by 2019. If these
duties are breached, the names of those establishments will be disclosed and fined at a
maximum of 500,000 yen. Unlike the Japanese national government’s Basic Law on
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Tackling Global Warming, Tokyo’s scheme solely focuses on emissions reductions in
term of absolute volume. This is a pioneering initiative in Japan, and neighbouring local
governments are trying to take concerted action to respond to this new initiative.

As shown by the case of Japan, climate policies are rapidly evolving in Northeast Asia
with significant repercussions for international relations. In addition, the region has
significant trade relations and common interest in energy security and technology
solutions. Therefore, it is critically important to strengthen our understanding of climate
policy on a regional basis.

I am very much glad to have distinguished resource persons today and tomorrow, all of
you are well known for intellectual contributions to the climate policy process and debates
at not only domestic level but also regional and international levels. I am sure that your
participations to this workshop will help ADB to capture rapidly changing landscape of
Japan’s climate policies and enhance a better understanding of economies of climate
change from a regional perspective.

As I conclude my remarks, once again I would like to welcome all of you to this important
workshop, and wish you good and fruitful deliberations. And, I hope this kind of
consultations offers an important and timely avenue for making progress in global efforts
to tackle climate change.

Thank you very much.