TiSA reduces COP21 to a charade

• BLiP
• 8 years ago
• Categories: climate change, energy, Environment, ETS, global warming, Globalisation, International, Mining, national, privatisation, Privatisation, trade
• Tags: climate change, cop21, GATS, neoliberalism, TISA, wto

‘

While the world’s eyes are focused on COP21 in Paris, the laws and regulations which will actually be put in place to ameliorate climate change are being simultaneously discussed in secret at the TiSA negotiations in Geneva.

The Trade in Services Agreement (TiSA) is an adjunct to the World Trade Organisation’s (WTO) General Agreement on Trade in Services (GATS). Difficult to follow? Its supposed to be . . . makes it hard for people to catch on to what’s up. Fortunately, there was a massive leak of documents earlier this year and, on November 30, Wikileaks released an expert analysis of the proposed TiSA Annex “Energy Related Services” (ETS). If even just a few parts of the expert analysis come to fruition, COP21 is an utter charade.

For example, the analysis shows that it is the current intention of  TiSA’s participating nations to:

• establish as Article 1 a principle of “technological neutrality” whereby commitments would extend across all energy sectors regardless of the fuel source of technology, denying regulators the right to distinguish solar from nuclear, wind from coal, or geothermal from fracking
• reduce states’ sovereignity over energy resources (regardless of Article V’s declaring otherwise) by requiring states to establish free markets for foreign suppliers of energy related services thereby removing the right to ensure domestic economic benefits from exploiting energy resources
• shift political power over energey and climate policies from people using their governments for shaping fair and sustainable economies to global corporations using TiSA restricting governments from regulating energy markets, companies, and industry infrastructure

New Zealand was locked into compliance with what ever TiSA comes up with when the, so-called, “free trade” deal with South Korea was signed. The leaking of the TiSA material in June, exposed New Zealand as one of the most extreme neoliberal nations involved, particularly in relation to the reduction of state sovereignty.  TiSA itself is so extreme, the WTO barely wants anything to do with it.

That National Ltd™ is preparing to remove any ability for government to do anything about climate change explains why expectations are being talked down: we’re being softened up. It also partly explains the zombie-like performance of John Key in Paris: he knows COP21 is just a big waste of time.

Hat Tip: Tautoko Mangō Mata