Climate change campaign
progress report

February 2011 (updated March 2011)

Current status: 2
Every month our Climate Change campaign team assesses the progress of the campaign so far. We look at our goals for political change, and how the public and the private sector are taking action to make it happen. We give the campaign a rating of 1-4 to summarise progress each month (1 = much more progress needed; 4 = we're making great progress).

Slow political progress

We’ve seen some small progress with signs that the European Commission is considering increasing the Europe-wide target for reducing emissions from 20% to 25% by 2020. This is still far short of the 40% needed but is positive. The UK Government has been blocking international support for a Robin Hood Tax which could help pay for climate action. It has also confirmed that climate adaptation funding for the world’s poorest countries won’t be additional to development aid – not unexpected but still a negative sign.

Media get the message

There was lots of media coverage of the fact that rising food prices are pushing millions of people into poverty. Oxfam will be making further connections between climate change and food crises over the coming months. We’ll also be exposing other factors, such as “land grabs” by governments and corporations, that are forcing people into hunger.

Robin Hood falls in love

Oxfam activists took to the streets and showed their MPs some love over February. Robin Hood Tax actions took place across the UK, and the world, as banks announced details of their bonuses. Campaigners also sent Valentine’s cards to their MPs asking them to show some love for the climate by pressing the Government to take strong action on climate change.

Take action to fill the fund

The Cancun climate talks established a global Climate Fund, but we still need to make sure it’s filled with cash to fight climate change.

The International Maritime Organisation (the UN body that regulates international shipping) meets in London this March to look at proposals to reduce emissions from shipping. It’s estimated schemes to reduce emissions from international transport (e.g. a tax on shipping) could generate at least $12 billion (US dollars) a year.

We want to make sure the delegates at the March meeting understand what an important role they can play in reducing emissions and raising climate finance.

Send us your message for the IMO

Send us your message and we’ll hand the best ones to IMO delegates in the form of origami boats! Either tweet your message, including the hashtag #FillTheFund, or post it in the comments section of our fill the fund blog.

Find out how we did last month

See our progress report for January.