ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY Essay Example | Topics and Well Written Essays - 2000 words

ENVIRONMENTAL POLICY - Essay Example This is a significant environmental issue that has raised debate across the country and the increasing use of technology by the developed nations is one of the major threats that prompted the signing of the Montreal protocol. The agreement also sought to tighten the ban on trading some substances like methyl due to its great contribution to the ozone depletion with dire climatic consequences on Earth. b. Implementation schedule. Since 1987 when this protocol was observed after the Vienna convention, there has been a series of meetings among the parties and there is as steady implementation and amendment of some of the policies. The initial meeting was meant to address the mode of mitigating the emission of ozone depletion substances with particular focus to the chlorofluorocarbon compounds (Reitze, 2001). Further meetings have been occasioned by assessment of the implementation process with the last meeting of the open-ended working group emphasizes the strict adherence to the protoc ol rules and regulations which is now backed up by licensing of various manufacturers and their nations on the limit of the producing the specified ozone depletion process (United Nations Environment Programme,2006). Implementation schedule was spread over years that spans from the protocol’s inception to 2013. c. Number of participants and the reasons for the level of participation. The Protocol currently has 197 parties who are assigned various legal obligations to undertake. The members participation is determined by the economic status since this highly gives the estimated volume of industrial production which in turn explains the production of ODS (Reitze, 2001). The developed member states have been found to be the major polluters as compared to the less developed countries and this explains why their participation is more of concern. The developing countries are most involved in promoting environmental care campaign in their respective nations. d. Compare the success o f the Montreal Protocol to that of the Kyoto Protocol and address the reasons for any differences in terms of National Interests of those that elected to participate and those that have not. The two protocols have a common denominator in the form of reducing the exponential rate of ozone layer depletion emissions. It is worth to note that US has been at the center stage as the global economic powerhouse in respect to the control of this climate menace issue. On the basis of cost benefit analysis US realized that it has more to lose from Kyoto protocol and therefore vehemently opposed it. On the other hand Montreal protocol was seen to be relatively friendly and proved to be acceptable by many countries. One of the issues that dogged Kyoto protocol was its monetary compensation mechanism which did not go down well with US and other nations. The conflicting interests of various participants arose from the cost/benefit analysis of the monetary consideration of Kyoto protocol against th e licensing of Montreal protocol (Oberthu?r & Ott, 1999). On aggregate many participants promoted adoption of Montreal protocol as being effective and economical to implement. 2. United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS): a. Discuss the issue of â€Å"Property Rights† as it relates to UNCOLS The United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) provides a legal framework that empowers various countries bordering sees and oceans on how to manage them (Sands, 2003). It is important to