Guest essay by Eric Worrall
The UN is looking for a replacement for retiring UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon, and Christiana Figueres, who is credited with re-invigorating the global climate process in the wake of the Copenhagen disaster, is a top contender for the job.
Christiana Figueres, the UN official who helped steer the Paris climate change accord to success in December, has entered the race to succeed Ban Ki-moon as the organisation’s next secretary-general.
Ms Figueres, daughter of a three-time Costa Rican president, joins a large field of contenders for a post tipped to go to a woman for the first time in the UN’s 71-year history.
A colourful diplomat known for speaking her mind, she vowed to deliver a new model of “collaborative diplomacy” and the organisational reform that has been a hallmark of her time running the UN’s climate change secretariat in Bonn over the past six years.
“There is a prevalent feeling that the UN has stagnated, operates excessively in silos and is not fit for purpose,” she said in a “vision statement” supporting her bid.
Eleven people have already thrown their hat into the ring, including Helen Clark, one of New Zealand’s longest serving prime ministers, and Irina Bokova, a Bulgarian who heads the UN agency Unesco.
Read more: http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/76b987a8-4455-11e6-b22f-79eb4891c97d.html#ixzz4DlKMASAD
Christiana’s official vision statement;
RESTORING HOPE
The objective of the United Nations is to provide the architecture through which countries can address their common problems, peacefully resolve their disputes and support each other in building strong, prosperous and just societies. This is the foundation of international peace and security. Much has been achieved by this unique institution over the past 70 years, thanks to the dedication of its Member States and the commitment of its staff worldwide.
The question before us now is how to address the exigencies of a future so mired in complexity. In the face of rampant injustices, abuses, unrest and conflicts with increasing ramifications, there is understandable despair. But given the stakes, failure to address these challenges is simply not an option. Humanity has created these challenges, and we ourselves can and must step up to address them.
To do that, we need a UN that reclaims its standing as a beacon of hope; a reason for global optimism that calls us toward a compelling vision of the future, rekindling our confidence and inspiring each and every one of us to live up to our highest purpose.
It is for the opportunity to pursue this vision that I am honored to accept the nomination of Costa Rica as candidate for the position of UN Secretary-General.
Read more: http://www.christianafigueres.com/restoring_hope
According to Bloomberg, Figueres thinks Chinese Communism is a better form of government than Democracy, when it comes to addressing climate change.
Biggest Emitter China Best on Climate, Figueres Says
China, the top emitter of greenhouse gases, is also the country that’s “doing it right” when it comes to addressing global warming, the United Nations’ chief climate official said.
The nation has some of the toughest energy-efficiency standards for buildings and transportation and its support for photovoltaic technology helped reduce solar-panel costs by 80 percent since 2008, Christiana Figueres, executive secretary of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, said yesterday in an interview at Bloomberg News headquarters in New York.
The country is facing growing public pressure from citizens to reduce air pollution, due in large part to burning coal. Its efforts to promote energy efficiency and renewable power stem from the realization that doing so will pay off in the long term, Figueres said.
“They actually want to breathe air that they don’t have to look at,” she said. “They’re not doing this because they want to save the planet. They’re doing it because it’s in their national interest.”
China is also able to implement policies because its political system avoids some of the legislative hurdles seen in countries including the U.S., Figueres said.
I’ve got to say I’m not a fan of Figueres. Someone who seems to think Democracy is a hassle, because other people get to interfere with and impede your directives, is not someone I want to see in a position of even greater global authority than her previous job. But hey, its not like anyone is giving us a chance to vote on this decision.
close it down
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/2016/06/08/un-chief-faced-blackmail-after-blacklisting-saudi-led-coalition/
Following the EU, the UN is the next Marxist relic to be thrown onto the ash-heap of history.
One of Figueres’ proud boasts is that she was trained by Al Gore to deliver “An Inconvenient Truth”.
Her other achievements have been in the world of carbon trading, http://www.ideacarbon.com/about-us/advisory-board/Ms-Figueres.htm.
“Ms Figueres joined as Vice Chairman of the Carbon Ratings Agency in February 2009 and left in July 2010 as the new Executive Secretary of the UNFCCC and as such had to relinquish her role with the CRA. She sat on all CRA rating committee meetings during her tenure and initiated CRA’s analysis work for programmatic CDM.”
“The Carbon Rating Agency (CRA) is a wholly owned subsidiary of the IDEAglobal Group. It is the world’s only ratings agency focused on carbon and energy efficiency asset ratings. Its mission is to enable the creation of carbon as an asset class.”
She was a colleague of Lord Stern:
http://www.ideaglobal.com/corporate/advisory.html
Lord Nicholas Stern
2007-2009 Vice Chairman IDEAglobal Group
2009-2013 Advisor IDEAglobal Group
Author of the seminal Review on the Economics of Climate Change and former Chief Economist at the World Bank
Her brother Jose, also a former Costa Rican President, from 1994-98, has some history in the AGW industry as well, https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jos%C3%A9_Mar%C3%ADa_Figueres. In 1990, Figueres co-founded Energía Global Inc. a renewable energy company with operations in Costa Rica, Gua-temala, and Chile. The business was later sold and today it continues to operate as a subsidiary of ENEL, Italy’s largest power company.
He has also been a Director of the World Resources Institute (WRI), the Stockholm Environment Institute and WWF. Since 2010 he has been President of Branson’s Carbon War Room. From 2009 until 2011, when its mandate was completed, Figueres served on UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon’s Advisory Group on Climate Change and Energy.
When Costa Rican President, he says “I brought in economists like Jeffrey Sachs. I was strongly influenced by people like Maurice Strong [who headed the Rio earth summit] and his adviser on business, the Swiss industrialist Stefan Shmidheiny who set up the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD).
Family business.
Jose also on the Board of The Rocky Mountain Institute in Colorado, US. Carbon War Room merged with Rocky Mountain Institute c.2014.
Rocky Mountain Institute Board of Trustees Colorado includes:
Peter Boyer, Union of Concerned Scientists
Mark Ferron, California ISO
Jose Figueres Olsen, brother of Christiana Figueres
Jigar Shah, past Director, Greenpeace USA.
http://www.rmi.org/Board+of+Trustees
Mark Ferron, Rocky Mountain Institute Board of Trustees.
California/CPUC, Mar.2011-Jan.2014
CAISO, July 2015-Present
Both appointments by California Gov. Jerry Brown
http://www.caiso.com for more information.
AYRSHIRE Foundation, founded 1998
Peter Boyer, Secretary
http://www.ayrshirefoundation.org/about_board.htm
Corporate Knights Magazine, Canada, May 28, 2015
‘Are rich subsidies for solar holding the industry back? By Jigar Shah
“Germany has done this by getting solar installed at far less cost than in North America, where investors like me manipulate solar subsidies to maximize returns.”
http://www.corporateknights.com/channels/clean-technology/rich-subsidies-solar-holding-industry-back-14327928
Will Hillary Win, Nov., 2015
Event details: Nov.2, 2015
“”Hillary Clinton be visiting Chicago, Illinois again to attend a fundraising event hosted by Tanya and Michael Polsky who have hosted other fundraisers, Polsky is is the founder, President and CEO of Invenergy.
https://www.willhillarywin.com/events/chicago-illinois
Polsky is also on the Board of the World Resources Institute
Invenergy is a U.S. based wind and solar developer.
World Resources Institute
Board includes: Michael Polsky, Invenergy
http://www.wri.org/about/board
That woman deserves a billion Oscars for her performances on the World stage, the way she can cry & shed tears to order is magnificent, unequalled in the World, imho! Just mention the Earth & she sheds oodles of them, perfectly! If Hollywood doesn’t give at least a hundred, thousand, million, (as an engineer I love making up numbers, just like the UNIPCC – sarc off), I will never ever go there again, & will refuse any invite the “Academy” may offer!!!!!!
“the way she can cry & shed tears to order is magnificent”
As when she visited Australia in 2015, drumming up support for the Paris conference:
http://www.smh.com.au/good-weekend/ray-of-hope-christiana-figueres-20150601-ghe88m.html
Ray of hope: Christiana Figueres – Date September 5, 2015
“A thousand chattering girls from prestigious St Catherine’s in Sydney’s eastern suburbs settle themselves on the floor of the school’s assembly hall, the din not unlike that inside a giant aviary. Silence falls as a compact figure in a pink jacket, tightly fitting black trousers and heels steps smartly to the microphone.
It is the morning’s “special guest”, the head of the United Nations’ Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), Christiana Figueres – a woman bizarrely characterised in May by Prime Minister Tony Abbott’s chief business adviser, Maurice Newman, as the spearhead of a UN conspiracy to bring the world under the iron control of shadowy international bureaucrats.
The girls regard their visitor politely, perhaps expecting a science lecture or a worthy presentation on the machinery of international climate negotiations. Instead, something extraordinary happens. Only a few words into her introduction, Figueres chokes up. “It always pains me … [a pause] … to see … [a suppressed sob] … the evidence of what we’ve done.”
lets cut to the chase and be bluntly honest – Kim Kardashian would be just as effective and qualified as this unelected wannabe, and a lot more fun to watch.
This is what so-called “world government” has come to – might as well let the Kardashian’s run it, because it really doesn’t matter anymore.
I just wish I had more food and ammo stockpiled.
When the zombie apocalypse comes, everyone is going to want to be friends with the doomsday preppers and the rubes who cling to their guns and religion.
Leftists better pray that the rubes cling to their religion enough to be willing to extend a helping hand. (See what I did there?)
The commies have realized the “country by country” method doesn’t work. You end up building walls to keep people in the commie section and the contrast between commie and non-commie is clear to all. So now they are using the “water in the bathtub” method where communism gradually rises everywhere via world organizations. There is no escape except by spaceship. No walls necessary.
Great, a scientific mystic. As if the UN does not already have a morbid reputation.
Here’s the full list.
http://www.1for7billion.org/candidates/
An Eastern European is the current best guess, but wait & see if any of the others enters the ring. Amina Mohammed would be a shoe-in, ticks all boxes, female, Muslim & African!
If they leave it open till Nov Obama is available . Guess this timing is pure coincidence .
Gotta love it…
China is “Doing It Right”…riiiiiight
Lets see….
“Top Emitter of GHG” (right)
…..Pour the Coals to it China and sell that surplus Dirty Coal Power to the Clean Eco-fascist Feel-goods in Europe
“Its support for photovoltaic technology helped reduce solar-panel costs by 80 percent since 2008” (right)
…..The average Chinese national earns $4755 USD per year, about 91.44 per week or 2.29 per hour.
…..No wonder they can produce panels at a cost savings of 80%, they pay their workers next to nothing.
“China is also able to implement policies because its political system avoids some of the legislative hurdles seen in countries including the U.S., Figueres said.” (right) Remember Tien’amen Square? It is plain scary just what that type of governance brings. The “Legislative Hurdles” are there to ensure a government “Of the people, by the people and for the people” doesn’t paris(h) from the earth and become just another government dictatorship.
A dysfunctional, idiosyncratic and ideologically-bent UN now wants to appoint someone who is dysfunctional, idiosyncratic and ideologically-bent as its leader? Go figure.
George Devries Klein, PhD, PG, FGSA
Don’t know if Ms. Figueres is located in Switzerland or New York (UN HQ) but perhaps the thought of returning to Costa Rica, a third world country, scares her, especially when having to face the poor who are victimized by the green lobby goals.
George Devries Klin, PhD, PG, FGSA
Based in Bonn, she has a German husband, Konrad von Ritter, estranged, a former head of the World Bank’s sustainable development unit and also in the climate business:http://bonsucro.com/site/speaker-konrad-von-ritter/#
http://www.iol.co.za/scitech/science/environment/profile-christiana-figueres—unfccc-1187574
Her mother, widow of former Costa Rican president Jose Figueres Ferrer, moves in top circles in Boston.
Christiana gave the commencement address at U. Mass in 2014: http://scholarworks.umb.edu/cgi/viewcontent.cgi?article=1004&context=cgs_pubs
She is located in Bonn, Germany, her mother lives in Boston.
https://www.bostonglobe.com/lifestyle/names/2014/06/04/bob-beal-hosts-reception-for-christiana-figueres/L7ps84BMiUe4gDYANGR8VM/story.html
Christiana gave the Commencement address at U. Mass. in 2014.
http://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/24/the-weight-of-the-world
“Figueres works out of a spacious office in Bonn, in a building that used to belong to the German parliament. On the wall by her desk there’s a framed motto that reads, “Impossible is not a fact, it is an attitude.” On another wall there’s a poster showing the Statue of Liberty waist-high in water, and on a third a black-and-white photograph of Figueres’s father, José, who led the Costa Rican revolution of 1948.”
Thanks for the detailed information. Bonn is better than Central or South America. I’ve worked
in both.
Verse 25 of the Impeachment song: Climate change and the end of Capitalism.
Christiana Figueres, the executive secretary of the United Nation’s Framework Convention on Climate Change, recently made a devastating admission… the goal of environmental activism is not to save the world from terrifying environmental calamity, but to end capitalism.
“This is the first time in the history of mankind that we are setting ourselves the task of intentionally, within a defined period of time, to change the economic development model that has been reigning for at least 150 years, since the Industrial Revolution,” she said.
Referring to a new international treaty environmentalists hope will be adopted at the Paris climate change conference later this year, she added: “This is probably the most difficult task we have ever given ourselves, which is to intentionally transform the economic development model for the first time in human history.”
This leads to verse 25 of the Obama Impeachment song( as if sung by President Obama to the tune of “Please release me, let me go)
Climate change our biggest threat,
If worse, I will break out a sweat.
Global Governance, you bet!
My war on King Coal not over yet.
The whole Obama Impeachment song: https://lenbilen.com/2015/02/25/the-complete-obama-impeachment-song/
Meanwhile, China keeps increasing its use of coal
Figure: https://lenbilen.com/2015/02/18/verse-25-of-the-impeachment-song-climate-change-and-the-end-of-capitalism/
Alarms must ring loudly. The UN lost its way a long time ago. We have more wars, drought, desert, poverty, mass migration, less potable water, food, shelter clean air and global unity/leadership.
UNFCCC COP system after 22 years and clearly the past 5 years highlights the present UN “data exchange protocol” has done zero to reverse CO2e build-up. The best illustration I* can offer is the UNFCCC COP21 decision “193 Nations Members of Parliament shall return to their homeland and think again of ways to stop the Earth’s mean temperature rising 2 degrees”.
If UN and for that matter Earth was run as a perpetual supply corporation such incompetent thought would never have reached the CEO desk let alone the BOD table.
Earth and UN are at a critical cross road unless there is a highly well trained HEAD of UN and a BOD from the corporate sector the repair the 50% damage to the once yielding Assets the Grandkids do not have a chance. Few stop to account Earth is our only business home and the baseline Bank of Assets soil-water-vegetation-atmosphere-bees and the UN’s own data reflects these like support assets loss more than 50%.
The UN Needs a President/Chair with hands on running a Nation and indeed a UN division to comprehend the tremendous waste the current data exchange UN is The UNFCCC COP 21 case and point.
Before the hand-over to a new Chief of UN Actual Heads of Nations need to be locked up and restructure UN charter, Earth is the Number 1 business with Bank of Assets not rolled over restored. Among Leaders of Nations present and in sight past Leaders is one the restore the assets of the Receiver Mother Nature is sending clear messages restore or stand aside and
a Helen Clark is clearly qualified!
Bottom line We do not need more UNFCCC COP 21 decisions “build a switch to stop temperature rising and pray”.
Without prejudice
Robert Vincin https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YbI8YZmBP8g We grow soil year 1 soil-carbon year 2 food fodder year 3 forestry year5- in desert Nations
Invited by UN USG 95-99 help write Kyoto Protocol. Appointed Foreign expert PRC 2005-
Co-author the Missing Sink Paper COP 6 to save cancelling Kyoto article 3.4 etc.
Sorry sweet chicken face the big O has this lined up . A temporary position possible but
don’t get comfy .