Martin Uden

World’s Mayors Meet in Seoul to Tackle Climate Change

Right now in Seoul, the City Government is hosting a meeting of Mayors on climate change, now known as the C40.  The first meeting was held in London in 2005, the second in New York two years ago, and the third is going on now.  Boris Johnson, the Mayor of London, has been here for the meeting and came out a day in advance so that he could look at Seoul’s Olympic sites from 1988 and bang the drum for investment in London and for the Olympic and Paralympics Games of 2012.

Interesting to see how Boris recorded his visit on Twitter and through his new ‘phlogs’.  I think he certainly found food for thought from the way Seoul has kept its Olympic sites alive and vibrant.  The swimming pool was amazing.  Both the 50 metre pool and the diving pool were simply packed – hundreds of swimmers doing laps – and apparently it’s like that all day from morn till late at night.  There was a BBC London team filming him – worth a look at the coverage.

It was interesting to hear Bill Clinton give the keynote at the start of the C40 conference.  Although Al Gore has become identified rather more with the climate change theme, Clinton was clearly just as passionate about it.  As Boris said on his tweets, Clinton was very complimentary about some of the projects in London – and of course the whole idea of a conference like this is to exchange best practice among the cities.

Events like the C40 are important for showing that there are people around the world who are serious about the risks and opportunities presented by climate change. Bill Clinton particularly stressed the imperfections of the Kyoto Protocol and the need – as we get closer to the crucial UN meeting in Copenhagen in December – to work together to generate momentum for an ambitious agreement.

London Mayor Boris Johnson

Posted at 15:56 20 May 2009 by Martin Uden  |  Comments[0]