ABSTRACT
In the last decades Argentine has actively participated in the elaboration and implementation of international policies leading towards the care of the global environment. The country has been enthusiastically involved in the international process that crystallized in the elaboration of the UNFCCC1; signed the Convention in 1992, ratifi ed and enforced it in 1994. In doing so Argentina committed herself to fulfi ll the ultimate objective of the Convention, which is the stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations “… at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human induced) interference with the climate system.” Argentina accepted this commitment taking into account its “… common but differentiated responsibilities, and their specifi c national and regional development priorities, objectives,
and circumstances.” Argentina chaired the international negotiations that materialized into the Kyoto Protocol to the Convention in 1995.2 The country is an observer in the World Bank’s Forest Carbon Partnership Facility, a program aimed at fi nancing the implementation of REDD+ projects in developing countries. Because of its commitment to the principles of the Convention, Argentina has submitted two national communications to the UNFCCC together with corresponding inventories of emissions and removals of Greenhouse Gases (GHG), and one review of the fi rst national communication. In both communications Argentina presented diverse studies which could be the foundation for devising national policies aimed to confronting the likely impacts of climate change. Two of those are particularly relevant to the present chapter. The fi rst national communication (RA 1997) contains a study on the vulnerability of oases located in both the NOA and Cuyo regions; the second communication (RA 2007) contains climate scenarios for the whole country.
