First Carbon Pro Newsletter.

• Carbon Pro: a new project on carbon balance
• An international staff for a wide area project
• New tools for understanding Kyoto Protocol
• The CPro project begins its way!
• News from CPro
• News from the world
• News from Italy

Carbon Pro: a new project on carbon balance

The Interreg project "Carbon Pro" (CARBON balance drafting and new resources management tools according to Kyoto PROtocol) started on June 2006.

It has been developed in the context of Kyoto Protocol implementation in the European space, and especially within CADSES area - Central European Adriatic Danubian South-Eastern Space.

It arose from the necessity to define strategies for planning and managing agricultural and forestry surfaces and from the requirement to identify shared methods for calculating carbon balance.
In order to analyze in detail the themes and to develop operative and practical solutions to transfer in land planning, both public bodies interested in Kyoto Protocol’s application and research institutes, contributing with their scientific support necessary for the identification of more effective solutions, have been involved within CPro project.

The main objectives of the project are:

• To assess the characteristics of the main agricultural and forest systems of CADSES area in relationship to the strategies set up by Kyoto Protocol and evaluate the sinking capacity
• To define strategies and techniques for improving the management of agricultural and forest systems of the CADSES area in order to obtain better environmental/economic results
• To provide for elements useful for orienting the planning documents of CADSES countries concerning the management of agricultural and forest systems and promote a sustainable development

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An international staff for a wide area project

The CPro partnership includes 9 subjects, split between public bodies, research institutes and one private subject. In the context of the project the public bodies provide certain territorial data and contribute to verify the applicability of the proposed methods for the local planning, while scientific subjects give technical support, elaborate data and validate technical results.

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New tools for understanding Kyoto Protocol

Considering that CPro is aimed at stimulating the implementation of Kyoto protocol concepts into the regional/local planning procedures, a series of tools for the dissemination of project results have been set up, also to allow a better understanding of these topics by public officers and by the whole population.

The main instruments foreseen by the project are the following:

• The website: by accessing www.carbonpro.org you will find information concerning CPro project (contact persons, activities and results) and a document section containing articles concerning Kyoto protocol, Carbon balance and other topics. This section is constantly updated and everybody can send materials that will be publish published after an internal control made by the technical board.
• Newsletter: this is the first number of the CPro Newsletter. Over the next months additional 5 numbers will be published and sent to the addresses contained in the mailing list (the registration form can be found on the web site).
• MAP: the Mainstreaming Action Plan contains the instruments for an effective dissemination of the innovative results achieved during project implementation. The document is the main tool for transmitting to external subjects innovative topics arising from the project. The MAP is available for downloading at the document section.
• Local working boards in 7 CADSES countries (Italy, Hungary, Germany, Slovenia, Austria, Greece, Croatia) will be held among national stakeholders in order to raise awareness about about the current local situation and in order to promote integration with the processes foreseen by Agenda 21. The meetings will moreover allow to promote the opportunities offered by supporting the improvement of forestry resources management.
• Scientific articles concerning project results will be published on specialized press.
• For more information write to: info@carbonpro.org

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The CPro project begins its way!

CPro project activities started in June 2006 with a kick-off meeting that was held in Gorizia (Italy). Specific objectives were defined there and further activities planned. During the initial phase of the project and in the first three meetings of the Transnational Technical Board (TTB), held in June, October and December 2006, respectively in Udine, Munich and Budapest, two databases have been created and validated by the partners: one concerning the classification of models used for calculating Carbon balance and the other related to target areas.

During next months field measurements will be carried out in order to amplify the data available for Carbon balance.
In the news section you will find the working-progress of all project activities.
For more info please write to the contact person in your country or e-mail to info@carbonpro.org

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News from CPro

• On 16th January 2007 a scientific delegation of CPro project will meet in Graz (Austria) with experts of Joanneum Research in order to define their collaboration within project activities.
• The fourth Transnational Technical Board and the second Technical Project Management Unit meetings will be held in Venice on 22nd - 23rd February 2007 and will be hosted by the Region of Veneto.

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News from the world

• Nairobi 2006
  The second meeting of the Parties to Kyoto Protocol (COP/MOP 2) and twelfth session of the Conference of the Parties (COP 12) concluded on Friday, 17th November 2006. The Conference was attended by six thousand participants from one hundred eighty countries including the United Nations Secretary-General, Kofi Annan. President Mwai Kibaki of Kenya and President Moritz Leuenberger of the Swiss Confederation addressed event as did ministers and heads of delegation from some ninety-two countries (more informations).
• Climate change: Member States of EU need to intensify efforts to reach Kyoto emission targets
  Latest projections indicate that the 15 States which were EU members before 2004 (EU-15) will only just reach their Kyoto Protocol target for cutting greenhouse gas emissions. The EU-15 are committed to reducing their collective emissions in the 2008-2012 period to 8% below the levels of the base year (1990 in most cases). The Commission's annual progress report shows that an 8% cut can be achieved in 2010 - the period's mid-point - provided that all actions planned by Member States are fully implemented and deliver the emission savings anticipated. Seven EU-15 Member States project that they will exceed their individual emission limits, which are binding under EU law. For the 25 current Member States (EU-25), the overall emission reduction by 2010 would be 10.8%. Date 27th October 2007.
  For the entire press release click on: www.europa.eu.int

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News from Italy

On 18th December, the Italian Ministry of Environment and the Ministry of Economic Development with the law DEC/RAS/1448/2006 approved the National Plan for the Assignment of CO2 quotes for 2008-2012 period (more information).

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