Group of Eight + Five Gruppe der Acht + Fünf Groupe de Huit + Cinq Gruppo di Otto + Cinque 主要国＋5新興国 Группа Восьми + Пять Grupo de los Ocho + Cinco Grupo dos Oito + Cinco Groep van Agt + Vyf आठ का समूह + पाँच 八国集团同发展中国家

G8 + 5 Canada Prime Minister Stephen Harper France President François Hollande Germany Chancellor Angela Merkel Italy Prime Minister Mario Monti Japan Prime Minister Yoshihiko Noda Russia President Vladimir Putin United Kingdom Prime Minister David Cameron United States of America President Barack Obama President of the G8+5 for 2012 Brazil President Dilma Rousseff China President Hu Jintao India Prime Minister Manmohan Singh Mexico President Felipe Calderón South Africa President Jacob Zuma

The G8+5 group of leaders consists of the heads of government from the G8 nations (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, the United Kingdom and the United States), plus the heads of government of the five leading emerging economies (Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa).

February 2007 Declaration[link]

On February 16, 2007, The Global Legislators Organisation (GLOBE International) held a meeting of the G8+5 Climate Change Dialogue at the GLOBE Washington Legislators Forum in Washington, D.C., where a non-binding agreement was reached to cooperate on tackling global warming. The group accepted that the existence of man-made climate change was beyond doubt, and that there should be a global system of emission caps and carbon emissions trading applying to both industrialized nations and developing countries. The group hoped this policy to be in place by 2009, to supersede the Kyoto Protocol, the first phase of which expires in 2012.^[1][2]

Foundation[link]

The G8+5 group was formed in 2005 when Tony Blair, then Prime Minister of the United Kingdom, in his role as host of the 31st G8 summit at Gleneagles, Scotland, invited the leading emerging countries to join the talks. The hope was that this would form a stronger and more representative group that would inject fresh impetus into the trade talks at Doha, and the need to achieve a deeper cooperation on climate change.

Following the meeting, the countries issued a joint statement looking to build a "new paradigm for international cooperation" in the future.

The G8+5 Climate Change Dialogue was launched on February 24, 2006, by the (GLOBE)^[3] in partnership with the Com+ alliance of communicators for sustainable development.^[4]

Institutionalization[link]

Following the 33rd G8 summit Heiligendamm 2007, German chancellor Angela Merkel announced the establishment of the "Heiligendamm Process" through which the full institutionalization of the permanent dialogue between the G8 countries and the five greatest emerging economies will be implemented. This will include the establishment of a common G8 and G5 platform at the OECD. (see: "Die G8 – Akteure in einer globalen Entwicklungspartnerschaft; http://www.bmz.de/de/service/infothek/fach/spezial/index.html)

Most recently on August 28, 2007, former French president Nicolas Sarkozy in a foreign policy statement proposed that Brazil, China, India, Mexico and South Africa should become members of G8: "The G8 can't meet for two days and the G13 for just two hours.... That doesn't seem fitting, given the power of these five emerging countries." Nevertheless, as of 2008, a formal enlargement of the G8 is not a realistic political option, since the G8 member states have diverging positions on this issue. The US and Japan have been against enlargement, the United Kingdom and France actively in favour, and Italy, Germany, Russia and Canada are reserved on the issue.^{[citation needed]}.

See also[link]

Energy portal

• Avoiding dangerous climate change
• G20 Climate Change Dialogue
• Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

References[link]

External links[link]

• "Policy Issues: G8"
• Feb 16, 2007, CNS News: Lawmakers prod G8 leaders on climate change