Jakarta (ANTARA News) - The Indonesian and Australian governments have agreed to bring the issue of forest conservation to an international conference on climate change to be held in the island resort of Bali from December 3 to 12, 2007.
The agreement was reached by the environment ministers of both countries after a closed-door meeting to discuss bilateral cooperation in the environmental field here on Monday.
"Its complete flatform is under discussion but it will be about deforestation, reforestation and forest conservation," Indonesian Environment Minister Rachmat Witoelar said.
Rachmat said the issue would be brought to the Bali conference because there had been little appreciation so far for parties or countries which were able to protect their forests.
"Yet, forests are not merely a natural resource of a particular country but they also serve as the world`s lungs," Rachmat said.
Meanwhile, his Australian counterpart, Malcolm Turnbull, said like in other tropical countries, forests in Indonesia were currently neglected even by the Kyoto Protocol.
"What the governments of Australia and Indonesia have been doing so far is to give a fresh breath," Malcolm Turnbull said, adding that the two countries were committed to placing the forest conservation issue on the main agenda of climate change.
On the occasion, Turnbull also said that although Australia did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol, the country would try to meet the target of emmission reduction as stipulated in the protocol.
Earlier, over the weekend, Rachmat said Indonesia would host the biggest international conference on the environment to discuss climate change.
He said the conference would be attended by at least 10,000 participants from 189 countries around the world.
"The conference will be a venue of negotiations between developed and developing countries," Rachmat said, adding that in the next 10 years, about 20 to 30 billion dollars would be spent on the management of global warming which caused climate change.
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