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Dear subscriber,

Economics has been a hot topic over the past fortnight. The European Union (EU) Council met last week where Prime Minister David Cameron pushed to limit any increase in the EU budget and called for greater transparency on what the EU spends its money on.

At the start of this week, The Rt Hon Chris Huhne MP, Secretary of State for the Department of Energy & Climate Change, set out his vision for green growth, calling for a ‘new kind of economy�.

And today sees the (AGF), which aims to take forward the commitment of developed countries to provide financial assistance to poorer countries in meeting the climate challenge.

The Climate and Energy Secretary The Rt Hon Chris Huhne MP explained the economic benefits of a green economy in his speech at the London School of Economics. He explained that ‘the global low-carbon and environmental goods and services sector is a £3.2 trillion market�. or .

At the last round of negotiations for the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), developed countries committed to mobilising $100 billion of public and private climate finance a year by 2020. A explains the feasible sources that can generate the scale of finance needed.

Discussions held this week by the /Dialogue for Progressive Action in Costa Rica and by the Alliance of Small Island States in Grenada, called for urgent action on climate change. The forums enabled countries to identify common ground on the key issues before the climate negotiations in Cancun at the end of the month.

The Rt Hon Chris Huhne MP is currently attending the pre-sessional consultation meeting in Mexico City known as the ‘‘’�. The 2 day meeting is an opportunity for countries to come together and prepare the groundwork for the 16th Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (COP16) in Cancun. The meeting will enable Ministers to discuss how they plan to manage the various strands of negotiation and establish shared ground on expectations for what it can deliver.

Environment Secretary Caroline Spelman welcomed the new agreement reached in Nagoya, Japan, for . The agreement was reached at the tenth meeting of the Conference of the Parties Convention on Biological Diversity.

Best of blogs:

• Seiko Indo, Tokyo: ‘â€�
• Pablo Retamal, Santiago, Chile: ‘â€�
• Bruce Callow, San Jose, Costa Rica: ‘â€�
• Giles Paxman, Madrid, Spain: ‘â€�

Also in the news:

• for bridging the science-policy divide on climate change
• European future energy forum highlights
• The (ALBI), a business grouping that develops recommendations and draft policy on future low carbon options for Indonesia

On video:

• Judith Macgregor, in her video blog

Keep in touch:

• Read our
• and the FCO’s

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