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Energy Subsidies - International

From the UNFCCC to the SDGs, and from the G20 to APEC, GSI is involved in international processes and fora to push for Fossil Fuel Subsidy Reform and transparency.

Research

Collaborations

GSI works with CSO coalitions for action on reform alongside ODI and OCI. GSI supports the work of the Friends of Fossil Fuel Subsidy Reform.

News: WTO subsidy dispute round-up

November 8, 2010
In the past two months, Japan has accused Canadian province Ontario of breaking WTO rules in its support for renewable energy; and the United States has launched an investigation into Chinese support for green industries more generally. Find out why in the WTO Subsidy Dispute Round-up.

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Some Concerns on the Fossil-Fuel Subsidies Debate in the G-20

November 8, 2010 | Carlos Galperín , María Victoria Lottici , María Cecilia Pérez Llana
Energy subsidies are a long-debated issue as regards their efficacy, efficiency and relationship with the problem of climate change. These questions have been recently included on the agenda of the G-20, after the Leaders’ Summit held in Pittsburgh in September 2009. Paragraphs 29 and 31 of the Leaders’ Statement set forth a course of action for member countries. In those paragraphs, fossil-fuel subsidies are questioned on the grounds that they can be inefficient and encourage wasteful consumption, and it is therefore proposed to phase them out over the medium-term, while recognizing the importance of providing those in need with essential energy services.

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Commentary: How big are your fossil-fuel subsidies? The International Budget Partnership on transparency and the right to access information

November 8, 2010
This October, the International Budget Partnership (IBP), part of the US non-profit organisation the Center on Budget and Policy Priorities, published preliminary findings from the Ask Your Government! initiative, an ambitious research project to investigate what happens when citizens around the world ask their governments for specific budgetary information relating to key international development commitments – including the enquiry, “What was the total amount actually incurred during the past three fiscal years on subsidies for oil, gas and coal production and consumption?”

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Hope on the horizon: Will the G-20 really start the final countdown on unsustainable energy subsidies?

November 8, 2010 | Cees van Beers , André de Moor
For decades there has existed a community of researchers – spanning government ministries, international organisations, academia and civil society – working to increase the world’s understanding and awareness of harmful subsidies. Since September 2009, when the G-20 committed to phase out and rationalize inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies that lead to wasteful consumption and distorted long-term energy investments, much attention has turned to the subject. Marking just over a year after this agreement was reached, and in the run-up to the G-20’s Seoul Summit on 11−12 November, Subsidy Watch contacted Professor Cees van Beers and André de Moor, part of the fossil-fuel subsidy research community since the 1990s, and asked for a retrospective: how far have we come and how far have we yet to go?

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Energy subsidies in the context of sustainable development

September 12, 2010 | Opec Secretariat
Editor’s introduction: in late 2009 and early 2010, the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) helped prepare a Joint Report, Analysis of the Scope of Energy Subsidies and Suggestions for the G-20 Initiative, in partnership with the International Energy Agency (IEA), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank. The purpose of the study was to analyse “the scope of energy subsidies” and provide suggestions for the G-20’s initiative to phase out and rationalize inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption, and it was submitted to the G-20 Meeting of Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors in Toronto, Canada, on 26-27 June 2010. In this article, the OPEC Secretariat explains its findings and perspective on the role of energy subsidies and their relationship with sustainable development.

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Studies: G-20 Joint Report becomes publically available

July 18, 2010
When the G-20 committed to rationalize and phase out inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies that lead to wasteful consumption, they asked the International Energy Agency (IEA), the Organisation of Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC), the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) and the World Bank to "provide an analysis of the scope of energy subsidies and suggestions for the implementation" of the initiative. Completed in time for the G-20 Energy Minister's meeting in March, but kept under wraps until after the recent Toronto Summit, it was recently made available on the OECD's website, alongside a range of other OECD work on fossil-fuel subsidies.

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Commentary: APEC Speaks: how Asia-Pacific economies plan to address fossil-fuel subsidy reform

July 18, 2010
The Leaders' Declaration from the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation's (APEC) 17th Economic Leaders' Meeting, released on 15 November 2009, included a commitment to "rationalize and phase out over the medium term fossil-fuel subsidies that encourage wasteful consumption, while recognising the importance of providing those in need with essential energy services." This closely mirrors the language of the Group of Twenty Finance Ministers and Central Bank Governors (G-20), who announced their own commitment to phase out and rationalize fossil-fuel subsidies at their Pittsburgh Summit on 25 September 2009.

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Press Release: Press release: GSI tackles reform of inefficient fossil fuel subsidies ahead of G-20 meeting of finance ministers

April 25, 2010
GENEVA—April 21, 2010—The International Institute for Sustainable Development's Global Subsidies Initiative (GSI) has issued a five-part series of reports into how nations might remove fossil-fuel subsidies, on the eve of a meeting of G-20 finance ministers in Washington this week. GSI's Untold Billions: Fossil-fuel subsidies, their impacts and the path to reform provides necessary research and analysis to support the commitment by the G20 and the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation (APEC) forum to phase out inefficient fossil-fuel subsidies.

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