1 February 2005

UK Environment Secretary Margaret Beckett has today called for international co-operation to battle climate change and its impacts. Mrs Beckett declared at an international climate change conference at the Met Office that the world needs to make radical changes if we are to combat climate change.

The minister was speaking at Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change - a three day conference attended by more than 200 international scientists and experts being held at the Met Office's headquarters in Exeter this week.

She said that no single country could solve the problem and emphasised that there has to be an international approach to how we generate and use energy.

The conference, organised by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), aims to advance the scientific understanding of the long term implications of climate change, the relevance of stabilisation goals and options to reach such goals. It also aims to encourage research and international scientific debate on these issues.

Discussion topics include socio-economic effects of climate change and the vulnerability of eco-systems.

Details of the speakers and papers being presented can be found at the Avoiding Dangerous Climate Change Conference web site.

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