Ozone Regime

Who are the Ozone Regime?

In this context, an international environmental regime (particularly the ozone

regime) is an international agreement or social institution with more or less in agreed

upon principles, norms, rules, decisionmaking procedures and programmes that govern

the activities and shape the expectations of actors in a specific environmental issue area.

International institutions provided foundation, basic and opportunity to initiate, sustain

and build policy. This regime control the measures as a clear, strong, simple, binding,

total phases out their goal, and this regime have their different responsibilities.

When Ozone Regime started?

The Ozone Regime started after the Vienna Convention in 1985. A total of 164

countries had ratified their participation in this convention. This convention have marked

three major achievements in the development of ozone regime.

i. The community of nations had decided to take advance action against a

distant threat and not to wait for incontrovertible proof of cause and effect,

which might come too late to avoid irreparable harm.

ii. The convention had led to an increase in scientific research, whose findings

in turn accelerated the negotiation process.

iii. The achievement was a formal request by the Conference of

Plenipotentiaries that adopted the convention that UNEP continue to work

on a protocol on substance that deplete the ozone layer.

A constellation of key ingredients had been marked as a important to the success of

the negotiations which led to the signing of the Montreal Protocol in 1987. This is a core

group of countries with a similar objective, the strong role of science and technology and

their integration in the negotiation process, a willingness to compromise and to move

forward slowly, and the presence of strong personalities at the negotiating table. Several

other characteristics marked the negotiations, including a movement by States away from

rigid positions on absolute State sovereignty, and the application of the principle of

common but differentiated responsibility to confront environmental problems.

Because the legal obligations established under the Vienna Convention and

Montreal Protocol were preventive rather than remedial measures, those two instruments

constituted the first international agreements that applied the principle of precautionary

measures. Because of their prospective nature, it was necessary that these obligations be

set out within a framework which had the necessary flexibility to adapt to new

discoveries and future assessments of all aspects of ozone depletion.

The phases of the Ozone Regime development

In this section, our group outline the characteristic phases in the development of

ozone regime. The processes of ozone regime can be divided into several phases: agenda

formation, negotiation and decisionmaking, implementation and further development.

The agenda formation stage included the processes in recognized the problem. Then

this problem was taken into the political stage, is framed for consideration and debate by

relevant policy communities, and rises high enough on the international political agenda

to initiate negotiations and decisionmaking processes. In the ozone regime, this phase

began in early 1970, when Rowland and Molina ( 1974 ) who are the scientists fo United

States did a research and found that CFCs was emmited into the atmosphere. They said

that the employing ofrsonic aircraft, air conditioners or aerosol might be elicit the CFCs.

As a result, these things should be banned but DuPont and other major companies

producing CFCs strongly disputed this. The decreasing of CFCs production was happen

when United States restricting the employing CFCs in 1978. Internationally, the North

America and Scandivian countries supporting UNEP`s efforts to establish international

restrictions on ozone depleting chemicals except Japan and UN.

Thus began the international process of negotiating and decisionmaking. This stage

takes a political process on an issue from the point where it becomes a priority item on

the agenda of relevant policymaking or negotiating for a to the point where international

decisions are made about which policies and rules will be adopted to address the issue. In

the ozone regime, the beginning of this stage was quite slow and we can see in Ronald

Reagen administration show that United States joined the sceptics and little enthusiasm

for pressuring the EU and Japan on ozone issue. Under the charismatic leadership of

Mostapha Tolba, UNEP played a key brokering role on the ozone issue. After that, in

1985, the Vienna Convention for the protection of the Ozone Layer was signed.

Moreover the announcement by scientists from the British Antartic Survey connected on

discovery of a deep ‘ozone hole’ over the Antartic provided a key illustration of the

galvanizing effect of vivid or dramatic events in regimes politics. This make DuPont and

other major CFC producers believe this can scratched their business when international

restrictions on CFCs become virtually inevitable. But they still want to oppose this

restrictions with influencing any international agreement because they realized that

stringent international controls on CFCs would create market for substitutes to them. By

this time ozone regime becoming powerful in most West European countries. In this

context government that had previously vetoed stringent international controls had every

interest in reversing their position. For example, the UK Prime Minister Mrs Thatcher

had declared that her government ban CFCs and within two years most all of developed

western countries agreed to ban CFCs. And then in 1990 the agreement A Multilateral

Fund was established in order to paid the spoil costs to the industrialized countries for the

restrictions of CFCs and this agreement make developing countries agreed to phase out

comsumption of CFCs and halons by 2010.

The implementation phases included all of the activities involved in implementing

the decisions and the policies adopted in response to the problem. Finally ozone regimes

usually need to make further develop once they have been established in order to

maintain or improve their effectiveness. The processes of implementing and further

developing the Montreal Protocol proceeded in Tandem. Experience with implementing

the Protocol’s commitments, though complex turned out to be easier and cheaper. The

chemical produsers had a strong commercial incentive to develop substitutes quickly and

also to monitor compliance amongst competitors. The Technology and Economic

Assessement Panel ( TEAP ), established to advise on the availability and effectiveness

of substitutes or alternatives for controlled substance, proved very effective in identifying

opportunities and persuading users to accept them. Meanwhile the international Scientific

Assessement Panel and the environmental Impacts Panel produced authoritative reports

on the need for even more stringent commitments. UNEP continue to play a key role in

brokering stringentagreements supported by sympathetic states and environmental NGOs.

Implementation of these phase outs proceeded on time and reasonably effectively in

western developed states, although there had a problem with black market trading of

illicit CFCs in 1990. This process going more difficult when some countries tried to

neglected their Montreal Protocol commitments. Thus a crisis that could have

substantially weakened the ozone regime was averted, and the institutions of the regime

played a key role in achieving this. However the ozone regime continues to adapt and

develop, with major reviews every two to three years and will probably have to do so for

decades to come.

The events of Ozone Regime in Global Warming

1930 CFCs are invented.

1982 Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee formed.

1983 “Toronto Group” Proposal.

1985 Ozone Hole Discovery published.

1985 Vienna Convention.

1987 Montreal Protocol.

1990 London Amendment and Adjustments.

1992 Copenhagen Amendment and Adjustments.

1995 Vienna Amendment and Adjustments.

1997 Montreal Amendment and Adjustments.

1999 Beijing Amendment and Adjustments.

A Multilateral Fund was established.

2007 Montreal Adjustment.

CONCLUSION

The successful of the ozone regime can be see in several reasons. For our group, we

included three contribution to the success of ozone regime. This elaborations that we

make was after our group make a further reading

Firstly, our group want to emphasized the paramount role of science and scientists

in the development of the ozone regime. Based on knowledge that our group gain in

further reading, the most significant contribution of the Vienna Convention to history was

the unprecedented degree of global scientific attention to the ozone issue which it

stimulated and without which the world would have remained unware of the threat to the

ozone layer until it was too late for remial action. All scientists together put an efforts to

protecteting the planet’s ozone layer that transcended narrow national interest. The

collaborations between the scientists can be see such as in doing agreement data,

analyses, exchange opnions or ideas.

Another reasons was the role of private industry. The industry give a full

cooperation in protecting the ozone layer based on Vienna Convention and Montreal

Protocol’s, there was very tight rules that have make in this two instruments. There is

because if the treaty were too soft on industry like DuPont, there would be greater risks to

the ozone layer but if controls were unrealistic, they could delay the overall process of

structural change. As a result cooperations between two side it is a must.

Last but no least, Montreal Protocol’s ( 1987 ), this treaty was a most significant

contributed to the successful of ozone regime. The flexibility rules built into the Montreal

Protocol’s give a change to the ozone regime to protect ozone layer.