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Dublin - Governments should adopt a single global carbon offset mechanism to address carbon emissions from international aviation, according to a unanimous resolution adopted at the 72nd annual general meeting of the International Air Transport Association (Iata) on Thursday.
The resolution urges the adoption of such a single mechanism at the assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (Icao) taking place in September.
According to Iata CEO Tony Tyler, airlines are committed to sustainability.
"With improvements to technology, operations and infrastructure and the deployment of sustainable fuels, we are delivering results against our climate change commitments," said Tyler. "However, to achieve carbon-neutral growth from 2020, we also need a mandatory global carbon offset scheme."
He said the details of what such a single global mechanism would involve, are still being worked out.
"But as an industry we have a clear focus on what is needed. We want a cost-effective measure that leads to real and permanent carbon reductions. That mechanism should be simple, mandatory and applied on a global basis, avoiding the cost and complexity that a patchwork of uncoordinated measures would create," said Tyler.
"It must not lead to competitive or market distortions."
He pointed out that the aviation industry was the first sector to set carbon-reduction targets at a global level.
The proposal for such a single global mechanism might still be easier said than done. At the AGM some of the concerns raised was, for instance, that some airlines would rather want to follow the carbon reduction programmes of their own governments and that others feel it would not be fair to tax airlines who have been implementing carbon reduction programmes earlier in the same taxed way as those who only do so later or on a lesser scale.
* Fin24 is a guest of Iata at its AGM.
