On August 25, 2004, Mexico became the first country to adopt the Greenhouse Gas Protocol, which comprises internationally-accepted standards to measure and report GHG Emissions.

This partnership, known as the Mexico GHG Pilot Program, established between the Secretariat of Environment and Natural Resources (Secretaía de Medio Ambiente y Recursos Naturales or SEMARNAT), the World Resources Institute (WRI), and the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD) aims at developing in two years a voluntary reporting platform on GHG emissions for Mexican businesses.

Through such partnership, it is intended to provide assistance to businesses in Mexico for preparing GHG inventories, identifying opportunities to reduce them, and participating in programs to reduce emissions, while simultaneously protecting their interests, reducing local air pollutants, and mitigating global climate change.

Since its launch in 2001, the GHG Protocol has become the most widely used standard worldwide for corporate calculation of greenhouse gas emissions of Carbon Dioxide and of other five global warming pollutants. The Protocol was formulated by over 500 experts from businesses, non-governmental organizations, and governments. It was initially tried by 30 companies in 10 countries; but currently it has been adopted by over 150 companies.

Although such a large number of companies has adopted it, Mexico stands out internationally for being the first Government to adopt the GHG Protocol, thus manifesting its interest in taking the lead in global warming mitigation.

The GHG Protocol is voluntary, but when the Kyoto Protocol enters into force, in case it is ratified, GHG emission limits will be set. It can be assumed that companies which voluntarily adopt such standards at present will make headway when emission limits become mandatory. Another reason for which many companies are participating in this initiative is because they see global warming not only as a problem, but also as an opportunity to create an international market for emission reduction, while at the same time, promoting technological innovation to solve the problem.

The Mexico GHG Pilot Program will be coordinated by SEMARNAT with technical support from con WRI and WBCSD. During the first phase of the program, the Corporate Standard of the GHG Protocol will be adopted to design a calculation framework that takes into account local conditions and needs, including the training of Mexican experts. The second, the implementation phase, will take place from January 2005 to November 2006. The resources for the Program are provided by the three agencies and the US Agency for International Development.

Information obtained from: http://climate.wri.org and http://www.wbcsd.org