Today it was announced that a deal had been reached at Copenhagen between the big polluters. Led by President Barack Obama, the key emitter nations of the US, China, India, Brazil and the European Union have declared that they will cut carbon emissions by up to 80 percent of 1990 levels by 2050.

This is a good first step on behalf of the major emitters. Yet, there is still a lot of water to go under the bridge. For one thing, a legally binding treaty has yet to be negotiated and signed. There are still no short-term goals included within the declaration and these are important if the momentum begun under Kyoto is to be continued. A $100 billion climate change fund to assist poorer nations in reducing their emissions has been proposed but the details have yet to be hammered out.

It must be said that this last minute result has saved the Copenhagen talks from collapse. Just yesterday it looked as if a train wreck would ensue with no agreement being reached. But pull in all the big players such as Barack Obama, Chinese Premier Wen Jiabao, Indian Prime Minister Manmohan Singh, Brazilian President Luis Ignacio Lula Da Silva and European Union President Claude Du Rumpoy, and the game was back on.

But I still have a number of concerns about the deal.

For one, will the impact of paying for any carbon emissions deal continue to fall on the poorest? As I have previously blogged, emissions trading regimes, such as those used in New Zealand, mean that the poor end up paying more for electricity and other essentials. Just this week, while I have been in Australia, there has been a huge uproar over here too regarding planned power price hikes brought on by the Australian Government's emissions trading scheme.

Another interrelated concern is that will governments pay big polluting corporates even more money to stop polluting? Anti-capitalist critics of emissions trading regimes (like New Zealand's) rightly contend that such schemes negatively redistribute incomes from the poorest to the richest. Wealthy corporates who will have to meet the targets just agreed at Copenhagen will have to be placated by governments for doing so. Nothing must interfere with the corporate desire to make profits. Hence, poorer nations might also be pushed by corporate enforcement agencies such as the World Bank and International Monetary Fund into introducing regressive emissions trading schemes as part of any future loan deals.

And what enforcement mechanisms will be created to monitor the Copenhagen agreement? In my view a new, much stronger United Nations international environmental and climate change agency should be created with the ability to, for example, heavily penalise nations who breach their agreed emissions targets. At the same time, this new agency should actively assist poorer nations and poorer communities in developed nations to tackle climate change and energy poverty.

Above all, the National Government should seek to agree to the deep cuts just proposed at Copenhagen. According to the statements I have seen this morning (Saturday), John Key has argued that New Zealand should be given special treatment in terms of being only required to meet a 50 percent reduction target by 2050. If this were agreed to, supposedly in order to protect this country's agriculture and forestry industries, then we would attract international opprobrium. Were that to occur, the popular idea of this country being a clean and green land would evaporate altogether. This would be really great for our tourism industry, wouldn't it Mr Key? 

In the end run, I am cautiously pleased that a deal has been reached at Copenhagen. Now the hard work begins to ensure that it is a fair, just and equitable agreement that will deliver what we all want - salvation from climate change!