Kyoto naysayers are predicting gloom and doom if the Chrétien government goes through with ratification. They're wrong. The question is not whether we should ratify Kyoto, it's how. The challenge is to ensure that no one region or group of workers bears the brunt of implementation. The good news is that policies exist that can ensure implementation is fair and equitable.

The current scenario (in which Premier Ralph Klein denounces Kyoto as a selling-out of Alberta, just as the rest of the country sends the province hay due to an unprecedented drought) is absurd. It shows the extent to which many have focused on the costs of climate-change action, but not on the costs of climate change itself.

Those urging the rejection of Kyoto are losing. Here's why. According to the latest forecasts, if Canada ratified Kyoto, our economy would still grow by approximately 30 per cent by 2012, compared to about 31 per cent if we do nothing. Former finance minister Paul Martin's spending cuts in the mid-1990s had a far greater impact on economic growth, but we only heard about the necessity of balancing the federal books -- nothing about forgone economic growth.

It's true that Alberta's economy will suffer more than others. Federal estimates are that it will grow by 26 per cent with Kyoto, instead of 27 per cent without it. Even the oil-and-gas sector will grow by 24 per cent over that time (instead of 27 per cent without Kyoto).

When it comes to jobs, the Canadian Manufacturers and Exporters (CME) positions itself as an advocate on behalf of the 450,000 workers who, it claims, will lose their jobs if Canada ratifies Kyoto. But the CME's study fails to consider jobs created from 30-per-cent growth in the economy; it only considers job losses from an estimated 2-per-cent hit due to Kyoto policies (using the worst-case scenario, of course).

Almost every other study finds both job gains and job losses, as you'd expect in an economic shift -- with gains outnumbering losses. The Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, using the same federal data as the CME, found that while there would be 13,000 job losses in the Canadian energy sector over 10 years, the same period would see 16,000 new jobs created. The 150,000-member Communications, Energy and Paperworkers union, which represents most oil-patch workers, the Alberta Federation of Labour and the Canadian Labour Congress have all endorsed Kyoto ratification.

Yes, some workers will lose their jobs and some communities will suffer negative impacts. But the solution is not to abandon Kyoto, especially because tackling climate change will also offer more than $90-billion in business and investment opportunities in emerging industries in renewable energy, energy efficiency, and fuel-efficient vehicles. The key is to include in our Kyoto implementation strategy a fair transition plan for both workers and communities. A worker transition plan would have two elements.

The first is training and educational opportunities for displaced workers. There are a number of reasons to be optimistic about the future for affected workers and communities, if there is the political will to support transition. Smart, adequately funded, regionally focused transition programs have the potential to make this large-scale social and economic change relatively worker-friendly.

The Canadian Steel Trade and Employment Program can be used as a model. A collaboration among the steel industry, federal government and labour, this program was very successful at cost effectively training and finding employment for workers forced to leave the industry.

The second part of this transition strategy focuses on encouraging investment and job creation in emerging energy industries. Canada could establish energy efficiency funds (modelled on the successful Toronto Atmospheric Fund), shift subsidies from nuclear and fossil fuel energy to renewable energy production, and fund public transit.

The federal discussion paper showed that Canada could meet Kyoto and recuperate $4.5-billion per year by auctioning off tradable emission permits. By channeling that money into transition programs for workers and communities affected by climate-protection policies, Ottawa can ensure that no region of the country bears an unfair burden. That is, after all, the concern of Alberta and, to a lesser degree, Saskatchewan and British Columbia.

Like the hay donated by Canadians to Alberta ranchers (and, for that matter, the aid given to victims of Eastern Canada's ice storm and the Saguenay and Red River floods), it is possible to share both the burden and the bounty that will result from ratifying and implementing the Kyoto Protocol.
Dale Marshall is a resource and environmental policy analyst with the B.C. office of the Canadian Centre for Policy Alternatives, and author of Making Kyoto Work: A Transition Strategy for Canadian Energy Workers.