Welcome message from Prof. Maciej Nowicki, Minister of the Environment, Poland

The world is undergoing continuous change which we can no longer stop. As a result of human activities, the climate is also changing. Today, the tackling of global warming is an enormous challenge for all of us, but it is only our common efforts that can bring effects.

The greatest world mechanism supporting these efforts is the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), along with its Kyoto Protocol. In the course of the last session of the Conference of the Parties held in Bali, an action plan was developed; it envisages the adoption of a new instrument at the fifteenth session in Copenhagen in 2009. This will be preceded by two years of negotiations. Precisely during this period, the fourteenth Session of the Conference of the Parties to United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change will be held, along with the fourth Session of the Meeting of the Parties to the Kyoto Protocol (COP 14/CMP 4).

I have the honour of inviting you to this event, so deeply important on the world level, which will take place on 1-12 December 2008 in Poznañ, Poland. The task of the Poznań Conference is to sum up the results of the Kyoto Protocol, along with an indication of the necessary changes and improvements which should be incorporated into the new instrument adopted.

In parallel to the Conference, we will be organising a large exhibition of technological innovations serving to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. This project should facilitate specific measures designed to protect the climate on the Earth.

In inviting you, Ladies and Gentleman, to Poznań, I express my hope that due to the UN Climate Change Conference, we shall be able to work out effective methods to address those changes which may be harmful for all of us.

Prof. Maciej Nowicki, the Minister of the Environment