Informeel overleg Raad over klimaattop Kopenhagen (en)

Gunnar Caperius is the Minister for the Environment’s right-hand man. When all the EU environment ministers meet in Åre this week, he is there to help Minister for the Environment Andreas Carlgren and maintain contacts with delegations from over 30 countries. During the autumn’s negotiations on a new international climate change agreement, he will also be there right behind the Minister. Gunnar Caperius is also one of the Swedish Presidency’s micro-bloggers, who shares his daily life via short entries on the social messaging utility Twitter. During the meeting in Åre, he will be twittering from the very centre of events.

What will you be twittering about during the week?

From Wednesday to Saturday, it will all be from the informal meeting of environment ministers in Åre. There will be a lot of environment ministers attending from the EU and the candidate countries. With the packed programme we have, and the enormous amount of planning that has gone into the meeting, they will be intensive days.

What is the charm of micro-blogging for you?

The challenge and the charm are the same. To recount something from my everyday life concisely, and preferably something that will be interesting for others to read as well.

What will be the most important topic of discussion for the ministers in Åre?

The theme is an eco-efficient economy, i.e. measures that enable the EU to emerge strengthened and more efficient and sustainable from the current economic crisis. But I think the discussions on the EU’s strategy for the climate negotiations in the run-up to the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December will be the most exciting. Unfortunately, yet obviously, those discussion are secret and not something I can talk about until after Copenhagen.

How have you prepared for Åre?

I have read a folder bursting with background documents for the different sessions, studied all the ministers names and pictures, and memorised the programme. I will be in Åre a couple of days in advance to look at the venue, walking routes and suchlike.

It will be an intensive autumn for you, with trips and negotiations ahead of the UN Climate Change Conference in Copenhagen in December. What are you looking forward to the most?

The conference in Copenhagen will be the culmination both of the Swedish Presidency and of several years of preparation, so it is difficult to see that anything could top that. I am looking forward to it with a mixture of expectation and a certain dread, because it will require a lot of hard work from an huge number of people before we can reach our goal in Copenhagen.

Read Gunnar Caperius’ tweets at se2009.eu/twitter   or follow him at twitter.com/G_Caperius

PROFILE / Gunnar Caperius

Age: 33

Position: Deputy Director, Ministry of the Environment

Twitter profile: G_Caperius

On the bedside table:  Dreams from My Father by Barack Obama and Här kommer bärgningsbilen (Here comes the breakdown lorry) by Arne Norlin

Role model: Sam Seaborn