Markets focused on issuing permits to allow greenhouse gas emissions and obtaining credits by not emitting them are rapidly emerging around the world (MacKenzie, 2009), with countries like as New Zealand participates in what is known as the Emissions Trading System. Carbon markets have increasingly become a way to address greenhouse mitigation, and essentially climate change, as a result of the Kyoto Protocol and subsequent intergovernmental emissions trading system (Stephan & Paterson, 2012). This essay will begin by addressing what the emissions trading system is, its context, and the subsequent introduction of carbon markets. We will then discuss how the ETS connects on an international scale. We will also discuss the presence of the ETS in New Zealand, with the effects of its implementation on life and industry. This essay will then end by discussing what has been gained and lost as a result of the ETS, and the conflicts surrounding the ETS and indeed all environmental policy around the world. The ETS is an example of how value systems around the world can get in the way when a significant issue like climate change threatens the global economy and its citizens. The intergovernmental emissions trading scheme includes a joint international action plan led by the United Nations and the creation of the Kyoto Protocol (New Zealand Climate Change Programme, 2001). The Kyoto Protocol is the world's first international treaty on climate change and was adopted at the Earth Summit in Rio de Janerio in 1992 and has been ratified by 154 countries (Renowden, 2007). The protocol itself contains provisions for a cap and trade market between nation states (MacKenzie, 2009). An emissions trading scheme m...... middle of document....... New Zealand Energy Greenhouse Gas Emissions Report. Ministry of Business, Innovation and Employment. New Zealand Climate Change Programme. (2001). Kyoto Protocol: Securing our future. Wellington, New Zealand: Ministry of the Environment. Renowden, G. (2007). Hot topic: Global warming and New Zealand's future. Auckland: AUT Media. Sauquet, A. (2012). Exploring the nature of interactions between countries in the ratification process of international environmental agreements: the case of the Kyoto Protocol. Public Choice, 141-158. Stephan, B., & Paterson, M. (2012). The politics of carbon markets: an introduction. Environmental Policy, 21:4, pp. 545-562. United Nations Convention on Climate Change. (2014). Kyoto Protocol. Retrieved May 11, 2014, from the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change: http://unfccc.int/kyoto_protocol/items/2830.php