The Government has claimed that the UK is “making progress” on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

However, environment secretary Hilary Benn said that there is still much work to do.

His comments followed the publication of provisional statistics for greenhouse gas emissions for 2007, which showed a drop of 2% over the previous year.

This equates to a reduction of 13 million tonnes of CO2.

“These figures show we are making progress in cutting emissions and are on target to go beyond our Kyoto targets.

But there’s much to do at home and abroad if we are to going to avert dangerous climate change,” said Mr Benn.

“But while the Government can provide encouragement and incentives, we also need individuals and businesses to do their bit to cut their carbon footprint because it’s only by all of us tackling climate change that we will achieve success.”

However, the estimates fail to take into account high polluters, such as the amount of CO2 emitted from international flights taking off and landing at UK airports.

In addition, the final estimates will not be published for another 10 months and the typical accuracy of these figures is put at within 1%.

A Department for the Environment, Food and Rural Affairs spokesman said: “Although for any given year considerable uncertainties may surround the emissions estimates for a pollutant, it is important to note that trends over time are likely to be much more reliable.”