In an open letter released at the Belém Climate Summit, special envoys for strategic regions have expressed their support for the COP30 presidency and for all leaders committed to advancing climate crisis action.

Former New Zealand prime minister Dame Jacinda Ardern, the “voice” for Oceania, was among the seven climate envoys signing the letter.

The document acknowledges the progress achieved through the Paris Agreement and the Dubai Consensus, while underscoring the need for further advances “in light of the Global Stocktake” and warning of the growing challenge posed by climate disinformation.

The text calls for unity and concrete action to bridge the “triple gap” between climate finance, adaptation, and mitigation.

These bottlenecks, it emphasised, could not be resolved solely through revisions to Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), but required tangible policy measures.

The Baku to Belém Roadmap is highlighted as a vehicle for developing innovative solutions to unlock large-scale investments while reducing financing costs.

In addressing the spread of climate disinformation, the special envoys underlined the need for coordinated responses, collective strategies, and reinforced regulatory frameworks.

The letter was signed by Special Envoys Adnan Z. Amin (Middle East), Arunabha Ghosh (South Asia), Carlos Lopes (Africa), Jacinda Ardern (Oceania), Jonathan Pershing (North America), Laurence Tubiana (Europe), and Patricia Espinosa (Latin America and the Caribbean).

The open letter to leaders in Belém and to the COP30 presidency from the special envoys for strategic regions

We, the Special Envoys for our respective regions, wish to express our strong support for the Brazilian Presidency and all leaders committed to climate action at Belém.

COP30 presents both a significant opportunity and a profound challenge. To remain aligned with the ambition of the Paris Agreement amidst an increasingly complex geopolitical environment, we must demonstrate decisive progress. Multilateralism, grounded in international law and guided by the Paris Agreement, remains our most effective framework.

A clear signal from COP30 that the international community stands united in its determination to confront climate change will resonate globally. Our shared commitment to fully implement the Paris Agreement is the strongest collective response to a crisis that is disproportionately affecting vulnerable households and countries, devastating lives, livelihoods, and the ecosystems upon which we all depend.

We should also recognise the progress achieved since the Paris Agreement in 2015. The rapid growth of clean solutions is bending the trajectory of global emissions; where we had been on track to exceed a devastating temperature increase of more than 4°C, we are now able to project a level of less than 2.5°C.

But we need greater progress. We are not on track to achieve the goals of the Paris Agreement, and in particular, we are taking insufficient action to keep 1.5°C within reach, or even enough to keep warming well below 2°C. And every tenth of a degree of additional warming will mean harsh consequences for the world.

COP30 must acknowledge and address the “triple gap” in mitigation, adaptation and finance. Doing so requires an accelerated effort across the next decade, mobilising the full range of tools, resources, and partnerships available to us. This is at the heart of the goal of COP30: to advance the full implementation of both the Paris Agreement and the UAE Consensus, informed by the Global Stocktake presented at COP28 in Dubai.

To accelerate progress, we must maintain a laser focus on concrete, coordinated action.

The Action Agenda is a powerful reservoir of those actions, which must be structured, monitored, and supported for effective delivery. Addressing the gap should not be understood solely as revising Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs), but rather as translating ambition into policies that enable each country to overperform on its existing commitments. And the policies we take, as has been amply demonstrated in our successes to date, can marry not only climate benefits, but also contribute to growing our economies, promote our national security, improve the welfare of our citizens, and promote a healthy environment.

Tripling global renewable energy capacity is a goal within reach. Collectively, we have the
technology and resources: what is required now is scaled investment in all regions. The Baku to Belém roadmap to mobilise US$1.3 trillion annually for developing countries outlines both established and innovative solutions to deliver investment at scale at reduced costs of finance. To operationalise it, clear milestones, mandates, and responsibilities are needed.

Ministers of finance should take the lead in defining the priorities. Creating fiscal space, minimizing debt burdens, effectively mobilising domestic and international finance, and
ensuring enabling policy environments, alongside increased investment in the Global South,
are all essential to making this roadmap credible and implementable.

Strengthening resilience and adaptation are equally critical. Climate impacts are increasingly a major barrier to sustainable economic and social development. We must work together to define the indicators that do not impose resource-intensive reporting burdens but instead help our economies and societies adapt to their local circumstances and become resilient.

We must engage the insurance sector, central banks, and private investors to close the
protection gap that threatens long-term developmental gains.

Countries pursuing the transition away from fossil fuels should define roadmaps, in line with their national circumstances, while fostering dialogue between producers and buyers of fossil fuels. Roadmaps to end deforestation and restore ecosystems are equally necessary. Taken together, these pathways can allow countries to implement the long-term strategies submitted in previous years.

For the first time, COP30 will also confront the challenge of climate disinformation: a growing threat that undermines public trust and policy implementation. Combatting this challenge requires coordinated approaches, shared strategies, and strengthened regulatory
cooperation. We must shine the spotlight on our collective progress, in general, but also cases in particular where countries have met their climate targets ahead of schedule,
demonstrating a positive bias for action.

Lastly, we need an evolution of the climate regime that makes implementation more effective and inclusive. Progress depends on joining forces with the local authorities, economic sectors, governments, and civil society. Subnational leaders, from governors, to regional authorities, mayors, and community representatives, must be empowered to reinforce and complement NDCs and National Adaptation Plans (NAPs). COP30 is the moment to have them at the table and to craft a new approach that brings all relevant actors together in a global effort to safeguard our common future.

It is the moment to remind ourselves of the need for solidarity, and to recognise our agency — we have it within our power to change the future for the better.

Signed:

Adnan Z. Amin (Special Envoy for Middle East), chair, World Energy Council; CEO of COP28; former director-general, International Renewable Energy Agency

Arunabha Ghosh (Special Envoy for South Asia), founder-CEO, Council on Energy, Environment and Water

Carlos Lopes (Special Envoy for Africa), chair, Africa Climate Foundation; former executive
secretary, UN Economic Commission for Africa

Jacinda Ardern (Special Envoy for Oceania), former Prime Minister of New Zealand

Jonathan Pershing (Special Envoy for North America); former US Special Envoy for Climate Change

Laurence Tubiana (Special Envoy for Europe), dean, Paris Climate School; CEO, European
Climate Foundation; former French Special Envoy for Climate Change

Patricia Espinosa (Special Envoy for Latin America and the Caribbean), former executive
secretary, UN Framework Convention on Climate Change

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

COMMENTARY: By Dr Satyendra Prasad

As Pacific’s leaders and civil society prepare for the United Nations Climate Conference in Brazil (COP30) next week, they also need to keep a line of sight to the subsequent Pacific’s COP31.

As they engage at COP30, they will have in their thoughts the painful and lonely journey ahead in Jamaica and across the Caribbean as they rebuild from Hurricane Melissa.

The Blue Pacific needs to build a well-lit pathway to land Pacific’s priorities at COP30 and COP31. The cross winds are heavy and the landing zone could not be hazier.

At the recent Pacific Islands Forum Meeting in Honiara, Pacific leaders called for accelerating implementation of programmes to respond to climate change. They said that finance and knowhow remained the binding constraints to this.

The Pacific’s leaders were unanimous that the world was failing the Pacific.

Climate-stressed infrastructure
Pacific leaders spoke about their infrastructure deficit. The region today needs well in excess of $500 million annually to maintain infrastructure in the face of rising seas and fiercer storms.

There are more than 1000 primary and secondary schools, dozens of health centres across coastal areas in Solomon Islands, PNG, Vanuatu and Fiji that need to be repaired rehabilitated or relocated.

The region needs an additional $300-500 million annually over a decade to build and climate proof critical infrastructure — airports, wharves, jetties, water and electricity and telecommunications.

The Blue Pacific’s infrastructure distress is a cocktail that poisons its human development progress. This has lethal consequences for our elderly, for children and the most vulnerable.

As a region has fallen short in convincing the international community that the region’s infrastructure distress is quintessentially a climate distress. This must change.

The constant cycle of catastrophe, recovery and debt are on autoplay repeat across the world’s most climate vulnerable region. The heart-braking images coming out of Jamaica and the Caribbean in the wake of Hurricane Melissa makes this same point.

The Blue Pacific as a region attracts a woefully insufficient share of existing climate finance. Less than 1.5 percent of the total climate finances reaches the world’s most climate vulnerable region today. This is unacceptable of course.

Is our planet headed for a 3.0C world?
At COP30, the world will see what the new climate commitments (NDCs) add up to. Our best estimates today suggest that the planet is headed for a 3.0C plus temperature rise. Anything above 1.5C will be catastrophic for the Blue Pacific.

Life across our coral reef systems will simply roast at 3.0C temperature increase. The regions food security will be harmed irreparably. This will have massive consequences for tourism dependent economies. Bleached reefs bleach tourism incomes.

The health consequences arising from climate change are set to worsen rapidly. As will the toll on children who will fall further behind in their learning as schools remain inaccessible for longer periods; or children spend long hours in hotter classrooms.

For Pacific’s women, the toll of runaway temperature increase will be heavy — on their health, on their livelihoods and on their security. It will be too heavy.

A deal for the Pacific at COP30
The world of climate change is becoming transactional. Short termism and deal making have become its norm.

As Pacific leaders, its civil society, its science community and its young engage at COP30 in Brazil, they are reminded that the Blue Pacific needs more than anything else, a settled outlook climate finance that will be available to the region. Finance must be foremostly predictable.

The region should not feel like it is playing a lottery — as is the case today. Tonga must know broadly how much climate finance will be available to it over the next five years and so must Papua New Guinea.

At Bele’m, the world will need to agree to a road map for how the climate financing short fall will be met. This is a must to restore trust in the global process.

The weight on the shoulders of host Brazil is extraordinarily heavy. Brazil is the home of the famous Rio Conference in 1992 where the small island states first succeeded in placing climate change, biodiversity loss on the global agenda.

The Small Islands States grouping is chaired by Palau. President Whipps Jnr will lead the islands to Brazil. He will no doubt remind the host that the world has failed the small states persistently since that moment of great hope at the Rio Conference in 1992.

Pace of climate finance
There are three principal reasons why climate finance must flow to the Pacific at speed.

First, is that most countries in our region have less than a decade to adapt. Farms and family gardens, small businesses, tourist resorts, villages and livelihoods need to adapt now to meet a climate changed world.

Second, if adaptation is pushed into the future because of woefully insufficient finances — the window to adapt will close.

As more sectors of our economy fall beyond rehabilitation, the costs of loss and damage will rise. Time is of the essence. And on top of that loss and damage remain poorly funded. This too must change.

The Pacific needs to do many things concurrently to build its resilience. Everything for the Blue Pacific rests on a decent outcome on financing.

The region needs to make its clearest argument that its share of climate finance must be ring-fenced. That its share of climate finance will remain available to the region even if demand is slow to take shape.

The Pacific’s rightful share of climate finance over the next decade is between 3-5 per cent of the total across all financing windows. This is fundamentally because based the adaptation window is so short in such a uniquely specific way.

This should mean that the Blue Pacific has access to a floor of US$1.5 billion annually through to 2035. This is very doable even if global currents are choppy.

TFFF and Brazil’s leadership
Brazil has already demonstrated that it can forge large financing arrangements through its leadership and creativity. It will launch the Tropical Forest Forever Facility (TFFF) at COP. PNG’s Prime Minister has played an important role on this. We hope that forested Pacific states will be able to access this new facility to expand their conservation efforts with much higher returns to landowners.

Beyond Bele’m
COP30 in Brazil is an opportunity for the Pacific to begin to frame a larger consensus — well in time for COP31. It is my hope that Australia and Pacific’s leaders will have done enough to secure the hosting rights for COP31.

A ‘circuit-breaker’ COP31
Fiji’s former Deputy Prime Minister Biman Prasad and Australia’s Climate Minister Chris Bowen recently said that COP31 must be “a circuit breaker moment” for the Blue Pacific.

The reversals in our development story arising from the climate chaos have become too burdensome. Repeated recoveries means that every next recovery becomes that much harder.

Ask anyone in Jamaica and Caribbean today and you will hear this same message. Their finance ministers know too well that in no time they will be back at the mercy of international financial institutions to rebuild roads and bridges that have been washed away and water systems that have been destroyed by Hurricane Melissa.

Climate finance by its very nature therefore must involve deep changes to the architecture of international development and finance. The rich world is not yet ready to let go of privilege and power that it wields through an archaic financial international system.

But fundamental reform is a must. Fundamental reform is necessary if small states are to reclaim agency and begin to drive own destinies.

Future proofing our societies
The risks arising from climate change are so multi-faceted that economic, social and political stability cannot no longer be taken for granted.

Conflicts over land lost to rising seas, the strain on education, health and water infrastructure, deepening debt stress take their toll on institutions through which stability is maintained in our societies.

The Blue Pacific needs to work with this elevated risk of fragility and state failure. This reality must shape the Blue Pacific expectations from a Pacific COP.

Building on the excellent work underway in climate ministries in Fiji, Vanuatu, Samoa, PNG and across the region through the SPC, SPREP, OPOC, I have outlined what the Pacific’s expectations could be from a Pacific COP31.

COP31 must be about transformation and impact. The Blue Pacific’s leaders should seek a consensus that includes both the rich industrial World and large developing countries such as China and India in support of a Pacific Package at COP31.

A Pacific COP 31 package
The core elements of a Pacific package at COP31 are:

1. Ensuring that the Loss and Damage Fund has become fully operational with a pipeline of investment ready projects from across the Blue Pacific.
2. Securing the Pacific Regional Infrastructure Facility (PRIF) as a fully funded and disbursement ready financing facility with a pipeline of investment ready projects.
3. Securing ring-fenced climate finance allocations for the Blue Pacific at the Green Climate Fund (GCF) and across international financial institutions.
4. Securing support for Blue Pacific’s “lighthouse” multi-country (region wide) transformative programs to advance marine and terrestrial biodiversity protection and promote sustainability across the Blue Pacific Ocean.
5. A COP decision that is unambiguous on quality and speed of climate and ocean finance that will be available to small states for the remainder of the decade.
6. Securing sufficient resources that can flow directly to communities and families to rapidly rebuild their resilience following disasters and catastrophes including through insurance and social protection vehicles.
7. Ensuring that knowhow, resources and mechanisms for disaster risk reduction are in place, are fully operational and are sustainable.

An Ocean of Peace for a climate changed world
Fiji’s Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka has championed the Blue Pacific as an Ocean of Peace. Its acceptance by Pacific leaders opens up opportunities for the region’s climate diplomacy.

The Pacific’s leaders accept that the Ocean of Peace anchors its stewardship of our marine environment to the highest principles of protection and conservation. An Ocean of Peace super-charges the Pacific’s efforts to take forward transboundary marine research and conservation, end plastic and harmful waste disposal, end harmful fisheries subsidies and decarbonise shipping.

It boosts the Pacific’s efforts to main-frame the ocean-climate nexus into the international climate change frameworks by the time a Pacific COP31 is convened.

A window of hope
Between COP30 and COP31 lies a rare window of hope. The Blue Pacific must leverage this.

Both a Brazilian and an Australian Presidency offer supportive back-to-back opportunities and spaces to take forward the regions desire to project a solid foundation of programs that are necessary to secure its future.

Uniquely the ball may be in the Pacific’s court on how successfully we can harness this rare opening in the international environment.

Dr Satyendra Prasad is a Non-Resident Senior Fellow at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace and Fiji’s former ambassador to the UN. He is the Climate Lead for About Global. This article was first published by Wansolwara Online and is republished by Asia Pacific Report in partnership with USP Journalism.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific leaders believe climate experts are missing an opportunity to incorporate indigenous knowledge into adaptation measures.

The call has been made as hundreds of scientists, global leaders, and climate adaptation experts around the globe gather at the Adaptation Futures Conference in Christchurch.

At the conference’s opening session, Tuvalu’s Environment Minister Maina Talia explained how sea level rise was damaging agricultural land and fresh groundwater is becoming saline.

“The figures are alarming, this is not just for Tuvalu and this is not a Tuvaluan problem, it’s not even a small island developing states problem, it’s a global economic bomb,” he said.

Incorporating indigenous knowledge into climate adaptation has been a major focus of the event.

Talia told RNZ Pacific he feels adaptation is generally presented in a Western lens.

“We need to decolonise our mind, decolonise our soul, in order to integrate community-based adaptation measures.”

Flagship adaptation projects
The highest elevation in Tuvalu is only four and a half metres. A 2023 report from NASA found much of Tuvalu’s land would be below the average high tide by 2050.

To combat rising seas the government has started reclaiming land, which is one of the island nation’s flagship adaptation projects.

Talia said a “decolonisation approach” gave communities ownership of the work being done.

“It’s all informed by our elders, informed by our youth, informed by our women in society, we cannot come with the idea that this is how your adaptation measures should look like.”

Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) director-general Sefanaia Nawadra, on a similar line, said the “biggest difference” of incorporating indigenous-led solutions was giving people a sense of ownership.

“It’s management by compliance rather than management by regulation, where you’re using a stick to say, ‘ok, if you don’t do this, you will be penalised’.”

‘Like a cheat code’
Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change president Cynthia Houniuhi said those on the front line of the adverse effects of climate change are often indigenous people, which is almost always the case in the Pacific.

“Who knows the place better than the ones that have lived there, so imagine that experience informs the solution, that’s the best way, it’s kind of like a cheat code.”

United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) head of adaptation Youssef Nassef said it is not always clear how national adaptation plans included input from indigenous people.

He also said climate knowledge is not always accessible to those who need it most.

“We create knowledge, we put them in peer-reviewed publications but are the people who are actually needing it on the frontlines of climate change impacts really receiving that knowledge.”

Pacific climate activists are coming off a high after a top UN court found failing to protect people from the adverse effects of climate change could violate international law.

ICJ advisory opinion
Houniuhi was one of the students who got the advisory opinion in July from the International Court of Justice.

But she told those attending the conference it meant nothing if not acted upon.

“We must continue this same energy, momentum and drive into the implementation of the ruling. As one of our mentors rightly said, ‘the law has now caught up to the science, what we now need is for policy to catch up to the law’.”

Houniuhi said the advisory opinion provided “more weight to influence demands”. She expected the advisory opinion to be used as a negotiating tool by Pacific leaders at COP30 in Brazil next month.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Trump administration’s decision to eliminate more than 90 percent of the US Agency for International Development (USAID) funding means “nothing’s safe right now,” a regional political analyst says.

President Donald Trump’s government has said it is slashing about US$60 billion in overall US development and humanitarian assistance around the world to further its America First policy.

Last September, the former Deputy Secretary of State Kurt Campbell said that Washington had “listened carefully” to Pacific Island nations and was making efforts to boost its diplomatic footprint in the region.

Campbell had announced that the US contributed US$25 million to the Pacific-owned and led Pacific Resilience Facility — a fund endorsed by leaders to make it easier for Forum members to access climate financing for adaptation, disaster preparedness and early disaster response projects.

However, Trump’s move has been said to have implications for the Pacific, which is one of the most aid-dependent regions in the world.

Research fellow at the Australian National University’s Development Policy Centre Dr Terence Wood told RNZ Pacific Waves that, in the Pacific, the biggest impacts of the aid cut are likley to be felt by the three island nations in a Compact of Free Association (COFA) with the US.

He said that while the compact “is safe” for three COFA states – Federated States of Micronesia, Marshall Islands, and Palau – “these are unprecedented times”.

“It would be unprecedented if the US just tore them up. But then again, the United States is showing very little regard for agreements that it has entered into in the past, so I would say that nothing’s safe right now.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Dr Terence Wood speaking to RNZ Pacific Waves.   Video: RNZ Pacific

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Vanuatu’s top lawyer has called out the United States for “bad behavior” after newly inaugurated President Donald Trump withdrew the world’s biggest historic emitter of greenhouse gasses from the Paris Agreement for a second time.

The Pacific nation’s Attorney-General Arnold Loughman, who led Vanuatu’s landmark International Court of Justice climate case at The Hague last month, said the withdrawal represented an “undeniable setback” for international action on global warming.

“The Paris Agreement remains key to the world’s efforts to combat climate change and respond to its effects, and the participation of major economies like the US is crucial,” he told BenarNews in a statement.

The withdrawal could also set a “troubling precedent” regarding the accountability of rich nations that are disproportionately responsible for global warming, said Loughman.

“At the same time, the US’ bad behavior could inspire resolve on behalf of developed countries to act more responsibly to try and safeguard the international rule of law,” he said.

“Ultimately, the whole world stands to lose if the international legal framework is allowed to erode.”

Trump’s announcement on Monday came less than two weeks after scientists confirmed that 2024 was the hottest year on record and the first in which average temperatures exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

Agreed to ‘pursue efforts’
Under the Paris Agreement adopted in 2015, leaders agreed to “pursue efforts” to limit warming under the 1.5°C threshold or, failing that, keep rises “well below” 2°C  by the end of the century.

Fiji Prime Minister Sitiveni Rabuka said on Wednesday in a brief comment that Trump’s action would “force us to rethink our position” but the US president must do “what is in the best interest of the United States of America”.

Other Pacific leaders and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) regional intergovernmental body have not responded to BenarNews requests for comment.

The forum — comprising 18 Pacific states and territories — in its 2018 Boe Declaration said: “Climate change remains the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and wellbeing of the peoples of the Pacific and [we reaffirm] our commitment to progress the implementation of the Paris Agreement.”

Trump’s executive order sparked dismay and criticism in the Pacific, where the impacts of a warming planet are already being felt in the form of more intense storms and rising seas.

Jacynta Fa’amau, regional Pacific campaigner with environmental group 350 Pacific, said the withdrawal would be a diplomatic setback for the US.

“The climate crisis has for a long time now been our greatest security threat, especially to the Pacific,” she told BenarNews.

A clear signal
“This withdrawal from the agreement is a clear signal about how much the US values the survival of Pacific nations and all communities on the front lines.”

New Zealand’s former Minister for Pacific Peoples, Aupito William Sio, said that if the US withdrew from its traditional leadership roles in multilateral organisations China would fill the gap.

“Some people may not like how China plays its role,” wrote the former Labour MP on Facebook. “But when the great USA withdraws from these global organisations . . . it just means China can now go about providing global leadership.”

Analysts and former White House advisers told BenarNews last year that climate change could be a potential “flashpoint” between Pacific nations and a second Trump administration at a time of heightened geopolitical competition with China.

Trump’s announcement was not unexpected. During his first term he withdrew the US from the Paris Agreement, only for former President Joe Biden to promptly rejoin in 2021.

The latest withdrawal puts the US, the world’s largest historic emitter of greenhouse gases, alongside only Iran, Libya and Yemen outside the climate pact.

In his executive order, Trump said the US would immediately begin withdrawing from the Paris Agreement and from any other commitments made under the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

US also ending climate finance
The US would also end its international climate finance programme to developing countries — a blow to small Pacific island states that already struggle to obtain funding for resilience and mitigation.

A fact sheet published by the Biden administration on November 17, which has now been removed from the White House website, said that US international climate finance reached more than US$11 billion in 2024.

Loughman said the cessation of climate finance payments was particularly concerning for the Pacific region.

“These funds are essential for building resilience and supporting adaptation strategies,” he said. “Losing this support could severely hinder ongoing and future projects aimed at protecting our vulnerable ecosystems and communities.”

George Carter, deputy head of the Department of Pacific Affairs at the Australian National University and member of the COP29 Scientific Council, said at the centre of the Biden administration’s re-engagement with the South Pacific was a regional programme on climate adaptation.

“While the majority of climate finance that flows through the Pacific comes from Australia, Japan, European Union, New Zealand — then the United States — the climate networks and knowledge production from the US to the Pacific are substantial,” he said.

Climate actions plans
Pacific island states, like all other signatories to the Paris Agreement, will this year be submitting Nationally Determined Contributions, or NDCs, outlining their climate action plans for the next five years.

“All climate actions, policies and activities are conditional on international climate finance,” Carter said.

Pacific island nations are being disproportionately affected by climate change despite contributing just 0.02 percent of global emissions, according to a UN report released last year.

Low-lying islands are particularly vulnerable to rising sea levels and extreme weather events like cyclones, floods and marine heatwaves, which are projected to occur more frequently this century as a result of higher average global temperatures.

On January 10, the World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) confirmed that last year for the first time the global mean temperature tipped over 1.5°C above the 1850-1900 average.

WMO experts emphasised that a single year of more than 1.5°C does not mean that the world has failed to meet long-term temperature goals, which are measured over decades, but added that “leaders must act — now” to avert negative impacts.

Harry Pearl is a BenarNews journalist. This article was first published by BenarNews and is republished at Asia Pacific Report with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Fiji’s Deputy Prime Minister Biman Prasad has told an international conference in Bangkok that some of the most severely debt-stressed countries are the island states of the Pacific.

Dr Prasad, who is also a former economic professor, said the harshest impacts of global economic re-engineering are being felt by the poorest communities across this region.

He told the conference last month that the adaptation challenges arising from runaway climate change were the steepest across the atoll states of the Pacific — Kiribati, Tuvalu and Marshall Islands.

Dr Prasad said at no time, outside of war, had economies had to face a 30 to 70 percent contraction as a consequence of a single cyclone, but Fiji, Vanuatu and Tonga had faced such a situation within this decade.

He said the world must secure the Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs).

“There is no Plan B. The two options before the world are to either secure the goals, or face extreme chaos,” he said.

“There is nothing in the middle. Not this time.”

Extreme chaos risk
Prasad said there will be extreme chaos if the world went ahead and used the same international financial architecture it had had in place for years.

“And if we continue with the same complex processes to actually access any grant funding which is now available, then we cannot address the issue of this financing gap, as well as climate finance — both for mitigation and adaptation that is badly needed by small vulnerable economies.”

More and more Pacific states would approach a state of existential crisis unless development funding was sorted, he said.

Dr Prasad said many planned projects in the region should already be in place.

“We don’t have time on our hands plus the delay in accessing financing, particularly climate resilient infrastructure and for adaptation — then the situation for these countries is going to get worse and worse.”

He wants to “decolonise” aid, giving the developing countries more control over the aid dollars.

More direct donor aid
This would involve more donor nations providing aid directly into the recipient nation’s budgets.

Dr Prasad, who is also the Fiji Finance Minister, has welcomed the budget funding lead taken by Australia and New Zealand, and said Fiji’s experience with Canberra’s putting aid into the Budget had been a great help for his government.

“It allows us, not only the flexibility, but also it allows us to access funding and building our Budget, building our national development planned strategy, and built in with our own locally designed, and locally led strategies.”

He said the new Pacific Resilience Facility, to be set up in Tonga, is one way that this process of decolonising aid could be achieved.

Prasad said the region had welcomed the pledges made so far to support this new facility.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

As the curtain fell at the UN climate summit in Baku last Sunday, frustration and disappointment engulfed Pacific delegations after another meeting under-delivered.

Two weeks of intensive negotiations at COP29, hosted by Azerbaijan and attended by 55,000 delegates, resulted in a consensus decision among nearly 200 nations.

Climate finance was tripled to US $300 billion a year in grant and loan funding from developed nations, far short of the more than US $1 trillion sought by Least Developed Countries and Small Island Developing States.

“We travelled thousands of kilometres, it is a long way to travel back without good news,” Niue’s Minister of Natural Resources Mona Ainu’u told BenarNews.

Three-hundred Pacific delegates came to COP29 with the key demands to stay within the 1.5-degree C warming goal, make funds available and accessible for small island states, and cut ambiguous language from agreements.

Their aim was to make major emitters pay Pacific nations — who are facing the worst effects of climate change despite being the lowest contributors — to help with transition, adaptation and mitigation.

“If we lose out on the 1.5 degrees C, then it really means nothing for us being here, understanding the fact that we need money in order for us to respond to the climate crisis,” Tuvalu’s Minister for Climate Change Maina Talia told BenarNews at the start of talks.

PNG withdrew
Papua New Guinea withdrew from attending just days before COP29, with Prime Minister James Marape warning: “The pledges made by major polluters amount to nothing more than empty talk.”

Fiji’s lead negotiator Dr Sivendra Michael told BenarNews that climate finance cut across many of the committee negotiations running in parallel, with parties all trying to strategically position themselves.

“We had a really challenging time in the adaptation committee room, where groups of negotiators from the African region had done a complete block on any progress on (climate) tax,” said Dr Michael, adding the Fiji team was called to order on every intervention they made.

He said it’s the fourth consecutive year adaptation talks were left hanging, despite agreement among the majority of nations, because there was “no consensus among the like-minded developing countries, which includes China, as well as the African group.”

Pacific delegates told BenarNews at COP they battled misinformation, obstruction and subversion by developed and high-emitting nations, including again negotiating on commitments agreed at COP28 last year.

Pushback began early on with long sessions on the Global Stock Take, an assessment of what progress nations and stakeholders had made to limit global warming to 1.5 degrees C.

“If we cannot talk about 1.5, then we have a very weak language around mitigation,” Tuvalu’s Talia said. “Progress on finance was nothing more than ‘baby steps’.”

Pacific faced resistance
Pacific negotiators faced resistance to their call for U.S.$39 billion for Small Island Developing States and U.S.$220 billion for Least Developed Countries.

“We expected pushbacks, but the lack of ambition was deeply frustrating,” Talia said.

Greenpeace Pacific lead Shiva Gounden accused developed countries of deliberately stalling talks — of which Australia co-chaired the finance discussions — including by padding texts with unnecessary wording.

“Hours passed without any substance out of it, and then when they got into the substance of the text, there simply was not enough time,” he told BenarNews.

In the final week of COP29, the intense days negotiating continued late into the nights, sometimes ending the next morning.

“Nothing is moving as it should, and climate finance is a black hole,” Pacific Climate Action Network senior adviser Sindra Sharma told BenarNews during talks.

“There are lots of rumours and misinformation floating around, people saying that SIDS are dropping things — this is a complete lie.”

COP29 presidency influence
Sharma said the significant influence of the COP presidency — held by Azerbaijan — came to bear as talks on the final outcome dragged past the Friday night deadline.

The Azeri presidency faced criticism for not pushing strongly enough for incorporation of the “transition away from fossil fuels” — agreed to at COP28 — in draft texts.

“What we got in the end on Saturday was a text that didn’t have the priorities that smaller island states and least developed countries had reflected,” Sharma said.

COP29’s outcome was finally announced on Sunday at 5.30am.

“For me it was heartbreaking, how developed countries just blocked their way to fulfilling their responsibilities, their historical responsibilities, and pretty much offloaded that to developing countries,” Gounden from Greenpeace Pacific said.

Some retained faith
Amid the Pacific delegates’ disappointment, some retained their faith in the summits and look forward to COP30 in Brazil next year.

“We are tired, but we are here to hold the line on hope; we have no choice but to,” 350.org Pacific managing director Joseph Zane Sikulu told BenarNews.

“We can very easily spend time talking about who is missing, who is not here, and the impact that it will have on negotiation, or we can focus on the ones who came, who won’t give up,” he said at the end of summit.

Fiji’s lead negotiator Dr Michael said the outcome was “very disappointing” but not a total loss.

“COP is a very diplomatic process, so when people come to me and say that COP has failed, I am in complete disagreement, because no COP is a failure,” he told BenarNews at the end of talks.

“If we don’t agree this year, then it goes to next year; the important thing is to ensure that Pacific voices are present,” he said.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The United Nations climate change summit COP29 has “once again ignored” the Pacific Islands, a group of regional climate advocacy organisations say.

The Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN) said today that “the richest nations turned their backs on their legal and moral obligations” as the UN meeting in Baku, Azerbaijan, fell short of expectations.

“This COP was framed as the ‘finance COP’, a critical moment to address the glaring gaps in climate finance and advance other key agenda items,” the group said.

“However, not only did COP29 fail to deliver adequate finance, but progress also stalled on crucial issues like fossil fuel phase-out, Loss and Damage, and the Just Transition Work Plan.

“The outcomes represent a catastrophic failure to meet the scale of the crisis, leaving vulnerable nations to face escalating risks with little support.”

The UN meeting concluded with a new climate finance goal, with rich nations pledging a US$300 billion annual target by 2035 to the global fight against climate change.

The figure was well short of what developing nations were asking for — more than US$1 trillion in assistance.

‘Failure of leadership’
Campaigners and non-governmental organisations called it a “betrayal” and “a shameful failure of leadership”, forcing climate vulnerable nations, such as the Pacific Islands, “to accept a token financial pledge to prevent the collapse of negotiations”.

PICAN said the pledged finance relied “heavily on loans rather than grants, pushing developing nations further into debt”.

“Worse, this figure represents little more than the long-promised $100 billion target adjusted for inflation. It does not address the growing costs of adaptation, mitigation, and loss and damage faced by vulnerable nations.

“In fact, it explicitly ignores any substantive decision to include loss and damage just acknowledging it.”

Vanuatu Climate Action Network coordinator Trevor Williams said developed nations systematically dismantled the principles of equity enshrined in the Paris Agreement at COP29.

“Their unwillingness to contribute sufficient finance, phase out fossil fuels, or strengthen their NDCs demonstrates a deliberate attempt to evade responsibility. COP29 has taught us that if optionality exists, developed countries will exploit it to stall progress.”

Kiribati Climate Action Network’s Robert Karoro said the Baku COP was a failure on every front.

‘No meaningful phase out of fossil fuels’
“Finance fell far short, Loss and Damage was weakened, and there was no meaningful commitment to phasing out fossil fuels,” he said.

“Our communities cannot wait for empty promises to materialise-we need action that addresses the root causes of the crisis and supports our survival.”

Tuvalu Climate Action Network’s executive director Richard Gokrun said the “outcome is personal”.

“Every fraction of a degree in warming translates into lost lives, cultures and homelands. Yet, the calls of the Pacific and other vulnerable nations were silenced in Baku,” he said.

“From the weakened Loss and Damage fund to the rollback on Just Transition principles, this COP has failed to deliver justice on any front.”

PICAN’s regional director Rufino Varea described the outcome of the meeting as “a death sentence for millions”.

He said the Pacific Islands have been clear that climate finance must be grants-based and responsive to the needs of frontline communities.

“Instead, developed countries are handing us debt while dismantling the principles of equity and justice that the Paris Agreement was built on. This is a betrayal, plain and simple.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific delegates fear the implications of a Trump presidency and breach of the 1.5 degree Celsius warming target will overshadow negotiations on climate finance at the UN’s annual COP talks that have started in Azerbaijan this week.

At the COP29 summit — dubbed the “finance COP” — Pacific nations will seek not just more monetary commitment from high-emitting nations but also for the funds to be paid and distributed to those countries facing the worst climate impacts.

With the US as one of the world’s largest emitters, it is feared Trump’s past withdrawal from the Paris Agreement could foreshadow diminished American involvement in climate commitments.

“We have our work cut-out for us. We are wary that we have the Trump administration coming through and may not be favourable to some of the climate funding that America has proposed,” Samoan academic and COP veteran Salā George Carter told BenarNews.

“We will continue to look for other ways to work with the US, if not with the government then maybe with businesses.”

This year, for the first time, a COP President’s Scientific Council has been formed to be actively involved in the negotiations. Carter is the sole Pacific representative.

Past COP funding promises of US$100 billion annually from developed countries to support vulnerable nations “has never been achieved in any of the years,” he said.

Disproportionate Pacific burden
Pacific nations contribute minimally to global emissions but often bear a disproportionate burden of climate change impacts.

Pacific Island Climate Action Network regional director Rufino Varea argues wealthier nations have a responsibility to support adaptation efforts in these vulnerable regions.

“The Pacific advocates for increased climate finance from wealthier nations, utilizing innovative mechanisms like fossil fuel levies to support adaptation, loss and damage, and a just transition for vulnerable communities,” Varea told BenarNews.

COP29 is being held in the capital of Azerbaijan, the port city of Baku on the oil and gas rich Caspian Sea, once an important waypoint on the ancient Silk Road connecting China to Europe.

The country bordering Russia, Iran, Georgia and Armenia is now one of the world’s most fossil fuel export dependent economies.

About 40,000 delegates will attend COP29 from all the U.N. member states including political leaders, diplomats, scientists, officials, civil society organizations, journalists, activists, Indigenous groups and many more.

All nations are party to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and most signed up to the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement and the 1.5 degree target.

Priorities for Pacific
Pacific Islands Forum Secretary General Baron Waqa in a statement yesterday said “the priorities of the Pacific Islands countries, include keeping the 1.5 degree goal alive.”

“The outcomes of COP 29 must deliver on what is non-negotiable – our survival,” he said.

Ahead of COP29, the 39 members of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) — representing the Pacific, Caribbean, African, Indian, and South China Sea — met in Baku to discuss negotiation priorities to achieve the 1.5 degree target and make meaningful progress on climate finance.

Pacific negotiators have historically found COP outcomes disappointing, yet they continue to advocate for greater accountability from major polluters.

“There have been people who have come to COP and refuse to attend anymore,” Carter said. “They believe it is a waste of time coming here because of very little delivery at the end of each COP.”

Papua New Guinea is not attending in Baku in an official capacity this year, citing lack of progress, but some key PNG diplomats are present to support the Pacific’s goals.

Climate data last week from the Europe Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service predicted 2024 will be the hottest year on record, and likely the first year to exceed the 1.5 degree threshold set in Paris.

Science becoming marginalised
Delegates worry science is becoming marginalised in climate negotiations, with some “arguing that we have reached 1.5, why do we continue to push for 1.5?,” Carter said.

“Although we have reached 1.5 degrees, we should not remove it. In fact, we should keep it as a long-time goal,” he said.

Carter argues for the importance of incorporating both scientific evidence and “our lived experience of climate change” in policy discussions.

The fight for the Paris target and loss and damage funding has been central to Pacific advocacy at previous COPs, despite persistent resistance from some countries.

The 1.5-degree target is “a lifeline of survival for communities and people in our region and in most island nations,” Varea said.

He stressed the need for “a progressive climate finance goal based on the needs and priorities of developing countries, small island developing states (SIDS), and least developed countries (LDC) to enable all countries to retain the 1.5 ambition and implement measures for resilience and loss and damage (finance).”

“As Pacific civil society, we obviously want the most ambitious outcomes to protect people and the planet.”

Pacific negotiators include prominent leaders, such as President Hilde Heine of the Marshall Islands, Vanuatu’s Special Envoy Ralph Regenvanu, Tuvalu’s Climate Change Minister Maina Talia and negotiators Anne Rasmussen from Samoa and Fiji’s Ambassador Amena Yauvoli.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

Pacific delegates fear the implications of a Trump presidency and breach of the 1.5 degree Celsius warming target will overshadow negotiations on climate finance at the UN’s annual COP talks that have started in Azerbaijan this week.

At the COP29 summit — dubbed the “finance COP” — Pacific nations will seek not just more monetary commitment from high-emitting nations but also for the funds to be paid and distributed to those countries facing the worst climate impacts.

With the US as one of the world’s largest emitters, it is feared Trump’s past withdrawal from the Paris Agreement could foreshadow diminished American involvement in climate commitments.

“We have our work cut-out for us. We are wary that we have the Trump administration coming through and may not be favourable to some of the climate funding that America has proposed,” Samoan academic and COP veteran Salā George Carter told BenarNews.

“We will continue to look for other ways to work with the US, if not with the government then maybe with businesses.”

This year, for the first time, a COP President’s Scientific Council has been formed to be actively involved in the negotiations. Carter is the sole Pacific representative.

Past COP funding promises of US$100 billion annually from developed countries to support vulnerable nations “has never been achieved in any of the years,” he said.

Disproportionate Pacific burden
Pacific nations contribute minimally to global emissions but often bear a disproportionate burden of climate change impacts.

Pacific Island Climate Action Network regional director Rufino Varea argues wealthier nations have a responsibility to support adaptation efforts in these vulnerable regions.

“The Pacific advocates for increased climate finance from wealthier nations, utilizing innovative mechanisms like fossil fuel levies to support adaptation, loss and damage, and a just transition for vulnerable communities,” Varea told BenarNews.

COP29 is being held in the capital of Azerbaijan, the port city of Baku on the oil and gas rich Caspian Sea, once an important waypoint on the ancient Silk Road connecting China to Europe.

The country bordering Russia, Iran, Georgia and Armenia is now one of the world’s most fossil fuel export dependent economies.

About 40,000 delegates will attend COP29 from all the U.N. member states including political leaders, diplomats, scientists, officials, civil society organizations, journalists, activists, Indigenous groups and many more.

All nations are party to the 1992 United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) and most signed up to the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement and the 1.5 degree target.

Priorities for Pacific
Pacific Islands Forum Secretary General Baron Waqa in a statement yesterday said “the priorities of the Pacific Islands countries, include keeping the 1.5 degree goal alive.”

“The outcomes of COP 29 must deliver on what is non-negotiable – our survival,” he said.

Ahead of COP29, the 39 members of the Alliance of Small Island States (AOSIS) — representing the Pacific, Caribbean, African, Indian, and South China Sea — met in Baku to discuss negotiation priorities to achieve the 1.5 degree target and make meaningful progress on climate finance.

Pacific negotiators have historically found COP outcomes disappointing, yet they continue to advocate for greater accountability from major polluters.

“There have been people who have come to COP and refuse to attend anymore,” Carter said. “They believe it is a waste of time coming here because of very little delivery at the end of each COP.”

Papua New Guinea is not attending in Baku in an official capacity this year, citing lack of progress, but some key PNG diplomats are present to support the Pacific’s goals.

Climate data last week from the Europe Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service predicted 2024 will be the hottest year on record, and likely the first year to exceed the 1.5 degree threshold set in Paris.

Science becoming marginalised
Delegates worry science is becoming marginalised in climate negotiations, with some “arguing that we have reached 1.5, why do we continue to push for 1.5?,” Carter said.

“Although we have reached 1.5 degrees, we should not remove it. In fact, we should keep it as a long-time goal,” he said.

Carter argues for the importance of incorporating both scientific evidence and “our lived experience of climate change” in policy discussions.

The fight for the Paris target and loss and damage funding has been central to Pacific advocacy at previous COPs, despite persistent resistance from some countries.

The 1.5-degree target is “a lifeline of survival for communities and people in our region and in most island nations,” Varea said.

He stressed the need for “a progressive climate finance goal based on the needs and priorities of developing countries, small island developing states (SIDS), and least developed countries (LDC) to enable all countries to retain the 1.5 ambition and implement measures for resilience and loss and damage (finance).”

“As Pacific civil society, we obviously want the most ambitious outcomes to protect people and the planet.”

Pacific negotiators include prominent leaders, such as President Hilde Heine of the Marshall Islands, Vanuatu’s Special Envoy Ralph Regenvanu, Tuvalu’s Climate Change Minister Maina Talia and negotiators Anne Rasmussen from Samoa and Fiji’s Ambassador Amena Yauvoli.

Republished from BenarNews with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The Ocean Declaration that will be agreed upon at the Commonwealth Heads of Government Meeting (CHOGM) this week will be known as the Apia Ocean Declaration.

In an exclusive interview with the Samoa Observer, Commonwealth Secretary-General Patricia Scotland said members were in a unique position to bring their voices together for the oceans, which have long been neglected.

“The Apia Ocean Declaration aims to address the rising threats to our ocean faces, especially from climate change and rising sea levels,” she said.

Commonwealth pushes for ocean protection with historic Apia Ocean Declaration. Video: Samoa Observer

Scotland, reflecting on her tenure as Secretary-General, noted the privilege of serving the Commonwealth, a diverse family of 56 countries comprising 2.7 billion people.

“I am very much the child of the Commonwealth. With 60 percent of our population under 30 years, we must prioritise their future.”

Scotland reflected that upon assuming her role, she recognised immediately that addressing climate change would be a key priority for the Commonwealth.

“Why? Because we have 33 small states, 25 small island states and we were the ones who were really suffering this badly,” she said.

Pacific a ‘big blue ocean state’
“We also knew in 2016 that nobody was looking at the oceans. Now, the Pacific is a big blue ocean state.

“But it’s one of the most under-resourced elements that we have. And yet, look at what was happening. The hurricanes and the cyclones were getting bigger and bigger.

“Why? Because our ocean had absorbed so much of the heat, so much of the carbon, and now it was starting to become saturated. So before, our ocean acted as a coolant. The cyclone would come, the hurricane would come, they’d pass over our cool blue water, and the heat would be drawn out.”

The Apia Ocean Declaration emerged from a pressing need to protect the oceans, especially given the devastating impact of climate change on coastal and island nations.

“We realised that while many discussions were happening globally, the oceans were often overlooked,” Scotland remarked.

“In 2016, we recognised the necessity for collective action. Our oceans absorb much of the carbon and heat, leading to increasingly severe hurricanes and cyclones.”

Scotland has spearheaded initiatives that brought together oceanographers, climatologists, and various stakeholders.

Worked in silos ‘for too long’
“We worked in silos for too long. It was time to unite our efforts for the ocean’s health.

“That’s when we realised that nobody had their eye on our oceans, but of the 56 Commonwealth members, many of us are island states, so our whole life is dependent on our ocean. And so that’s when the fight back happened.”

This collaboration resulted in the establishment of the Commonwealth Blue Charter, a significant framework focused on ocean conservation.

“Fiji’s presidency at the UN Oceans Conference was a turning point. Critics said it would take years to establish an ocean instrument, but we achieved it in less than ten months.”

“We are not just talking; we are implementing solutions.”

Scotland also addressed the financial challenges faced by many small island states, particularly regarding climate funding.

“In 2009, $100 billion was promised by those who had been primarily responsible for the climate crisis, to help those of us who contributed almost nothing to get over the hump.

Hard for finance applications
“But the money wasn’t coming. And in those days, many of our members found it so hard to put those applications together.”

To combat this issue, the Commonwealth established a Climate Finance Access Hub, facilitating over $365 million in funding for member states with another $500 million in the pipeline.

“But this has caused us to say we have to go further,” she added.

“We’re using geospatial data, we have to fill in the gaps for our members who don’t have the data, so we can look at what has happened in the past, what may happen in the future, and now we have AI to help us do the simulators.

“The Ocean Ministers’ Conference highlighted the importance of ensuring that countries at risk of disappearing under the waves can maintain their maritime jurisdiction,” Scotland asserted.

“The thing that we thought was so important is that those countries threatened with the rising of the sea, which could take away their whole island, don’t have certainty in terms of that jurisdiction. What will happen if our islands drop below the sea level?

“And we wanted our member states to be confident that if they had settled their marine boundaries, that jurisdiction would be set in perpetuity. Because that was the biggest guarantee; I may lose my land, but please don’t tell me I’m going to lose my ocean too.

Target an ocean declaration
“So that was the target for the Ocean Ministers’ Conference. And out of that came the idea that we would have an ocean declaration.

“It is that ocean declaration that we are bringing here to Samoa. And the whole poignancy of that is Samoa is the first small island state in the Pacific ever to host CHOGM. So wouldn’t it be beautiful if out of this big blue ocean state, this wonderful Pacific state, we could get an ocean declaration which could in the future be able to be known as the Apia Ocean Declaration? Because we would really mark what we’re doing here.

“What the Commonwealth has been determined to do throughout this whole period is not just talk, but take positive action to help our members not only just to survive, but to thrive.

“And if, which I hope we will, we get an agreement from our 56 states on this ocean declaration, it enables us to put the evidence before everyone, not only to secure what we need, but then to say 0.05 percent of the money is not enough to save our oceans.

“Oceans are the most underfunded area.

“I hope that all the work we’ve done on the Universal Vulnerability Index, on the nature of the vulnerability for our members, will be able to justify proper money, proper resources being put in.

“And you know what’s happening in this area; our fishermen are under threat.

“Our ability to use the oceans in the way we’ve used for millennia to feed our people, support our people, is really under threat. So this CHOGM is our fight back.”

As the meeting progresses, the emphasis remains on achieving consensus among the 56 member states regarding the Apia Ocean Declaration.

Republished from the Samoa Observer with permission.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

The recent climate talks in Egypt have left us with a sobering reality: The window for maintaining global warming to 1.5 degrees is closing fast and what is on the table currently is insufficient to avert some of the worst potential effects of climate change. The Nationally Determined Contribution targets of Asian and Pacific countries will result in a 16 per cent increase in greenhouse gas emissions by 2030 from the 2010 levels. 

The Sharm-el Sheikh Implementation Plan and the package of decisions taken at COP27 are a reaffirmation of actions that could deliver the net-zero resilient world our countries aspire to. The historic decision to establish a Loss and Damage Fund is an important step towards climate justice and building trust among countries.

But they are not enough to help us arrive at a better future without, what the UN Secretary General calls, a “giant leap on climate ambition”. Carbon neutrality needs to at the heart of national development strategies and reflected in public and private investment decisions. And it needs to cascade down to the sustainable pathways in each sector of the economy. 

Accelerate energy transition

At the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP), we are working with regional and national stakeholders on these transformational pathways. Moving away from the brown economy is imperative, not only because emissions are rising but also because dependence on fossil fuels has left economies struggling with price volatility and energy insecurity.

A clear road map is the needed springboard for an inclusive and just energy transition. We have been working with countries to develop scenarios for such a shift through National Roadmaps, demonstrating that a different energy future is possible and viable with the political will and sincere commitment to action of the public and private sectors. 

The changeover to renewables also requires concurrent improvements in grid infrastructure, especially cross-border grids. The Regional Road Map on Power System Connectivity provides us the platform to work with member States toward an interconnected grid, including through the development of the necessary regulatory frameworks for to integrate power systems and mobilize investments in grid infrastructure. The future of energy security will be determined by the ability to develop green grids and trade renewable-generated electricity across our borders. 

Green the rides

The move to net-zero carbon will not be complete without greening the transport sector. In Asia and the Pacific transport is primarily powered by fossil fuels and as a result accounted for 24 per cent of total carbon emissions by 2018.

Energy efficiency improvements and using more electric vehicles are the most effective measures to reduce carbon emissions by as much as 60 per cent in 2050 compared to 2005 levels. The Regional Action Programme for Sustainable Transport Development allows us to work with countries to implement and cooperate on priorities for low-carbon transport, including electric mobility. Our work with the Framework Agreement on Facilitation of Cross-border Paperless Trade also is helping to make commerce more efficient and climate-smart, a critical element for the transition in the energy and transport sectors.

Adapting to a riskier future

Even with mitigation measures in place, our economy and people will not be safe without a holistic risk management system. And it needs to be one that prevents communities from being blindsided by cascading climate disasters. 

We are working with partners to deepen the understanding of such cascading risks and to help develop preparedness strategies for this new reality, such as the implementation of the ASEAN Regional Plan of Action for Adaptation to Drought.

Make finance available where it matters the most

Finance and investment are uniquely placed to propel the transitions needed. The past five years have seen thematic bonds in our region grow tenfold. Private finance is slowly aligning with climate needs. The new Loss and Damage Fund and its operation present new hopes for financing the most vulnerable. However, climate finance is not happening at the speed and scale needed. It needs to be accessible to developing economies in times of need.

Innovative financing instruments need to be developed and scaled up, from debt-for-climate swaps to SDG bonds, some of which ESCAP is helping to develop in the Pacific and in Cambodia. Growing momentum in the business sector will need to be sustained. The Asia-Pacific Green Deal for Business by the ESCAP Sustainable Business Network (ESBN) is important progress. We are also working with the High-level Climate Champions to bring climate-aligned investment opportunities closer to private financiers.

Lock in higher ambition and accelerate implementation

Climate actions in Asia and the Pacific matter for global success and well-being. The past two years has been a grim reminder that conflicts in one continent create hunger in another, and that emissions somewhere push sea levels higher everywhere. Never has our prosperity been more dependent on collective actions and cooperation. 

Our countries are taking note. Member States meeting at the seventh session of the Committee on Environment and Development, which opens today (29 November) are seeking consensus on the regional cooperation needed and priorities for climate action such as oceans, ecosystem and air pollution. We hope that the momentum begun at COP27 and the Committee will be continued at the seventy-ninth session of the Commission as it will hone in on the accelerators for climate action.

In this era of heightened risks and shared prosperity, only regional, multilateral solidarity and genuine ambition that match with the new climate reality unfolding around us — along with bold climate action — are the only way to secure a future where the countries of Asia and the Pacific can prosper. 

*******

Armida Salsiah Alisjahbana is an Under-Secretary-General of the United Nations and Executive Secretary of the Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific (ESCAP)

The climate emergency is the result of an ethical, moral and spiritual crisis, manifested in a fixation on profit.

The extractive and, ultimately, unsustainable systems of production and consumption, by those complicit in this crisis, continue to ignore increasing scientific, and moral warnings.

Those who have contributed to this crisis the least, suffer the most, physically, existentially, and ecologically.

This is an injustice that must end.

We affirm the Faith and Science Joint Appeal, calling us to respond, with the knowledge of science, and the wisdom of spirituality: to know more and to care more.

Our interconnectedness to this common home forces us to a radical solidarity, across gender and generation, for climate justice for all.

In this spirit, wealthier countries must lead in reducing their own emissions, and in financing emission reductions of poorer nations.

Industrialised countries must support the vulnerable
Industrialised countries must support the vulnerable countries, and finance adaptation.

They must put into action a mechanism for loss and damage, with additional funds.

Love calls us to seek climate justice and restoration. It calls us to respect the rights of Indigenous Peoples, to protect them, and their ancestral domains, from predatory economic interests, and to learn from their ancient wisdom.

Indigenous spirituality could restore our understanding of interdependence between land, ocean, and life, between generations before us,and the ones to come.

Love calls us to transformation of systems and lifestyles. This transition away from fossil fuel-based economies must be just, securing livelihoods and wellbeing for all and not just some.

Keep Paris Agreement promise alive
We ask our leaders to not only keep the promise of the Paris Agreement alive, but also to keep alive the hope of a flourishing future for humanity.

We have heard many commitments in this place.

Words have power, but only when they are manifested into action.

The fate of the planet depends on it.

The World Council of Churches (WCC) presented a longer statement to the COP26 Climate Summit. This was the text of Pacific Conference of Churches (PCC) secretary-general Reverend James Bhagwan’s intervention to the High Level Plenary yesterday.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

After years of empty promises by major emitters, it’s time to deliver on climate financing.

The world is warming. The science is clear. Most large, developed countries need to take ambitious action to reduce their emissions in order not to impact us further.

If they don’t, there is dire consequence, and in turn a significant rise in adaptation cost to us, those that did not cause this problem.

Some people call it paradise, but for me and thousands of Pacific people, the beautiful pristine Pacific Island region is simply home. It is our inheritance, a blessing from our forebears and ancestors.

As custodians of these islands, we have a moral duty to protect it – for today and the unborn generations of our Pacific anau.

Sadly, we are unable to do that because of things beyond our control. The grim reality of climate change, especially for many Small Island Developing States like my beloved Cook Islands, is evidently clear.

Sea level rise is alarming. Our food security is at risk, and our way of life that we have known for generations is slowly disappearing. What were “once in a lifetime” extreme events like category 5 cyclones, marine heatwaves and the like are becoming more severe.

No longer theory
These developments are no longer theory. Despite our negligible contribution to global emissions, this is the price we pay.

We are talking about homes, lands and precious lives; many are being displaced as we speak. I am reminded about my Pacific brothers and sisters living on remote atolls including some of those in our 15 islands that make up the Cook Islands — as well as our Pacific neighbours such as Kiribati, Tuvalu, Tokelau and many others, not just in the Pacific Ocean.

This family of small islands states is spread beyond our Pacific to across the globe.

Here in the Cook Islands, we are raising riverbanks to protect homes that for the first time in history are being reached by floodwater. We are building water storage on islands that have never before experienced levels of drought that we see now.

Over the years, the devastating impact of climate change has evolved from a mere threat to a crisis of epic proportion, now posing as the most pressing security issue to livelihoods on our island shores.

We live with undeniable evidence to back up the science. Most of you who follow the climate change discourse know our story. We have been saying this for as far as back as I can remember.

For more than 10 years of my political career, our message to the world about climate change has been loud and clear. Climate change is a matter of life and death. We need help. Urgently.

Given only empty promises
Today, I am sad to say that after all the years of highlighting this bitter truth, the discourse hasn’t progressed us far enough. All we have been given are promises and more empty promises from the world’s biggest emitters while our islands and people are heading towards a climate catastrophe where our very existence and future is at stake.

But we will not stop trying. As long as we have the strength and the opportunity to speak our truth to power, we will continue to call for urgent action. In the words of our young Pacific climate activists, “We are not drowning, we are fighting.”

As the political champion of Climate Finance for the Pacific Islands, I believe it is imperative that world leaders fast track large-scale climate finance that are easy to access for bold long-term and permanent adaptation solutions.

It is critical that COP26 begins discussions for a new quantifiable goal on climate finance. We need to do this now. Not tomorrow, next year or the next COP.

Last week when I addressed world leaders attending COP26, I urged them to consider a new global financial instrument that recognises climate-related debt, separately from national debt. We need to provide for innovative financing modalities that do not increase our debt.

We need to take climate adaptation debt off national balance sheets, especially since many Pacific countries are already heavily in debt. Why? Pacific countries contribute the least to global emissions and they should not have to pay a debt on top the consequences they are already struggling with.

Amortising adaptation debt
We need to consider amortising adaptation debt over a 100-year timeframe.

We must seek a new commitment that dedicates financing towards Loss and Damage that would assist our vulnerable communities manage the transfer of risks experienced by the irreversible impacts of climate change. We must also ensure that adaptation receives an equitable amount of financing as for mitigation.

I want to reiterate that adaptation measures by their very nature are long-term investments against climate impacts, thus we need to be talking about adaptation project lifecycles of 20 years, 50 years and 100 years, and more.

We are at a critical juncture of our journey where the fate of our beautiful, pristine homes is a stake. I call on all major emitters to take stronger climate action, especially to deliver on their funding promises.

Stop making excuses; climate change existed way before covid-19 when the promises of billions of dollars in climate financing were made.

It is time to deliver.

Mark Brown, Prime Minister of the Cook Islands, is also the Pacific Political Champion for Climate Finance at COP26. While not attending the COP this year due to covid-19 travel restrictions, Prime Minister Brown is providing support and undertaking this role remotely. This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz

A Chinese official characterised the US return to the international climate scene, not unfairly, as a “truant getting back to class”, reports Climate Change News.

Joe Biden just about scraped a pass with his first assignment this week, and inspired varying degrees of improvement from his slacker pals Japan, Canada and South Korea.

China may have a strong attendance record but will not win any school prizes for Xi Jinping’s long overdue acknowledgment that phasing out coal is essential to climate action.

UK is the class swot, doing its homework with the Climate Change Committee breathing down its neck.

It is a status Boris Johnson appears uncomfortable with, casually insulting those who actually care about the environment as “bunny huggers”, to general bemusement.

You get the sense he would rather be sharing a cigarette with Scott Morrison behind the bike shed.

To stretch the metaphor, Greta Thunberg is the headteacher poking her head round the door to say they’ve all let the school down.

Except there is no authority dispensing discipline, just peer pressure.

The lone Pacific voice, Marshall Islands President David Kabua, appealed for help for the region.

Climate Change News live blogged all the opening speeches and US climate finance pledge.

Article by AsiaPacificReport.nz