PM Salwai addressed United Nations on Climate Change

May 2, 2016 · by Vanuatu indigenous watch · in Economic. ·

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Mr President;
Excellencies;
The Secretary-General;
Distinguished delegates;
Ladies and gentlemen

I bring to you all warm greetings from the people of Vanuatu, on whose behalf I am privileged to address this august gathering.

Mr President,

We gather here today at a historic juncture in the global struggle to minimize the impacts of climate change and radically transform humanity’s business-as-usual development trajectory away from fossil fuel-driven growth.

Mr. President,

The people of Vanuatu celebrated the conclusion of the 21^st Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and the adoption of the Paris Agreement. This Agreement is fully in line with Vanuatu’s highest-level National Sustainable Development Plan, and has the potential to promote sustainable development across the globe. We trust that it will indeed support us to meet national green development aspirations and ensure that our people can enjoy prosperity while not compromising the life supporting climate system under our stewardship.

Vanuatu applauds the leadership of French COP President Manuel Pulgar-Vidal and UNFCCC Executive Secretary Christiana Figueres for their unwavering commitment to the cooperation of over 190 countries and in securing many of the positive outcomes Vanuatu sees in the agreement. The road to Paris was long, and hard, and for many of the issues first tabled by Vanuatu at the UNFCCC, has been several decades long.

Mr. President,

Vanuatu, as chair of AOSIS, first introduced the challenge of Loss & Damage to the UNFCCC in 1991. The limits to climate change adaptation are very real for the people of Vanuatu, who are now recovering from the devastation of category 5 Cyclone Pam and today facing a food and water crisis caused by the strongest El Nino event ever recorded. As such, Vanuatu is pleased that the loss and damage associated with Climate Change Impacts will be perpetually considered under the Warsaw International Mechanism for Loss and Damage.

It must be clear however, that Vanuatu has serious concern with the premise that liability and compensation should be excluded from the scope of the Paris Agreement. In addition to historical responsibilities for emissions, the continued actions of some Parties clearly indicates that they are not seriously or ambitiously undertaking mitigation efforts and thereby elevating the catastrophic risks and impacts of climate change faced by my people. Vanuatu continues to believe that liability and compensation should be addressed as part of the loss and damage under the multilateral climate change regime. For the record, by signing the Paris Agreement, Accordingly Mr. President I wish to declare at this juncture that in signing the Paris Agreement here today, Vanuatu does not waive any current or future rights to compensation for climate change loss and damage. We will make another declaration to this effect upon ratifying the Paris Agreement.

Mr. President,

Vanuatu lobbied hard to ensure that clear language exists in this Agreement that all Parties must “pursue ambitious efforts to limit the temperature increase to 1.5 °C above pre-industrial levels”. According to the Agreement emissions must peak “as soon as possible” and then rapidly decline. For the record, Vanuatu insists that no later than 2050 emissions must have achieved a balance between anthropogenic emissions by sources and removals by sinks of greenhouse gases. For the lives of my people, Vanuatu cannot and will not accept unambitious action in this regard that takes us into the end of the second part of this century.

Vanuatu’s own Nationally Determined Contribution takes the highest possible ambition of committing, with the support of developed country partners, to transitioning to close to 100% renewable energy in the electricity sector by 2030. This target would replace nearly all fossil fuel requirements for electricity generation in the country and be consistent with our own National Energy Road Map target of 65% total renewable energy by 2020.

Mr. President,

In regards to the finance required to meet the challenges of climate change, Vanuatu strongly supports the Agreement’s requirement that developed countries must take the lead in the global effort to mobilize climate finance from a wide variety of sources. Vanuatu will be carefully monitoring and contributing to the climate finance transparency mechanisms on support provided and received. Vanuatu expects developed countries to exceed a floor of USD 100 billion per year by 2020, and that this finance will be new and additional.

Mr. President,

For all of the hard-won positive outcomes in the Paris Agreement that we sign today, there are elements of the Paris Agreement, as outlined above, on which Vanuatu holds serious reservation. The real challenge is in translating these commitments into action that is transparent, accountable and effective enough to bring relief to the vulnerable people of the world suffering the losses, damages and negative impacts of climate change.

In Vanuatu we will continue to work to accelerate the widespread implementation of climate adaptation and mitigation actions. Current partnerships among Government, traditional authorities, the private sector, civil society, faith-based organizations, development partners and academia have saved the lives of our people when faced with climate disasters like Cyclone Pam, and increased our resilience to cope with the slow-onset impacts of climate change. Vanuatu’s Climate Change & Disaster Risk Reduction Policy outlines the strategic priorities our nation is undertaking, with all of its stakeholder, to reduce our many vulnerabilities while simultaneously building a low carbon and highly resilient and prosperous future for our people.

Mr. President,

In the spirit of international cooperation, and in the good faith in which Vanuatu continues to engage with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change, Vanuatu brings pen to paper of this Paris Agreement.

Mr President,

Having concluded on an Agreement in Paris, we now need the same collective commitment to bring the Paris Agreement into force. Accordingly we call on all parties to engage and commit to this process so we can move ahead and commence the implementation of the agreement particularly the implementation of our individual NDCs in light of the goals that we have agreed to in Paris. We look forward to partnering with you all as we implement the Agreement and work towards a stock take of our efforts, as agreed, after 5 years.

On this note, I leave you with a blessing of climate peace and solidarity from Vanuatu “Bambae God i bringim pis long wol mo klaemet blong yumi evriwan”.