By Dr Satyendra Prasad
This years UN climate talks are only weeks away. It will be held in Antalya under the Presidency of Türkiye. We have a unique window. Australia leads the negotiations at the Antalya COP31.
My warmest congratulations to the Fiji and Tuvalu Governments for successfully hosting the Pre-COP31.
Hosting some 5000 of the World’s leading community leaders, women’s organisations, faith group representatives, climate change researchers, students, scientists and traditional knowledge leaders, indigenous groups, environmental activists, influencers, leaders, negotiators, LGBTQ champions on these two shores concurrently is no mean task. Brilliant.
To the Australian Government that first of all insisted on a Pacific Pre-COP and helped to deliver a hugely successful Pre-COP , a huge Vinaka Vakalevu.
This is remarkable display of companionship with the Pacific.
Making the COP Process Deliver for the Pacific
I have been often conflicted when participating in these global climate negotiations. Conflicted not because the Blue Pacific does not deserve to be seen and heard at these forums but conflicted that so little seems to come out of them.
How hard can it be to secure resources to support rebuilding farms that have lost to salt water intrusion? How hard can it be to relocate some 50-70 health centres across the region to higher grounds? How hard can it be to build the 15,000 or so sea walls to keep rising seas at bay for that much longer from our coastal villages. Yet this remains incredibly hard. Making the case internationally for more financial resources is always painful.
But this pain fades into insignificance when you listen to Mia Kami, hear Tina Stege or Sindra Sharma or Melelusi Sokotia arguing our case, or when you see the anxiety and the hope in the hymns sung by young folks as at the opening Church Service Pre-COP.
This hurts. This is pain.
Thousands saw their efforts to describe our climate realities – through dance, music, prose and dialogue. So many of these voices would never be seen or heard at a global UN conferences otherwise. That is powerful.
The Pre-COP31 is a moment that was owned by people and communities who live on frontlines of climate change. But they are not only living on its frontlines. They are indeed holding the frontlines for the rest of the world. Magical.
Pacific that is Leading
The international community walked away from the Pre-COP fired up by the energy across the Blue Pacific. This is not a region that lives on hope and prayers alone. We displayed progress and projected leadership – project by project, program by program, country by country, ambition by ambition.
The Prime Ministers of Solomon Islands and Tonga presented their new climate ambitions. They presented their own national climate funds to back up that ambition – seeded in part through their own national resources. That’s leadership.
Papua New Guinea presented to the World its stunning progress in setting up the policy foundations from which its forests – some 5 percent of total primary forestland on the planet can be turned into protected regions – earning incomes for communities and providing an ecosystem service to the World.
Palau, Niue, Tonga and others presented their innovations across the blue sector – showing how to transform ocean, marine, coral protection into incomes and better livelihoods. That’s wisdom and tactic combined.
Pacific Media That Lifted the Region
What was also different was the care with which our own national and regional media presented our stories – thoughtfully, respectfully and without drama. PRE-COP31 was a moment which to me marked the emergence of a powerful force to emerge from the Pacific – the power and focus of its media.
Pacific’s media is now probably the World most savvy and sophisticated in reporting and presenting the climate crisis. It presents the frontlines with empathy. It presents powerfully to a world desperately short on empathy. It would do well to commence capacity building programs for Australian and New Zealand media hereafter. Congratulations all around.
A Pacific That is Creating Opportunities
For many years, we looked to the World for solutions. But this time it was different.
Organisers used the Pre-CoP to showcase progress from across the Blue Pacific. Our presenters created new opportunities for partnerships as they presented.
To representatives of communities from Palau, Tonga, RMI, Tuvalu, PNG and Fiji – Vinaka. You helped the world see that we too can innovate – we can transform ancient memory into contemporary solutions. We can lead. We have become a vast zone for learning.
From the Blue Community – came foundational innovations in financial engineering – blending national, international (public and private) resources for driving programmes to protect our ocean and conserve its vast biodiversity. Owning the programs – leading the programs and at the cutting edge of finance.
This time the Pacific did not turn up as spectators. It did not turn up as communities to be piloted upon. It turned up as drivers who were framing-leading- implementing and learning as they did so. Surreal.
A Pacific that is Inspiring
Our messages were simple. We have placed our trust in the World’s scientists. They agree that 1.5 decree Celsius temperature rise is a guardrail. It is a guardrail for us across the Blue Pacific. It is a guardrail for humanity.
Our Ocean helps to keep this 1.5 target within reach. We are stewards of our share of the World’s ocean. We hold our stewardship with sacred responsibility. So must the World.
A Blue COP31 in Atalya should now amplify this. It is that simple
Building our Resilience
The region has undertaken boldest steps yet to protect its communities by providing sufficient resources in ways that communities can access through its Pacific Resilience Facility. A region tired of climate debts, slow pace of finance, has now established its own financial institution to rebuild resilience – a community at a time and that too without driving up national debt.
If some of the smallest and most vulnerable states in the World can make significant financial contributions into the Pacific Resilience Facility – so can the rest of the World.
If the World did so, we can, as a region rebuild our resilience at pace – not one village at a time but many villages concurrently. Antalya should deliver on this. It is that simple.
The Pacific has yearned for voice and visibility in international forums where their futures get decided. The UN’s climate meetings are the place where the Pacific’s gravest priority – the risk of state failures arising from repeated climate stresses ultimately get decided.
Our collective wellbeing depends on our leaders succeeding into getting into the DNA of international decision making. This remains hard but it is more doable now than before.
Our leaders have worked tirelessly to support our communities to make their voices heard in Funafuti and in Nadi at the hugely successful pre-COP meetings. The Pacific’s leaders get wind and energy from these.
Pacific’s leaders take this energy into their global negotiations.
They carry prayers from our faith communities. They carry the hopes of those rarely seen or heard in international forums.
To have raised expectations from our leaders is not an unfair ask this time around therefore. Bring on the COP31.
This piece was first published in MaiTV and has been republished here with the kind permission of the author.
Contributing Author: Dr Satyendra Prasad is Fiji’s Former Ambassador to the United Nations and Senior fellow of Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. He is a Special Envoy to the Pacific Resilience Facility, Visiting Senior Diplomatic Fellow at Canterbury University and Climate Lead for Abt Global.
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