THE TIME TO HELP SMALL NATIONS FROM THE DEVASTATION OF CLIMATE CHANGE IS NOW- PM BAINIMARAMA
Our canoe is sinking, pick up your buckets and start bailing now before it is too late.
This was the desperate plea made by the Fijian Prime Minister and Chair of the Pacific Islands Forum, Josaia Voreqe Bainimarama, on behalf of the Pacific, at the Action and Solidarity event along the margins of COP26 in Glasgow today (1st November, 2021).
"As I speak, our global canoe is headed for storms that will sink us while seawater pours aboard through massive gaps; gaps in ambition, gaps in climate finance, and gaps in emissions reduction commitments,” he said.
“Island nations, like Fiji, have teaspoons with which to bail water. The G20 nations have buckets. Yet too many are wilfully ignoring the storms on the horizon and the holes in our canoe. “They must cut emissions now to set our canoe towards the calm of carbon-neutral seas and they need to start bailing now by meeting their climate finance pledges before our canoe sinks to the seabed.
“This COP is where we will choose to stay with 1.5 or lose it forever and it is where we decide whether we are with the young and future children of the world or we are against them.”
While we welcome the new Climate Finance Delivery Plan on meeting the $US100 billion goal by 2023, Prime Minister Bainimarama said we do so knowing that nations have fallen billions short of previous pledges.
“Despite being the most climate-vulnerable nations in the world, SIDS have accessed a mere two per cent of the available finance, which has mostly been through loans, forcing us to pay high interest rates to address climate-driven impacts we did not cause,” he added.
“Wealthy nations must do more than pledge finance, they must make it affordable and accessible, and they must actually ensure that it reaches the communities it’s meant to aid for mitigation, but mainly for adaptation purposes.
"To all leaders here; the message of the Pacific is simple: Our canoe is sinking. Pick up your buckets and start bailing, now, before it’s too late.”
Present at the event to deliver statements were the G20 leaders such as President of USA, President of Korea and the Prime Ministers of Canada and Italy.