Excellencies,
The COP26 Presidency,
Distinguished Guests,
Ladies and Gentlemen,
Good morning, good afternoon and good evening to you all.
We meet in this virtual setting when the world straddles between recovery and uncertainty. COVID-19 vaccines have begun rollout but new variants of the virus are being discovered around the globe.
The year 2020 was supposed to herald the ‘Decade of Action’ to deliver on global development goals with greater speed and scope. I am afraid that broad ambition is long obsolete. What we need now is an unprecedented symbiotic push towards post-pandemic socio-economic recovery that reinstates development gains lost since early 2020 and kick-starts massive resource mobilisation to ensure that the recovery is sustainable, resilient and leaves no-one behind.
COVID-19 has shown what the world can do if we work together to solve a common existential threat. We have developed vaccines in record times, implemented lock downs across borders in collaboration and mobilised financial resources and fiscal relief measures at rapid scales. I do not see why the same cannot be done for an even greater threat that is climate change. We must not forget that the existential threat of climate change will persist much longer than any Pandemic. Our collective global efforts to solving the climate crises will define our ability to achieve the 2030 Sustainable Development Agenda and future proof our nations against other Pandemics.
Need to Simplify Access Modalities for Climate Finance;
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
The climate finance landscape is overly complicated and fragmented with multiple sources of finance, each having very different access requirements. This stretches the already limited capacity of developing countries, particularly Small Island Developing States or SIDS in short, to mobilise adequate finance for meaningful climate action. There is an urgent need for more uniformed access modalities and criteria across major bilateral, multilateral and private sources of climate finance.
Long Term Financial Commitments;
Fiji is concerned by the lack of long-term commitment for climate finance from the developed world. Finance continues to be committed for quick ‘fly by night’ initiatives that satisfy the large resource mobilisation KPIs of donors and their intermediaries. Development partners must realise that truly transformative climate or development projects in developing countries need to be spread at least over 5 to 10 years to better enable structural reforms, techno-economic assessments, creation of robust business cases and an enabling environment for scalability. Moreover, we in the Pacific have multiple inherent vulnerabilities that result in higher cost of service delivery, and our governments end up spending much more per capita than any other nations. Such issues need to be incorporated and addressed through long term climate and development finance commitments which bring certainty and predictability to finance flows. Such long-term perspectives and commitments are key de-risking factors for mobilising critical private finance in climate vulnerable countries.
Means and Market Testing;
On a related note, Fiji has experienced a massive decline in support for pilot initiatives that have become casualties of the rush to meet resource mobilisation targets of climate financiers. There is very limited opportunity given to means and market test innovative projects through pilots to create a better business case. The need for long term financial commitments must heavily focus on pilot testing first before scaling later as it helps better incorporate community buy-in, encourages country driven development needs and promotes agile development of projects to enable better scalability. We must do away with parachuting large scale projects from top – down if we are to truly address the drivers of socio-economic inequity and climate vulnerability.
Economic Diversification – Blue Recovery Post COVID-19;
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
A sustainable recovery from COVID-19 will require developing countries to diversify their economies and catalyse new streams of finance. In this regard, SIDS must realise the bountiful potential of their most priced asset – their vast Ocean space. Fiji’s ocean is intrinsically linked to our identity as a small island developing state. But we are not letting that name fool us; when it comes to our ocean space under which we have complete jurisdiction, nothing is small about Fiji. Our Exclusive Economic Zone or EEZ in short, is 70% larger than our land mass, and when it comes to size of EEZ, Fiji has the 26th most expansive patch of planet under our protection. With these statistics in mind, we see our true potential as a big-ocean state –– one with significant potential for a very big, very vibrant, and very blue economy.
We call upon development partners and investors to channel finance into Fiji and let us help you ‘blue’ your portfolio. We also call upon you to help us structure new financial products such as blue bonds and debt for nature swaps that are tailor made to SIDS blue financing ambitions. This must be paired up with support to help de-risk innovative blue financing which could be in the form of guarantees and first-loss risk sharing opportunities.
Proactive Debt Forgiveness;
Fiji thanks the global north for facilitating the Debt Service Suspension Initiative (DSSI) until June 2021, even though it is little more than a band-aid solution for mortal wounds whose adverse effect will be felt for years to come if more long-term solutions are not adopted. It is rather concerning that such debt support facilities are only showing up due to fiscal crunch of COVID-19 whereas developing countries like Fiji have been suffering similar fiscal crises on an annual basis due to climate change. There should be urgent work done on developing debt forgiveness relief packages that are tied to climate induced fiscal shocks.
Excellencies, Ladies and Gentlemen,
These are just a few of many issues and solutions that we need to openly discuss and rapidly operationalise if we are to meet our long-term development goals. There is much to do and no time to waste.
I urge the Secretariat to note the need to have meaningful follow ups after this Roundtable and Fiji suggests the need to have a high-level Working Group or a Taskforce that would help operationlise the recommendations emanating from our discussions today.
Thank you.