Time for Industrialised nations to save our planet says Fijian PM ahead of COP21
Speaking in Brussels at the 102nd ACP Council of Ministers, Bainimarama said that many African Caribbean and Pacific (ACP) members share his alarm at the clear and present danger they face on the impacts of Climate Change.
Bainimarama told delegates the extreme weather events accompanying climate change are already having a devastating impact on countries such as Fiji – whether they are parching droughts killing our agriculture or howling cyclones coming out of nowhere and killing our people and destroying our infrastructure.
“Rising sea levels are already claiming large reaches of coastal land and forcing the evacuation of entire settlements. And in the case of three of our neighbours – Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Marshall islands – these sovereign countries, members of the United Nations, seem destined to sink beneath the waves altogether.
“Never before in the entire sweep of human history has the Pacific been so threatened. Not from invasion and war nor the testing of nuclear weapons – all of which we endured last century - but from the sea. Rising as the icecaps melt and the average global temperature climbs because of the carbon emissions of the industrialised nations. From the factories that have made them rich. The energy they burn. The cars they drive. The planes they travel in.
“We haven’t caused this crisis. They have. In fact, Fiji’s contribution to carbon emissions is a 0.004%. Yet we are still willing to play our part. To cut this tiny amount by 30 per cent by 2030, almost entirely by embracing sustainable energy sources and reducing our use of fossil fuels to just one per cent,” Bainimarama emphasised.
He reaffirmed Fiji have also offered to give permanent refuge in a worst-case scenario to the people of its closest neighbours, Kiribati and Tuvalu.
“And we are comprehensively building our resilience to climate change – whether it is moving flooded settlements to higher ground or preparing our people for the even more devastating and unpredictable cyclones the scientists say are coming.
Our message in Paris next week will be simple. We are doing what we can to help ourselves. It is now time – high time – for the industrialised nations to do what they must do to save us and save our planet. They must cut their carbon emissions and by much more than many of them are planning to do,” Bainimarama stressed.
Bainimarama commended the EU’s commitment to reduce carbon emissions by 40 per cent by 2030, which he said augurs well for the future of pacific small island developing states.
He also called on the EU's support in the lead up to the Climate Change talks in Paris.
“We salute the people of Europe for committing themselves to a 40 per cent cut in carbon emissions by 2030. But those nations that are baulking at drastic action – what I have called the coalition of the selfish – need to be prodded out of their complacency.
The Pacific island nations are going to Paris next week with what we have called the Suva Declaration, a position we agreed on at a summit in the Fijian capital of members of the PIDF - the Pacific Islands Development Forum. This declaration calls on the global community to adopt legally binding measures to cap global warming at 1.5 per cent above pre-industrial levels instead of the 2 per cent that is currently envisaged. And we are asking every nation – including our ACP partners – to support this measure as the only viable way to stave off catastrophe,” Bainimarama explained.
Bainimarama also urged the ACP grouping to heed the voice of the Pacific and voices of other low-lying areas of the world.
“It is morally unacceptable to sacrifice our survival to maintain the current status in the developed and emerging nations. And history will judge us very harshly if at this point in time, we fail to act. To do what is necessary to save us. We who have not benefited from the riches of the industrial era, are not polluting the planet ourselves, yet who stand to lose the most. Whole islands. Whole countries. Our agriculture. Our lifestyle. Our economy. Our way of life.
“We need the industrial nations to realise that if they don’t act, it will be to their ultimate cost. Because they are merely delaying the inevitable. Embrace a more sustainable energy future now and the pain will be far less than having to do it later. Embracing a clean, green future – as Fiji has – is actually a huge plus, a selling point for any nation in a world that increasingly values sustainable development. So I appeal to the industrialised nation to examine the clear benefits of acting now rather than leaving it until it is all too late,” Bainimarama said.
SOURCE: PACNEWS
Post a Comment