Dubai, 1st December 2023
Tonga Government Leads Side Event at COP28 to Drive Climate Finance Reform
The Government of Tonga, in collaboration with the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) Pacific Office and the Pacific Islands Forum (PIF) has spearheaded a pivotal side event at COP28 in Dubai. Supported by the Government of the Cook Islands, the Lowy Institute (Australia), and the United Kingdom’s Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office (FCDO), the event focused on addressing critical issues related to climate finance in the Pacific region.
Tonga’s Honourable Prime Minister Huʻakavameiliku attends this year’s international climate conference, as the High-Level Political Champion in the Pacific, for Climate Finance. In September 2023, he addressed the 78th session of the United Nation’s General Assembly, emphasizing the need to invest in resilience. Tonga supports the review of the international financial architecture to ensure it is fit for purpose and calls for predictable, stable, and substantial support for nations facing financial difficulties. The Honourable Prime Minister has also stressed the need for greater access to concessional finance for SIDS and the need to operationalize the Loss and Damage Fund, announced at COP27.
This COP28 side event, held in the Moana Blue Pacific Pavilion, was moderated by Chief Secretary and Secretary to Cabinet, Mr Paula Ma’u, a well-known figure in the climate change space, having held the position of CEO MEIDECC for the past 10 years. Honourable Tiofilusi Tiueti, Minister for Finance, commenced the panel discussion, highlighting the importance of ministries of finance being engaged in these discussions and drawing attention to the work of the Government of Tonga to strengthen internal systems and processes for effective utilization of climate finance.
The Minister emphasized,
“we know the importance of deploying financial instruments, establishing processes and strengthening our systems to be able to catalyze investment in resilience.”
The Government of Tonga, a champion of a risk-informed development approach, has progressed climate budget tagging initiatives and also established the National Climate Change Trust Fund, a national mechanism aimed to leverage climate finance and channel this to local communities that are most impacted by climate change. The Minister acknowledged “my team is leading work on budget tagging and expenditure tracking to ensure we are understanding how we are investing and where we need to better allocate our resources for resilient development. We have formed a technical working group, in partnership with our Ministry of Climate Change and the National Planning Division to progress this work”. The Government is also working with partners to access funding from mechanisms, including the Green Climate Fund.
Joining the Government of Tonga in the dialogue, Mr. Wayne King - the Director for Climate Change for the Government of the Cook Islands; Dr. Melanie Pill - Research Fellow at the Lowy Institute, Australia, represented the Lowy Institute’s Policy paper on GCF and the implications for the Pacific, talking to the performance and future direction for the Green Climate Fund; and Ms. Debbie Palmer, the Director of Energy, Climate, and Environment Directorate.
In concluding the side event, Mr. Paula Ma’u thanked the panelists and partners of the event, and acknowledged the many participants who joined the event both in person at the Pavilion and online. The Government of Tonga appreciates the support of partners including the UNDP Governance for Resilient Development in the Pacific (Gov4Res) project, the New Zealand Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Trade (MFAT), the UNDP Pacific Office and the Pacific Islands Forum in these initiatives. The Tonga Delegation looks forward to the outcomes of the negotiation processes from COP28 and positive outcomes for the Kingdon of Tonga and its Pacific neighbors.
- Log in to post comments
