Oxfam launches climate change report

A report on strengthening governance of climate change finance in the Pacific was launched by Oxfam yesterday.

The Owning adaptation in the Pacific :Strengthening, governance of climate adaptation finance report was launched by Richard Benyon, the British Parliament under Secretary for the Department of Environment Fisheries and Rural Affairs (DEFRA).

Benyon said, “Our support comes from a deep commitment by the British government to play our part in building resilience to the devastating effects of climate change in the Pacific.”

The ultimate goal of this collective act is to empower Pacific communities most vulnerable to climate change together with their government to drive the way adaptation is used to meet their needs.

The specific country report is a result of research undertaken by Oxfam in three Pacific countries, Papua New Guinea, Tonga and Vanuatu, on the challenges of mitigating and adapting to climate change.

Benyon said the British government was pleased to support climate change adaptation and crucially to provide support for developing countries through working with Oxfam.

“To address the most tremendous challenges of our time which is of course climate change, I thank those who took part in this independent report from Oxfam,” he said.

The report looked at all factors that are helping or hindering specific countries access and use climate funding for adaptation so that climate resources reach those most in need at the frontline of climate change.

“As a government we are stepping up our responsibilities to progress negotiations to secure additional climate finance, we know it is crucial for the countries to protect the affected communities,” Benyon said.

“With initiatives like UK advocacy funds we are working with vulnerable countries across the world to increase their capacity at the international climate negotiation to ensure their voices are heard.”

Executive Director of Oxfam New Zealand Barry Coates said that in international negotiations they will be pushing for a fair and binding international agreement particularly to support additional climate finance to be made available and accessible to Pacific island countries.

“Much more needs to be done to access climate change finance, a core message is that response to climate change depends heavily on building in-country capacity. And for such capacity to be fully effective it requires collaboration between all actors at all levels of society.”

Coates said this include non state actors such as business, private entities, NGO, churches, women and youth networks and local customary authorities.

However, the potential for better corporation will remain untapped unless effective climate change strategies are undertaken in five key areas, which include enhancing National capacity, strengthening partnership and coordination, sharing information and increasing communication with direct access to climate finance.

Speaking on behalf of PNG government, National Planning Minister Charles Abal thanked the British government and Oxfam for the report and said as a government they would take a higher step to look at climate change in the country.

He said that the challenge of climate change in the Pacific is common and thanked Oxfam for choosing Papua New Guinea as one of the case study samples, looking at some of the ways in which climate change was affecting the country.

“As minister I wish to take a high level approach to climate change in the country and have in place responsible environmental policies. I want to bring a strategic approach recognising some of the mistakes made and approaches highlighted by this report.”

He said we tend to ignore the primary causes and deal with the symptoms so we have to start to elevate some of these issues and environmental responsibilities, and population impact because it’s primarily the impact of the human foot print which is causing these issues.