BY JOHN HOUANIHAU
Permanent Secretary for the Ministry of Environment Climate Change Disaster Management and Meteorology David Hiba Hiriasia, has acknowledged the ministry’s first meeting for this year.
The MECDM under the Climate Change Division held a roundtable discussion with the other line ministries, private sector representatives, donor partners, NGOs, CSOs and other tertiary institutions at the Heritage Park Hotel last week.
Hiriasia in a statement said the roundtable discussion is an important moment for them as outlined in the Solomon Islands National Climate Change Policy, climate action cannot and must not be carried out by government alone.
He said that the policy calls explicitly for ministries, the private sector, donor partners NGOs and communities to work together.
He said that the gathering is a practical expression of a call for collective action.
Hiriasia also noted that climate change is the defining threat to livelihoods, ecosystem and economy, thus, Pacific leaders, including Solomon Islands, have declared a climate change emergency because climate change is a risk multiplier magnifying every existing social and economic vulnerability.
“We are already observing its impacts like rising temperature, accelerating sea level rise, more extreme rainfall events, increasingly destructive cyclones, these trends directly threaten our low-lying islands, our food security, our infrastructure and indeed our way of life. Urgent, locally informed adaptation and mitigation are no longer optional they are essential for our survival,” he said.
The key outcomes of the roundtable meeting were;
-The establishment of two additional coordination bodies (Private Sector and Loss & Damage)
-The adoption of the development partners Terms of Reference (TOR)
-Participants delivered updates on their climate actions
The meeting concluded with the membership reaffirming their support for data sharing under the CCR coordination structure, the need for the inclusion of academia in the CCR and a call to finalize the National CCR TOR.
The meeting objectives are to recap on the roundtable structure and expectations, review the Climate Change Division’s strategic priorities and upcoming events, hear updates from each other and identify practical opportunities for coordination and to agree on next steps and meeting dates.
Photo: Supplied
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