Preliminary report findings indicate Solomon Islands achieving main goal against climate change
BY IRWIN ANGIKI
Solomon Islands has already reached net-zero status in its emitting and absorption of carbon.
While this is yet to be made official, findings from the Green House Gas (GHG) Assessment carried out under our Third National Communication to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change confirms it.
Reaching net-zero status is the main goal the United Nations has set for all countries in the global effort to slow down climate change.
Net-zero is when the rate of releasing carbon (and greenhouse gases) into the air equals the rate of removing them from the air.
Only eight countries are officially declared net-zero. They are Bhutan, Comoros, Gabon, Guyana, Madagascar, Niue, Panama and Suriname, according to the World Economic Forum in December last year.
Being net-zero reinforces Solomon Islands rights to ‘global helps’ such as climate finance, and further empowers the country’s calls for huge global emitters such as US and China to reduce emission.
However, the ministry of environment and climate change (MECDM) warns “we need to be vigilant to ensure we do not allow our emissions to surpass removals into the future.”
This statement was made by the Permanent Secretary for MECDM Dr Melchior Mataki when addressing stakeholders who gathered in Honiara last week to validate the Solomon Islands Low Emission Development Strategy (LEDS), MECDM Media statement yesterday said.
One of the participants in the validation workshop, Henry Tufah, deputy director of MECDM’s Climate Change Division, explains to the paper that knowing our status can help policymakers, the MECDM (which is leading the charge against climate change) and stakeholders map the way forward.
Mr Tufah however echoes that challenges to this endeavour such as unsustainable deforestation activities accompanying extractive industries – logging and mining, could become significant if we are not careful.
Other emitters include industries under transportation (mainly ships and trucks), developments which include infrastructure and businesses, agriculture, etc. Solid waste pollution is also a major across-the-board challenge.
“From 1994 to 2012, emission was high. Since then, up to 2018, it has dropped. But, atmospheric carbon removal by forests is again declining due to unsustainable logging practices and conversion of forest for other uses.”
Tufah also explains that availability of data is one soft challenge, which government and stakeholders are addressing.
It is understood that the only data available, which revealed our net-zero status, are based on forests alone. Marine and mangroves are needed.
PS Mataki in the MECDM statement yesterday said: “The Solomon Islands is least responsible for the human induced change in our global climate system and yet we are at the forefront of climate change impacts.
“Regardless of our situation we recognise our role in the global effort to curtail GHGs emission.
“This is particularly important because major emitters and those with historical responsibility are doing very little to drastically reduce their emissions.
“The benefits of shifting to a low carbon society are sufficient on their own to warrant the shift irrespective of the requirements of the Paris Agreement.
“A high GHG emitting society is indicative of unsustainable production and consumption patterns and behaviours. As such a LEDS is needed for the Solomon Islands.
“The Solomon Islands LEDS which started way back in 2021 seeks to explore the challenges and opportunities associated with transformational changes that is needed to maintain our net zero status while at the same continue to work on reducing our GHG emission from the energy, agriculture, industrial processes and product use and waste.
“The purpose of the LEDS is twofold, first it will be for local application and second for international cooperation.
“Domestically it will complement short- and medium-term development and sectoral strategies of the country including the National Development Strategy, National Climate Change Policy, National Determined Contributions and the National Forestry policy.
“On the international front, it will be used to help Solomon Islands meet its obligations and support climate action on the global level under the Paris Agreement.”
Earlier this year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the body which advises the UN on temperature rise, released a report which has been described as “what could be mankind’s last warning” to reverse climate change.
The report had prompted the UN to call on countries to fast-track their efforts towards net-zero and to bring their timelines forward by 10 years.
The AR6 report also demands that leading global emitters reduce their emission by almost half.
UN secretary General António Guterres labels the world’s situation the “ticking climate time bomb”.
The IPCC chair, Hoesung Lee described the lack of commitment by leading world emitters in this phrase – “we are walking when we should be sprinting”.
Temperature rise by 1.5 degrees Celsius (since pre-industrial days) could be realised in the 2030s, just seven years away. We are already at 1.1 C.
