Climate Change

The three-day event has representatives from Pacific Island countries with the GCF’s implementing partners, private sector organisations, civil society organizations and other development partners.

The Green Climate Fund was established in 2010 to finance climate change projects and programmes that help developing countries adapt to climate impacts and reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
 
GCF has approved USD$2.2 billion for 43 projects and programmes to date.

Ocean-bound wildlife is particularly vulnerable to environmental pressures, especially endemic species living on only one or a handful of islands. Among other things, this remoteness makes migrating to another land mass nearly impossible.
 
Dozens of species -- especially birds -- have also been wiped out over the last century by invasive species and disease brought by human settlers.
 

Greenhouse gas emission should be to levels that would keep global temperature increases to just 1.5C, the UN agency responsible for overseeing world heritage sites has said.

But while their proposal for the shipping sector to adopt climate targets in line with the Paris Agreement gained overwhelming expressions of support, the IMO said a consensus was not reached between more than 170 member nations.

It said at last week's London meeting, China and India voiced strong support for alternative low carbon fuels, while European nations joined the Pacific in highlighting the urgent need for sector action.

However, a number of countries including Brazil and Chile were concerned about potentially negative impacts of carbon reduction measures.

Nicolas Hulot announced the planned ban on fossil fuel vehicles as part of a renewed commitment to the Paris climate deal.

He said France planned to become carbon neutral by 2050.

Hybrid cars make up about 3.5 percent of the French market, with pure electric vehicles accounting for just 1.2 percent.

It is not yet clear what will happen to existing fossil fuel vehicles still in use in 2040.

Ministers from the Marshall Islands, Tuvalu and Kiribati were joined by envoys from Fiji, Vanuatu and Palau in urging member states of the International Maritime Organisation to try and limit global warming to 1.5 degrees celsius above pre industrial levels.

The Marshall Islands minister for transport Mike Halferty told the London meeting that the shipping industry was one of the world's big emitters.

He made this statement while closing the Climate Action Pacific Partnership event at the Grand Pacific Hotel in Suva on Tuesday.

Mr Bainimarama also thanked Australia and New Zealand for lending a helping hand to Fiji when it was struck by Tropical Cyclone Winston in 2016.

Present at the event was Australia's Minister for International Co-operation and the Pacific, Concetta Fierravanti-Wells. However, the Deputy Prime Minister for New Zealand, Paula Bennett had already left Fiji.

Following this week's Climate Action Pacific Partnership (CAPP) event in Fiji, 12 Pacific states called for action from the world's most powerful nations attending this weekend's G20 summit in Germany.

Describing themselves as being on the front line of climate change, the Pacific states expressed deep concern that the United States government had indicated its intention to withdraw from the Paris Agreement and urged the US to reconsider.

And that would be one of the critical issues that the Pacific would push for through Fiji's presidency of COP23 in Bonn, Germany in November.

The Fiji Times said the agreement was reached by leaders at the end of the two-day Climate Action Pacific Partnership conference in Suva yesterday.

The draft action document that would shape the global action at COP23 was not released at the close of the conference on Tuesday as it needed to be sent back to all stakeholders for their feedback in the next 14 days.

250 people served as crew members at different times on a journey that relied heavily on traditional navigation by the stars.

Jenni Ishii from the Polynesian Voyaging Society, says it is important to look after the earth's resources and to not take things for granted.

She said that a physical challenge was navigating changing and extreme weather patterns.