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South African Minister of Forestry, Fisheries, and the Environment Dr Dion George has called for a comprehensive, outcomes-based financial model to effectively fund the global response to climate change. For South Africa and many other developing countries, this is vitally important, given that financing available for adaptation is lagging.
The Minister was speaking at the G20 Environment and Climate Sustainability Ministers meeting in Brazil. He said Brazil, through the G20, has seen the need to prioritise scaling up and expediting adaptation financing and strengthening institutional capacity, through measures such as increasing the volume of adaptation finance; and strengthening capacities to access financing promptly and to implement effective adaptation programmes and initiatives.
The impacts of climate change, desertification, biodiversity loss and pollution are severe and far-reaching and require innovative global solutions. One must acknowledge the centrality of the United Nations system and must continue to adhere to agreed multilateral processes, including the negotiating of outcome documents.
The continent must continue to strive towards a balance of ambition and action on all three aspects of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change [UNFCCC] and its Paris Agreement, namely mitigation, adaptation and the means of implementation, George said. According to the United Nations, the UNFCCC is a multilateral treaty adopted in 1992 to stabilise greenhouse gas concentrations “at a level that would prevent dangerous anthropogenic (human-induced) interference with the climate system. Since entering into force in 1994, the UNFCCC has provided the basis for international climate negotiations, including landmark agreements such as the Kyoto Protocol (1997) and the Paris Agreement (2015).
The Paris Agreement sets long-term goals to guide all nations to substantially reduce global greenhouse gas emissions and to provide financing to developing countries to mitigate climate change, among others. The Minister said a collaborative and comprehensive approach to maintaining the integrity of biodiversity assets and ecological infrastructure will play a fundamental role in achieving various social and economic development objectives.
South Africa is committed to increasing economic incentives for nature conservation, restoration and sustainable use of biological resources, with a focus on Payment for Ecosystem Services as a market-based instrument. With regards to its oceans, South Africa with over 3,000 kilometres of coastline, has jurisdiction over one of the world’s largest exclusive economic zones, spanning the Atlantic, Indian, and Southern Oceans. The Minister said this represents a significant ocean economic asset for current and future generations.
South Africa has adopted the Marine Spatial Planning legislation and remains committed to the sustainable regulated use of our fishing resources and actively preventing illegal fishing activity. The legislation intends to provide a framework for marine spatial planning in South Africa and for institutional arrangements for implementing marine spatial plans and governance of the use of the ocean by multiple sectors, among others.
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South Africa remains committed to the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee process to develop an international agreement of a legally binding instrument on plastic pollution, including in the marine environment.
