CAN: Yardstick for success in COP23

by admin | Nov 11, 2017 | #MYD, MYD2017, UNFCCC

The 23rd Conference of Youth (COP23) will be the first ever COP that will be hosted by a Pacific Nation which is the Nation of Fiji making this year’s COP also known as the Pacific COP. The nation of Fiji is only a small island nation with a population of less than 1 million inhabitants. Although Fiji emits a negligible amount of CO2, they are the first to feel the effects of Climate Change such as rising sea levels, increasing intensity of cyclones, intrusion of salt beds in aquifers and much more.

Thus, there are a few specific things that COP23 are setting up as a yardstick for success, one of which is to construct a proper mechanism for the Facilitative Dialogue (FD) or what is now known as the Talanoa Dialogue (TD), a preamble to the Global Stocktake (GST) that acts as a benchmark for countries to analyse and progress into more ambitious Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs). The next main objective is to create a mechanism for the mobilisation of the Paris Agreement in the year 2020. Although COP23 will not hold any major UNFCCC event such as the TD of COP24, the importance of COP23 lies on how it lays the foundation for the mechanism of the TD and the Paris Agreement (PA).

During the CAN session, speakers from the Global South and the Global North gave their input on how the main agendas can manifest into a successful outcome in regards to finance, education and enhanced action. In regards to Finance, Lucile Dufour from Réseou Action Climat France stresses on how the climate finance is crucial in the UNFCCC process and how it is crucial to enhance solidarity between developed and developing nations. However, the 100 billion dollar promised by the developed countries to provide climate finance is still far from reaching the value by 2020, as promised among other issues such as transparency and the discussion of new areas in climate finance.

From the education side, Yongsong Chen from Green Education Center China stresses on the importance of green education towards the public especially the youth to provide a global impact against combating climate change. Only through green education shall people be able to improve their own lives towards a greener path progressing from the bottom up. He proposes to use policy and international conventions which liberates into teaching materials according to each country’s situations especially on climate change issues.

Adrian Martimez, from the Asociacion la Ruta del Clima, talked on why civil society participation is important in international negotiations and the national level in the implementation of climate actions. The main concept of public participation comes from the convention text itself. It has to come education, access to information and training to be an informed participant. He mentions how public participation has developed over the past COPs as public participation topics have become more in depth.  He also explains on how the GST should include public participation and that there are much more void to exploit from where we are now in the decision making process especially in the national level such as governmental programmes, budget allocation, prioritization etc.

The closing remarks was given to the Genevieve Jiva representing the Pacific Island CAN (PICAN). She mentions on how she had seen the devastating effects of climate change how she lived through a category 5 cyclone. She enlightened us on how Fiji resorting to 100% renewable would not be enough to tackle climate change. She added that at the Pacific COP there must be a recognition of increased urgency and recognition and lock fossil fuel in the ground and move towards a safe and just renewable energy and limiting temperature increase to only 1.5 degrees celsius.

To summarise, the success of the Pacific COP looks like;

• Strong support for COP23 and COP24 Presidencies to take this forwarded next year,
• Avoid a negotiated outcome,
• Clarity on active participation of non-party stakeholder, which is through the submissions of inputs through science, impact assessments, technology etc and the inclusion to participate in technical discussions, and
• Consensus on purpose of the TD which highlights both the need for enhanced action as well as the opportunity and allow third discussion questions (how do we get there) should identify tangible impact and meaningful actions that countries can take forward to enhance.

CAN hopes to push negotiators to insure that the Pacific COP will carry the Talanoa spirit in hoped that we can achieve what have been pledged in the Paris Agreement. The seas will be rough but if we take care of each other, we will reach the rainbow on the other side of the storm.

Written by Azam

Edited by Varun

YOUNGO Intervention in the APA Opening Plenary

by admin | Nov 11, 2017 | #MYD, MYD2017, UNFCCC

Amongst all the delegation from parties of the United Nations, you would see a small number of people with yellow badges working to push the urgency of the discussion as much as they can. They are the (almost) silent people of the United Nations, the civil society organization representatives. As far as inclusive goes, there is still much work to be done in including the CSOs into the discussion.

YOUNGO Intervention Drafting

On 6th of November (the first day of COP), I was spending more than half of the morning drafting the YOUNGO intervention for the APA Plenary session. Fortunately, I was able to include what was discussed in our YOUNGO Adaptation Working Group into the speech. The speech included an emphasis on Action for Climate Empowerment (ACE), formally known as education and training, which as discussed in the Working Group meeting, was an important element of adaptation. We see it that ACE, as a capacity building mechanism, ensures that the future generation knows more about climate change and how to take action on them- which acts as an effective adaptation strategy.

I also included the emphasis on youth involvement in the upcoming Talanoa Dialogue. I think it is necessary for the Talanoa Dialogue, with the vision of being more inclusive in its process, to include not only youths but also the other United Nations constituency in its process. Considering the transparency mechanism that will be discussed in this conference, I also highlighted its importance in ensuring that data collected will be able to be used for the future generation of climate decisions.

The APA Opening Plenary

In Plenary New York

I entered the room around 10, and observed the delivery of the statements from the blocs. I sat in the last row at the right-hand corner, dedicated to civil service organizations. It was at a location very distant from the rest of the parties, and I felt that very little attention was given for the civil service organizations because the location of the seats is very close to the door, therefore the representatives of the civil service organizations are susceptible to the disturbance of the people coming in and out.

During this opening plenary, a contact group session was inserted in between and thus creating a huge window of waiting time for the civil society representative to voice out. In the end, the intervention opportunity for the civil service organization only started close to 1 pm even though the plenary opened at 10 am. Also, because the time was already very close to lunch break, many of the parties were leaving the room as civil service organizations deliver their speech, reducing the impact of the intervention (well, the interventions were meant for the parties but many of them weren’t there). However, there was still something amazing about the civil society representatives. Of all the seven representatives for the APA Opening Plenary, six of them were women (yay! Girl power!)

Credits to Jasmin!

Being able to draft and deliver an intervention at the APA Opening Plenary was fun exciting. I hope that more emphasis will be taken into consideration in terms of the flow of the sessions to be more inclusive of civil service organizations. After all, we want our voice to be heard, not displayed.

Written by Xiandi

Edited by Varun

MYD Participation at the Nordic Pavilion

by admin | Nov 9, 2017 | #MYD, MYD2017, UNFCCC

MYD Participation at the Nordic Pavilion

The Malaysian Youth Delegation left its mark once again at the global stage as Thomas was invited to speak at the Nordic Pavilion on the first day of COP23. Organised by the Nordic Council of Ministers, the session hosted four panellist, two from global north and two from global south, on a single platform to discuss on youths role in tackling climate change.

Our very own Thomas was invited to be part of panel and speak on behalf of the Malaysian Youth Delegation. He swiftly took the stage with one of his many existing MYD presentation slides, and effortlessly delivered an impromptu introduction of MYD as an organisation.

Thomas representing MYD

After all four of the panellists gave their introduction and opening remarks, the session transitioned into breakout groups. Each panellists facilitated one breakout group. Thomas was facilitating a group on youth involvement in climate action, while I joined a discussion on youth involvement at national level in policy making.

Thomas leading the discussion on youth in climate action.

The breakout group that I participated in consists of participants from the United States, Canada, China and Tunisia. It was really interesting to see things in a different perspective as my group mates shared their experience being in a youth organisation back in their country.

Jasmin taking part in a discussion revolving on youth involvement at national level in policy making.

One of the interesting things that was being brought up is the difference of being just an NGO and being a youth delegation as part of a party. Some countries, such as Sweden, have a youth delegation as part of the national delegation. This means that they are allowed to take part in the negotiations along with their national negotiators. This is particularly interesting as it conveys that the country has imbedded interest to invest in youth as a form of recognition in terms of capacity building – which I feel that more countries should follow suit.

Another interesting matter that was discussed is whether the government have been engaging with the youth at all or not. One of my group mates said that her government does go through a stakeholder engagement as part of a procedural structure, and thoroughly engage with NGO, while another group mate of mine mentioned that some of the people in the government does not even know what ‘NDC’, let alone carry out engagements for policies.

Thomas and I met with Idah Klint, Senior Advisor of Children-youth and Gender equality from the Nordic Council of Minister.

As the discussion for the breakout session came to an end, the four groups were required to present on the outcome of the discussion. Thomas presented on behalf of his group, which came up with very interesting points and takeaways.

Some of the suggestions include:

• “Give opportunities to youth to work together with government on policy papers.”
• The role of out in organisation is to track leaders and policy makers and hold them accountable.”
• “Gender equality is important – when you educate man, you educate a person. When you educate woman, you educate the whole world.”
• “Maximise communication. Translate international documents in local language.”
• “Mix art and activism together. You’ll get artivism.”

Overall, I could happily say that the session went well. I was impressed at how the Nordic Council of Ministers are in full support of children. youth and gender equality. Proactive government leads to informative events, which leads to positive change. Let us all take the Nordic as an example to inspire the youth to contribute meaningfully in the area of climate change, thus aspiring for a more sustainable future.

Group picture from the youth session at the Nordic Pavilion.

Thomas and I met with Idah Klint, Senior Advisor of Children-youth and Gender equality from the Nordic Council of Minister.

Written by Jasmin
Edited by Adrian

Bula Vinaka from the “Pacific COP”

by admin | Nov 9, 2017 | #MYD, MYD2017, UNFCCC

What’s the significance of this being a “Pacific COP”?

Despite being held in gloomy, chilly Bonn, Germany, COP23 has had a warm, tropical feel to it. Each year, the COP is held in different parts of the world as the UN aims to be geographically fair. This year, the conference was meant to be presided over an Asia Pacific country with the ultimate decision coming down to Fiji. Due to the logistical issues a COP would pose, the decision was made to host it at the headquarters of the UNFCCC – Bonn, Germany – while still being presided over by Fiji.

Prime Minister Frank Bainimarama of Fiji delivers his welcoming address as the incoming President for COP23

Since the COP opening plenary, phrases such as bula vinaka and talanoa mada have made their way into discussions and meetings. The former meaning a warm hello, and the latter describing inclusive, participatory and transparent discussions. The Fijian presidency has worked hard and has done a good job so far to bring their spirit to these crucial climate talks. The renaming of the Facilitative Dialogue to Talanoa Dialogue has been welcomed by all Parties, many of whom have reiterated the importance of inclusivity, participation and transparency in the dialogue, which are all values that will be key to productive talks in the next year toward enhancing ambition and NDCs by 2020. Yesterday we saw an initiative by the Presidency from Fiji and the UNFCCC Secretariat which saw an Open Dialogue between CSOs and the Parties take place for the first time at a COP. The session was a good start and we look forward to seeing more transparent, facilitative, open discussions.

Also the “Ambition COP”

Despite many people thinking of this COP as a “middle-COP”, where no major event or decision is made, COP23 is incredibly important for paving the way forward with increased ambitions by countries in the coming years. It is a fact that the action that has been committed right now via each country’s Nationally Determined Contributions are simply not enough to achieve the temperature goal of either 1.5°C or 2°C as stated in Article 2 of the Paris Agreement. With the current NDCs that were submitted by countries, we are on course for 3°C warming by the year 2100. There is no doubt that more needs to be done and it’s a conversation that many countries are having here at COP23.

As with any negotiations, especially COP negotiations, these conversations are not without complexities. Although many countries agree that ambitions need to be ramped up for both pre-2020 period, as well as in relation to NDCs for post-2020 period, the issue of equity within the ratcheting mechanism is a huge discussion. While there are many mentions of equity and Common, But Differentiated Responsibilities, it is still unclear how the principle is to be implemented into the ambition ratcheting of the Global Stocktake.

Parties and CSOs sit in a roundtable format during the first ever Open Dialogue at a COP, hosted by the COP Presidency and UNFCCC Secretariat.

If the past few days at COP23 are any indication, we are in for an extremely interesting COP, a COP that is hopefully forward-looking, and a COP that should show the world that the Paris Agreement is alive and well, and is performing like how it was designed. I think the negotiator from one of the small island states in the Pacific has most appropriately summed it up. Across a couple meetings, he has made emotional interventions, bordering on saying that the drive for increased ambition, or lack thereof, is a life or death decision that will affect the lives of many Pacific Islanders. It’s time the Parties stand in solidarity with the people of the nations that will suffer the worst and the soonest. This is, after all, the “Pacific COP”. Let’s do it some justice.

Written by Mike Campton
Edited by Emily & Adrian

MYD Youth Forum on Climate Change – COP23 Side Event

by admin | Nov 9, 2017 | #MYD, MYD2017, UNFCCC

Guten tag and bula vinaka!

The Malaysian Youth Delegation – MYD would love to invite you to our Youth Forum on Climate Change in conjunction with UNFCCC YOUNGO’s Young and Future Generations Day #YFGD at #COP23.

We’ll be exchanging ideas and having a dialogue around the role of youth in climate change discussion in the Global South as well as the Global North. Our list of panelists include:

1. Lhavanya DL from Malaysia
2. Sara Nyberg from Sweden
3. Lagi Seru from Fiji
4. Mona Hosseini from Germany
5. Saffran Mihnar from Sri Lanka

The forum will be held at the Malaysian Pavilion, Bonn Zone, from 10-12pm. If you are able to attend, please sign up at this link: https://goo.gl/forms/mK4g1lZkaWb95TCp2

Venue: Malaysian Pavillion, Bonn Zone
Date: 9th November 2017
Time: 10am – 12pm
RSVP here: https://goo.gl/forms/mK4g1lZkaWb95TCp2

We hope to see you there!

Agenda Young and Future Generations Day 9 November