SHARM EL SHEIKH, Egypt– Barbados Prime Minister Mia Mottley Monday told the international community that “the talk must come to an end” as she urged countries to implement various agreed-upon policies to deal with the impact of climate change.
Addressing the United Nations Climate Change Conference (COP27) here, Mottley told the audience that “if we are to rise to the occasion and to play our part to stop the tragic loss of lives …and the impact on livelihoods that we are feeling across our countries then there needs to be a new deal”.
Mottley said that the international community knows what it is to put a man on the moon or the “Rover” on Mars, “but the simple political will that is necessary, not just to come here and make promises, but to deliver on them and to make a definable difference in the lives of the peoples whom we have a responsibility to serve, seems still not be too capable of being produced.
“I ask us how many more and how much more must happen. And I say so because there is no simplicity in it. We get it. I come from a small island state with high ambitions but cannot deliver on them because our global industrial strategy has cross lines in it.
“Our ability to access electric cars, or our abilities to access batteries or…panels are constrained by those countries that have a dominant presence and can produce for themselves, but the global south remains at the global north on these issues”.
Mottley said developing countries were also facing problems in accessing funding to deal with the impact of climate change, adding, “I ask us how many more people must speak before those of us who can instruct our directors at the World Bank…at the IMF…
“How many more countries must falter, particularly in a world that is now suffering the consequences of war and inflation, and governments cannot meet the challenges of finding the necessary resources to finance their way to net zero?
“This world looks still too much like it did when it was part of an imperialistic empire,” Mottley said, adding that the global north borrows between interest rates of one to four percent, while the global south has to borrow at around 14 percent.
“And we wonder why the just energy partnerships are not working. Similarly, if countries that want to finance their way to net zero and do the right thing can’t get the critical supplies, will they not have to rely again on natural gases?
“This is the bold reality, and we have come here to ask us to open our minds to different possibilities. We believe that we have a plan. We believe there can be the establishment of a climate mitigation trust that unlocks five trillion US dollars of private sector savings if we can summon the will to use the US$500 billion of SDRs (Special Drawing Rights) in a way that unlocks the private sector’s capital”.
Mottley said that would require a change in the prevailing attitude “because the agreement establishing the International Monetary Fund requires 85 percent to change that agreement. It cannot be done if the United States government has 17 percent of the quota.
“Similarly, we accept there was and must be a commitment to unlocking concessional funding for climate-vulnerable countries. ” Mottley said, ” there is no way that developing countries who have graduated can fight this battle,” Mottley said.
She said it was also critical for the international community to address the issue of “loss and damage,” saying, “the talk must come to an end.
She praised Denmark, Belgium, and Scotland “for their modest ways of trying to accept the precept and modules of the principles of loss and damage…as morally just.
‘But for loss and damage to work, we believe that it can’t only be an issue of asking state parties to do the right thing although they must, we believe non-state actors…the oil and gas companies and those who facilitate them need to be brought into a special convocation between now and COP 28″.
She questioned how companies could afford to make US$200 billion in profits in the last three months “and not expect to contribute at least 10 cents in every dollar to a loss and damage fund”.
“This is what our people expect,” she said, calling for a special meeting to deal with the loss and damage and introducing natural disaster and pandemic clauses in debt instruments.
and then 