http://www.pina.com.fj/?p=pacnews&m=read&o=626324924500f4162c5d458eda563c

 

 Fiji and China have agreed to strengthen their co-operation in the fight against climate change.

 

Minster for Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation Ratu Inoke Kubuabola, yesterday met with the visiting Chinese Minister of State Development, and Reform Commission Xie Zhenhua on Monday to address climate change.
"Climate change is a real threat to all Small Island Developing States (SIDS) like Fiji," Xie said.
"With current trends of global warming, sea level rise is expected to cause existential threat not only to the economic development of SIDS but more so the survival of many of them.
"In addressing climate change, the Fijian government is taking a two track approach - we believe that it is imperative if we are to comprehensively address climate change to focus on both the current international negotiations and our national laws and policies."
Ratu Inoke added Fiji's main challenge in addressing climate change was financial and capacity building.
"Climate change financing is an issue that is of great importance to us. We can have policies and laws and treaties, but these would not be effective if we do not have the tools to implement them. We need finance for mitigation and adaptation activities. An issue for us is the accessibility of international funding which is always complex and bureaucratic. Apart from that, a good portion of funds allocated for developing countries are taken off by implementing agencies of these funds as administering costs," Ratu Inoke said.
"Essentially, we would prefer funding mechanisms that are easily accessible and which are directly given to countries. We have also found that bilateral funding mechanism is the most effective. This is an area we hope China could assist us on, particularly our Climate Change Unit."