POLICY
JAKARTA (FORESTHINTS.NEWS) - Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment, Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Brazil’s Minister of the Environment, Joaquim Alvaro Pereira Leite (represented and signed on behalf of by Brazillian Ambassador to Indonesia José Amir Da Costa Dornelles) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Deputy Prime Minister/Environment Minister, Ève Bazaiba Masudi, released a historic joint statement.
The three top-ranking officials used the statement to reassert their mutual commitment to tropical forest and climate action cooperation while reiterating the need for enhanced climate financing mechanisms.
The dignitaries emphasized their common desire to promote mutual cooperation between their three countries in the field of tropical forest and climate action based on the principles of equality and common benefit, while also balancing the conservation and restoration of tropical forests with their own climate commitments and the potential for carbon trading.
In the statement, signed in Bali on the sidelines of the G20 Summit (Nov 14), the Ministers recalled the trilateral meeting between their countries in November 2021 in Glasgow to initiate Forest Power for Climate Actions.
The signing of this initiative was also witnessed by Indonesian Environment and Forestry Siti Nurbaya and Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo. Minister Nurbaya was responsible for initiating the tropical forest power collaboration, as reported in late October 2021 by FORESTHINTS.NEWS.
The initiative aims to find ways in which tropical forest countries can contribute to climate issues, including by boosting their own sway in the area of climate negotiations.
Concrete actions
At the signing ceremony for the joint statement, Minister Nurbaya delivered a speech in which she emphasized the major concerns and expectations that exist in taking any concrete actions in the form of climate collaborations.
In her speech, she congratulated all the parties involved for their recent collaborative efforts. “I am deeply pleased and greatly honored to have served as the principal witness to the historic signings of several collaborations on sustainable environment and climate actions,” she enthused.
This collaboration between the Government of Indonesia and its strategic partners, the Minister continued, will create significant and far-reaching benefits for Indonesia, related stakeholders and the world as a whole.
“Concrete actions need to be taken and implemented as soon as possible, even if we start with small steps. All big things come from small beginnings. At this stage, we are encouraging cooperation among sectors that contribute significantly to emissions reductions from forest and energy,” she said.
“We will review this cooperation together over the next couple of years, after which we can encourage and strengthen other contributing sectors such as agriculture, waste, and industry,” Minister Nurbaya added.
Minister Nurbaya ended her speech by urging action: “Let us continue to build on the historic progress of what we are doing today, and move swiftly, with courage and determination, to usher in a better world for our grandchildren through strengthening and enhancing cooperation in climate actions.”
Climate justice essential
The joint statement noted the various recent decisions and resolutions adopted by the UN and affiliated agencies pertaining to issues such as the management and restoration of wetlands, mangroves, peatlands and related ecosystems within the context of climate change.
In light of this, the Ministers stressed the importance of reinforcing efforts to facilitate trade and development policies, both international and domestic, that foster sustainable development and commodity production & consumption, while providing mutual benefits and minimizing deforestation and land degradation.
The joint statement also sought to underline the importance of ensuring the integrity of all ecosystems while upholding the concept of climate justice in addressing climate change.
According to the statement, ‘protecting, conserving and restoring nature and ecosystems to achieve the Paris Agreement temperature goal, while ensuring social and environmental safeguards’ is vital.
The dignitaries duly recognized that the conservation, restoration, sustainable management and use of ecosystems must be implemented on a balanced and integrated basis that also supports the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
This would be greatly facilitated if the Warsaw Framework for REDD+ in general is adhered to, whereby climate finance is provided to developing countries that are taking actions to reduce deforestation and to maintain and conserve forest carbon stocks.
Moreover, the upholding of Decision 9/CP.19 in particular, whereby financing entities, including the Green Climate Fund (GCF), are encouraged to distribute sufficient and predictable results-based finance in a way that is deemed fair and balanced, would also be hugely beneficial.
Without the fulfilment of these commitments, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the broader aim of sustainable development in its three dimensions, including long-term conservation, restoration, sustainable management and use policies for forest ecosystems as well as poverty eradication strategies and efforts, will be harder to achieve.
Innovative financing mechanisms needed
The joint statement also refers to the IPBES Global Assessment (2019) that highlighted climate change as one of the main drivers of biodiversity loss, while at the same time appealing for the acknowledgement of the respective laws and regulations in the Ministers' countries.
The three Ministers went on to express their wish to further entrench cooperation between their countries so as to develop and promote tropical forest and climate actions that encompass actions including the sustainable management and conservation of tropical forests, bioeconomy for healthy forests and people, and the restoration of critical ecosystems and forests.
In line with this, they agreed to begin efforts to set up a Global Biodiversity Fund under the provisions of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The objective of this would be to generate new and extra resources to facilitate the implementation of the Convention and its Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework in developing countries.
Given that ‘predictable, adequate and easily accessible multilateral funding is essential to our countries’ efforts to conserve and sustainably manage forests’ according to the statement, the framework’s timely application is paramount.
In view of the lack of delivery of financing pledges, the three respected officials underscored the importance of innovative financial mechanisms, in particular payments for ecosystem services, which assign value to the conservation, restoration and sustainable management of forests.
This would also involve engaging the private sector, Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities, as well as other relevant stakeholders, and affirming their mutual commitment towards sharing best practices and experiences to support the implementation of these mechanisms in their respective countries.
Furthermore, the dignitaries pointed to the potential of sustainable biodiversity-based products, innovations and technologies arising from the conservation, restoration, and sustainable management and use of forest ecosystems.
They also hailed the potential of innovative business models, like bioeconomy value chains, to enhance sustainable consumption and production patterns, deal with social and economic challenges, and realize numerous environmental objectives.
The three Ministers also saw eye to eye on the need to cooperate, in the context of the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement as well as the Green Climate Fund, to make sure that further resources are made available to support REDD+ undertakings in developing countries.
This, they stressed, should encompass the ‘approval of new terms of reference of the REDD+ RBP in the core budget of the GCF from 2023, in a fair, accessible and balanced manner’.
The statement concurred too that results-based payments for the reduction of deforestation and conservation of forest carbon stocks are essential in terms of deliberations aimed at a newly-quantified finance goal in the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement.
This, they affirmed, should be ‘based on the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and taking into account the needs and priorities of developing countries, in particular those with tropical forest’.
The officials ended the joint statement by confirming that cooperation in all the areas they mention will be implemented according to specific arrangements which will be duly discussed and approved.
RELATED STORIES
POLICY
JAKARTA (FORESTHINTS.NEWS) - Indonesia’s Coordinating Minister for Maritime Affairs and Investment, Luhut Binsar Pandjaitan, Brazil’s Minister of the Environment, Joaquim Alvaro Pereira Leite (represented and signed on behalf of by Brazillian Ambassador to Indonesia José Amir Da Costa Dornelles) and the Democratic Republic of the Congo’s Deputy Prime Minister/Environment Minister, Ève Bazaiba Masudi, released a historic joint statement.
The three top-ranking officials used the statement to reassert their mutual commitment to tropical forest and climate action cooperation while reiterating the need for enhanced climate financing mechanisms.
The dignitaries emphasized their common desire to promote mutual cooperation between their three countries in the field of tropical forest and climate action based on the principles of equality and common benefit, while also balancing the conservation and restoration of tropical forests with their own climate commitments and the potential for carbon trading.
In the statement, signed in Bali on the sidelines of the G20 Summit (Nov 14), the Ministers recalled the trilateral meeting between their countries in November 2021 in Glasgow to initiate Forest Power for Climate Actions.
The signing of this initiative was also witnessed by Indonesian Environment and Forestry Siti Nurbaya and Agriculture Minister Syahrul Yasin Limpo. Minister Nurbaya was responsible for initiating the tropical forest power collaboration, as reported in late October 2021 by FORESTHINTS.NEWS.
The initiative aims to find ways in which tropical forest countries can contribute to climate issues, including by boosting their own sway in the area of climate negotiations.
Concrete actions
At the signing ceremony for the joint statement, Minister Nurbaya delivered a speech in which she emphasized the major concerns and expectations that exist in taking any concrete actions in the form of climate collaborations.
In her speech, she congratulated all the parties involved for their recent collaborative efforts. “I am deeply pleased and greatly honored to have served as the principal witness to the historic signings of several collaborations on sustainable environment and climate actions,” she enthused.
This collaboration between the Government of Indonesia and its strategic partners, the Minister continued, will create significant and far-reaching benefits for Indonesia, related stakeholders and the world as a whole.
“Concrete actions need to be taken and implemented as soon as possible, even if we start with small steps. All big things come from small beginnings. At this stage, we are encouraging cooperation among sectors that contribute significantly to emissions reductions from forest and energy,” she said.
“We will review this cooperation together over the next couple of years, after which we can encourage and strengthen other contributing sectors such as agriculture, waste, and industry,” Minister Nurbaya added.
Minister Nurbaya ended her speech by urging action: “Let us continue to build on the historic progress of what we are doing today, and move swiftly, with courage and determination, to usher in a better world for our grandchildren through strengthening and enhancing cooperation in climate actions.”
Climate justice essential
The joint statement noted the various recent decisions and resolutions adopted by the UN and affiliated agencies pertaining to issues such as the management and restoration of wetlands, mangroves, peatlands and related ecosystems within the context of climate change.
In light of this, the Ministers stressed the importance of reinforcing efforts to facilitate trade and development policies, both international and domestic, that foster sustainable development and commodity production & consumption, while providing mutual benefits and minimizing deforestation and land degradation.
The joint statement also sought to underline the importance of ensuring the integrity of all ecosystems while upholding the concept of climate justice in addressing climate change.
According to the statement, ‘protecting, conserving and restoring nature and ecosystems to achieve the Paris Agreement temperature goal, while ensuring social and environmental safeguards’ is vital.
The dignitaries duly recognized that the conservation, restoration, sustainable management and use of ecosystems must be implemented on a balanced and integrated basis that also supports the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development.
This would be greatly facilitated if the Warsaw Framework for REDD+ in general is adhered to, whereby climate finance is provided to developing countries that are taking actions to reduce deforestation and to maintain and conserve forest carbon stocks.
Moreover, the upholding of Decision 9/CP.19 in particular, whereby financing entities, including the Green Climate Fund (GCF), are encouraged to distribute sufficient and predictable results-based finance in a way that is deemed fair and balanced, would also be hugely beneficial.
Without the fulfilment of these commitments, the Sustainable Development Goals, and the broader aim of sustainable development in its three dimensions, including long-term conservation, restoration, sustainable management and use policies for forest ecosystems as well as poverty eradication strategies and efforts, will be harder to achieve.
Innovative financing mechanisms needed
The joint statement also refers to the IPBES Global Assessment (2019) that highlighted climate change as one of the main drivers of biodiversity loss, while at the same time appealing for the acknowledgement of the respective laws and regulations in the Ministers' countries.
The three Ministers went on to express their wish to further entrench cooperation between their countries so as to develop and promote tropical forest and climate actions that encompass actions including the sustainable management and conservation of tropical forests, bioeconomy for healthy forests and people, and the restoration of critical ecosystems and forests.
In line with this, they agreed to begin efforts to set up a Global Biodiversity Fund under the provisions of the Convention on Biological Diversity. The objective of this would be to generate new and extra resources to facilitate the implementation of the Convention and its Post-2020 Global Biodiversity Framework in developing countries.
Given that ‘predictable, adequate and easily accessible multilateral funding is essential to our countries’ efforts to conserve and sustainably manage forests’ according to the statement, the framework’s timely application is paramount.
In view of the lack of delivery of financing pledges, the three Ministers underscored the importance of innovative financial mechanisms, in particular payments for ecosystem services, which assign value to the conservation, restoration and sustainable management of forests.
This would also involve engaging the private sector, Indigenous Peoples and Local Communities, as well as other relevant stakeholders, and affirming their mutual commitment towards sharing best practices and experiences to support the implementation of these mechanisms in their respective countries.
Furthermore, the dignitaries pointed to the potential of sustainable biodiversity-based products, innovations and technologies arising from the conservation, restoration, and sustainable management and use of forest ecosystems.
They also hailed the potential of innovative business models, like bioeconomy value chains, to enhance sustainable consumption and production patterns, deal with social and economic challenges, and realize numerous environmental objectives.
The three Ministers also saw eye to eye on the need to cooperate, in the context of the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement as well as the Green Climate Fund, to make sure that further resources are made available to support REDD+ undertakings in developing countries.
This, they stressed, should encompass the ‘approval of new terms of reference of the REDD+ RBP in the core budget of the GCF from 2023, in a fair, accessible and balanced manner’.
The statement concurred too that results-based payments for the reduction of deforestation and conservation of forest carbon stocks are essential in terms of deliberations aimed at a newly-quantified finance goal in the UNFCCC and its Paris Agreement.
This, they affirmed, should be ‘based on the principle of common but differentiated responsibilities and taking into account the needs and priorities of developing countries, in particular those with tropical forest’.
The officials ended the joint statement by confirming that cooperation in all the areas they mention will be implemented according to specific arrangements which will be duly discussed and approved.
RELATED STORIES