UK:Climate threat is real

 By MALUM NALU

PAPUA New Guinea and other Pacific Island countries have been urged to address the global problem of climate change, which threaten their very existence.

The effects of climate change were already conspicuous, visiting Minister of State for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office Hugo Swire told a Port Moresby Chamber of Commerce and Industry breakfast at the Royal Papua Yacht Club yesterday.

“The Pacific Island countries contribute just .03% of global greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.

“But small island states such as those in the Pacific are already feeling the terrible effects of climate change and, in some cases, it is already wreaking devastation.

“In 2007, the Carterets Islanders in the Autonomous Region of Bougainville became some of the first in the world to be forced from their homes by rising sea levels and extreme weather. I fear they will not be the last.

“The number of people displaced by environmental change is set to increase dramatically, with projections of those likely to be affected reaching hundreds of millions.”

Swire warned that communities and unique biodiversity such as PNG’s could be lost forever.

“For an area that amounts to a little more than 1% of the world’s land mass, Papua New Guinea holds an estimated 5% of the world’s biodiversity,” he said.

“Only last month, an expeditionary team from the BBC discovered more than 80 new species in the rainforests of PNG, including carnivorous plants, butterflies and a giant rat.”

Swire said between 2008 and 2013, 785 million pounds (K2.73 billion) from the European Development Fund  was spent on projects to tackle the most pressing issues in the Pacific.

He said the UK had committed 2.9 billion pounds (K8.37 billion) by 2015 to help countries cut their global emissions and tackle climate change.

“I am pleased that the UK finances a number of large multilateral funds which spend extensively in the Pacific region, including providing 50% of the funding for a pilot programme on climate resilience, which is making grants with US$75 million (K163.8 million) in Papua New Guinea, Samoa, and Tonga,” Swire said.