Pacific civil society calls out Australian Ambassador: “Your Government is undermining our future.”
An open letter from the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network to the Australian Ambassador for Climate Change, Patrick Suckling.
03/02/2017
SUVA, Fiji Islands
Dear Ambassador,
Time and again, Pacific island leaders have explained that climate change is the single greatest threat to the livelihoods, security and well-being of the peoples of the Pacific. We must work together to tackle climate change.
Unfortunately, and there is no polite way to put this, your government is knowingly undermining our future and the future of our children. In full knowledge of the facts and long-term impacts, the Australian government is pressing ahead with new coal mines and coal-fired power plants.
This directly contradicts global efforts to tackle climate change and puts our communities in peril.
To add insult to injury, you personally encouraged the Indian energy corporation Adani to invest in a massive new coal project in the Galilee Basin in Queensland. In your previous role, as Australian Ambassador to India, you described the proposed mine – which will produce 60 million tonnes of thermal coal per year for 60 years – as an ‘outstanding project’.
In recent years, cyclones of unprecedented strength have reminded us of the brutal reality of a changing climate. In Fiji last year, and Vanuatu in 2015, Category 5 cyclones killed dozens, reduced towns and villages to rubble, and pushed people into poverty.
Just this week you explained Australia will continue to support Fiji during the recovery from Cyclone Winston, as part of Australia’s commitment to working with the region on climate change. Your recognition that climate change contributes to stronger storms is important. Australia’s support for island communities recovering from disasters is welcomed. However, we need you to do more to address the warming trend that is making these storms more dangerous than ever.
In the wake of monster cyclones, Pacific islanders went without food to keep their children nourished and walked kilometers to find water for their families. We faced escalated family violence. We understand that this is just the beginning.
Unless polluting nations take action now, we can expect more strong storms, coral bleaching, an acidic ocean, changing rainfall patterns, crop failures, difficulties accessing drinking water, rising sea levels and coastal erosion.
It is clear what must be done to tackle climate change. We must all take immediate steps to reduce greenhouse gas emissions and move toward a zero emissions economy. The world has a limited carbon budget – the amount of carbon that can be released into the atmosphere before global temperatures exceed 1.5°C above the pre-industrial average.
Going beyond this threshold will threaten the very existence of Pacific nations such as Kiribati, Tuvalu and the Marshall Islands.
To keep global warming to 1.5°C the vast majority of the world’s coal reserves must remain in the ground. This is not a matter of political debate, but of physics. Heeding these facts, Pacific leaders have called for an urgent international moratorium on the development and expansion of fossil fuel-extracting industries, particularly new coal mines.
Australia is already the world’s largest exporter of coal. Disturbingly, your government is planning to dramatically increase coal exports, with public subsidies and taxpayer-funded infrastructure for new mining ventures.
Just yesterday, the Australian government announced it was considering subsidising new coal-fired power plants. This is deeply disappointing, and against the tide of global action to tackle climate change.
Australia’s current targets to reduce emissions, pledged under the 2015 Paris Agreement, are woefully inadequate. They are in no way consistent with keeping the global temperature rise below 1.5°C. The Marshall Islands ambassador for climate change Tony de Brum has explained that if the rest of the world set similar targets, his country, and other low-lying Pacific islands, would disappear.
Australia is not on track to meet even its inadequate targets. Building new coal power stations will make matters worse, by locking in emissions for decades.
This year, Fiji is President of the global climate negotiations. Fiji and other Pacific island governments are demanding that polluting nations reduce emissions, consistent with keeping temperature rise below 1.5°C.
It is time for Australia to accept the scale of action required to tackle climate change. We must all move away from fossil fuels, and immediately transition to renewable energy. Together, we must support climate action around the globe.
Pacific islanders are not drowning. We are fighting for our future. As our friend and near neighbor, we expect you, and the Australian government, to do more.
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Notes for editors:
This open letter is from the Pacific Islands Climate Action Network (PICAN). PICAN brings together civil society actors in Pacific island countries advocating for climate justice. PICAN is a regional node of the global Climate Action Network (CAN-International).
Australian Ambassador for Climate Change Patrick Suckling is in Suva this week for bilateral talks with the Fiji government. Fiji is the current president of the Conference of Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
For more information and clarifications contact the PICAN Coordinator Mr. Krishneil Narayan on +679-9462206 or email canpacificislands@gmail.com .