Tonga forges ahead with plans to finance domestic climate action Featured
20 August, 2021. The Department of Climate Change held the validation workshop for the High-level Nationally Determined Contribution (NDC) Financing Pathways for Tonga Report, which was developed with the support of the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) under its Climate Promise initiative.
The High-level NDC Financing Pathways for Tonga Report provides a map of past/current and potential future pathways to finance Tonga’s climate actions.
The workshop was attended by over 40 stakeholders from various sectors addressed under Tonga’s Second NDC, including energy, transport, water and waste management, agriculture, fisheries, and forests as well as stakeholders from the National Planning Division, Ministry of Finance, National Reserve Bank of Tonga, Retirement Fund Board and the Tonga Development Bank.
In his opening address, the CEO for MEIDECC, Mr. Paula Ma’u said “this report will help Tonga to explore funding opportunities to fund the reduction of Tonga’s greenhouse gas emissions as well as adapt to the adverse effects and reduce the impacts of climate change.”
He reiterated the call for urgent climate action and the need for clear financing plans as crucial enablers, in light of the stark warning of the first part of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’ sixth assessment report.
The UNDP’s Resident Representative, Mr. Levan Bouadze also addressed the workshop with this valued statement, “As you are aware, access to finance plays a significant role in completing the [climate] pledge.
I am sure that the financing pathways identified by this exercise, will help in securing finance to address Tonga’s enhanced NDC commitments”.
He highlighted that the financing pathway report would provide the Government of Tonga with a map of past/current and potential future pathways to finance mitigation and adaptation actions and would feed into the NDC financing and implementation work of other development partners supporting Tonga in addressing climate change.
The workshop discussed various financing instruments used in Tonga and across the Pacific and the potentials for their use in financing Tonga’s climate actions specifically across the focus areas of Tonga’s Second NDC—Energy; Agriculture, Forestry and Other Land Use (AFOLU); Waste; Marine Protected Areas (MPAs) and Special Management Areas (SMAs) sectors.
This financing is important because the second NDC has a specific mitigation commitment to reduce GHG emissions from the energy sector by 13% in 2030 from the baseline energy sector emissions in 2006.
The High-Level NDC Financing Pathways for Tonga Report will be launched during the National Climate Change Awareness Week held in Tonga in September 2021.
- MEIDECC
