Minister Edna Molewa: Lima Climate Action High Level Session

Minister Edna Molewa’s speech at the Lima Climate Action High Level Session - UNFCCC COP20 in Lima, Peru

Opening remarks

Honourable President Humala, United Nations Secretary General, Honourable Ban Ki-Moon, Former President of Mexico, Honourable Calderon and Chair of IPCC Mr Pachauri; Fellow Ministers, Distinguished Guests and fellow colleagues, I greet you all this morning.

We recognise and deeply appreciate the commitment shown by the government of Peru, as COP 20 Presidency, to support the much needed acceleration of climate action. We also appreciate your efforts in opening up space for all actors to play their distinct role in combating climate change.

Keeping temperature rise below 2ºc

The science is clear – human induced global climate change is real, it is happening now and its impacts on economies, society and ecosystems are much more severe than previously understood.

The IPCC 5^th Assessment Report clearly indicates the linkage between climate change mitigation ambition and the extent of adaptation required. The less mitigation is achieved, the more adaptation will be required. Adaptation therefore, is a global challenge and responsibility.

Furthermore, the science is clear that even at the current level of temperature increase of 0.8 degrees Celsius many vulnerable countries are experiencing severe impacts that require immediate investment in adaptation. The science is also clear that there is a finite limit to the amount of adaptation possible.

It is an obvious conclusion that the international community must collectively achieve both ambitious reductions of Green House Gas (GHG) emissions and the implementation of effective adaptation measures to enable and support a transition to a low carbon and climate resilient world.

As a responsible global citizen, South Africa is implementing a number of policies and measures that are consistent with our objective of sustainable development and that are also leading to considerable reduction of our emissions. We have such policies across all the sectors, including in: energy efficiency, renewable energy, transport, carbon capture and storage, waste management and land management.

We are also taking extensive action to build our resilience to the impacts of climate change, by assessing the likely impacts under future climate conditions, on water security, food security, health, human settlements and infrastructure and ecosystems.

Yet, despite the current and future mitigation commitments, action and pledges, there will be a very serious gap between the level of mitigation ambition for the pre-2020 period and the level that science requires. The gap in mitigation ambition, means, that in the African continent, we must prepare ourselves for a 4 or 5 degree world.

This will have a set of severe associated impacts on development gains, and hastens the urgency to build resilience, as well as capacity for adaptation, and response to the very real potential of loss and damage, which I must add, is already happening in many of our countries.

The implementation of existing climate commitments by Parties

Honourable Co-Chairs, the question remains: what more should the global community do, in the pre-2020 period, which will move us toward closing the ambition gap?

The convention spells out the commitments by all Parties to combat climate change. We are encouraged by the leadership shown by some developed country Parties. South Africa welcomes the recent pledges that were made for the initial capitalisation of the Green Climate Fund. We continue to make the call for further scaling up of the GCF such that it is commensurate with achieving the ultimate goal of the Convention.

However, to achieve the required scale of emission reductions and the associated need of building climate resilience it is clear to us all that there is an urgent need to scale up actions beyond the “business as usual” manner. It is our view Excellencies, that there exists numerous opportunities for developed country Parties to further entrench themselves as leaders of climate action.    

We must recognise the transformative actions that are being undertaken by developing countries through their own means and also through support by different partners.

In South Africa we have learnt that scaling up climate actions requires:

1. political will

2. involvement in, and ownership of climate actions by a broad set of role players – including the private sector, academia, civil society

3. strengthened institutional arrangements that function in a world of increasing complexity, cutting across conventional sectoral silos and crossing sovereign boundaries

4. a new generation of financial instruments that can deal with risks associated with economic and social transition and transformation; as well as predictable and scaled up financial support to leverage other sources of finance;

5. an evolving set of skills to support emerging green sectors;

6. a science and technology platform to support the transition; and

7. effective information &knowledge management for decision making in a world of uncertainty.

Towards the post- 2020 Climate Agreement

The 2015 Paris agreement must strengthen the multilateral rule based system in a manner that:

• Reflects the inter-dependence between the levels of mitigation ambition achieved and the requirement to adapt to climate impacts.

• Ensures that the collective level of ambition of mitigation and adaptation contributions can be clearly understood to enable the identification of any gaps between commitments and what the science indicates is needed. This is needed to inform how the international community can collectively address these gaps and collectively increase their contributions.

• Enables regular periodic review of progress towards the achievement of contributions, both individually and collectively as a basis to inform country processes to formulate future commitments.

• Given the differences in vulnerabilities, capabilities and national circumstance between countries, effectively enable and support country implementation through effective, adequate and predictable finance, technology and capacity building.

Concluding remarks

Honourable Chair, the pre 2020 climate action will provide a platform upon which the commitments that will be enshrined in Paris Agreement will be built. Therefore, it is a crucial period – and the global community will do well, for the sake of future generations, to move toward ambitious climate actions.

Again, I thank you for providing me the opportunity to make a few remarks at this important event.

Thank you!