Papua New Guinea will not be attending the United Nation’s Climate Change Conference – known as the 29th Conference of Parties (COP29) – this year 2024.
Prime Minister Hon. James Marape made his decision known when he met with the managements of Climate Change Development Authority (CCDA) and Conservation and Environment Protection Agency (CEPA) on Thursday, 22 August 2024, at his office in Manasupe Haus, Waigani.
Prime Minister Marape said Papua New Guinea’s non-attendance will be in protest at the big carbon footprint holders of the world to demonstrate that forest nations like PNG demand for seriousness in addressing climate change issues, especially in practically addressing conservation of forests as a mitigation strategy.
He also wants the CCDA and CEPA to assess their attendance of the UN climate change conference and detail the progress and achievements since PNG first sat in at these meetings beginning in 1992.
Prime Minister Marape said, “Our non-attendance this year will signal our protest at the big nations – these industrialised nations who are big carbon footprint holders for their lack of quick support to those who are victims of climate change, and those of us who are forest and ocean nations.
“We are protesting to those who are always coming in to these COP meetings,
making pronouncements and pledges, yet the financing of these pledges seem distant from victims of climate change and those like PNG who hold substantial forests.
“Papua New Guinea does not only have climate change-induced problems but we are a big ocean and forest nation that cleans off pollutants. Climate change and forest conservation are two sides of the same coin and COP meetings cannot talk about climate change with no consideration for forest conservation.
“Our carbon footprint is minimal. Our carbon sinks are not being appreciated by those who are huge carbon footprint holders. If they are not paying us for conservation, why do we make up the numbers all the time?
“Our economy needs money yet we are preserving trees as the lungs of the earth, whilst industrialised nations keep on emitting. You have not paid for any conservation.
“Our forests, when harvested, earns money for our economy. Similarly, that same forest, when conserved, must earn money for our economy,” said PM Marape.
The Prime Minister has demanded that the two agencies return with better deliverables in climate change mitigation, pointing out France’s funding support of the Managalas Conservation project through his and French President Emmanuel Macron’s dialogue as an example of the practical solutions that the CCDA and CEPA should be emulating and working on.
The COP29 will be held in Baku, Azerbaijan in November.