President Wavel Ramkalawan addresses COP27 in Egypt |08 November 2022

President Ramkalawan delivering his address at the COP27

New step to further curb impact of climate change

• Appeals to industrialised nations to respect their financial obligations towards SIDS

President Wavel Ramkalawan has announced that in 2023, Seychelles will fully protect all its mangroves and seagrass meadows as a further contribution to mitigate the effect of climate change, adding to the already 32% protection of its ocean and 50% of its forests.

He made the statement at the World Leaders Summit taking place during the 27th Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC, COP27), which got underway in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt yesterday afternoon.

Speaking before over a hundred world leaders, President Ramkalawan said like other islands, Seychelles contributes less to the destruction of the planet, but suffers the most.

“For example, the carbon emissions of Seychelles are very low, and we clean up through our mangroves and seagrass meadows, thus making us a zero contributor to the destruction of the planet, yet our islands are disappearing and our coasts are being destroyed,” said President Ramkalawan.

He said the people of Seychelles express their support and solidarity with all nations that have experienced the terrible effects of climate change lately and announced Seychelles’ additional measure to help mitigate its causes.

“It is an honour to announce that in 2023, Seychelles will further contribute in mitigation by moving to 100% protection of all its mangroves and seagrass meadows, adding to the already 32% protection of our ocean and 50% of our forests,” said Mr Ramkalawan.

He called on industrialised nations that contribute towards climate change to respect the Multi Vulnerability Index (MVI), a new data-driven index that seeks to increase eligibility for SIDS to receive greater financing to address their unique vulnerabilities.

“We insist that the MVI should be the new order. SIDS are vulnerable and we need access to concessionary funding in order to defend ourselves against climate change while fulfilling the SDGs to give our people a better life. Industrialised nations must pay greater attention to the Damage and Loss agenda. We, the oceanic states that receive the harsh effects of your activities have to be assisted in repairing the damage you cause to us,” added the head of state.

President Ramkalawan told the conference that Seychelles is playing a leadership role and building strong partnerships, regardless of its size. These include hosting this year’s Ocean Race Summit to discuss the urgency of saving the oceans. The island was also home to the first European Blue Invest Forum outside Europe, to put emphasis on financing the Blue Economy, and it also welcomed Prince Albert of Monaco and the Monaco research expedition in the search for resilient corals, late last month. Seychelles is also actively promoting the Great Blue Wall project, which is a project for the western Indian Ocean countries that intend to adopt an action-driven, oriented and focused approach towards the blue economy.

“Seychelles takes its participation seriously – we initiated the first Blue Bonds, participated in Debt for Nature Swap and we are an Ocean and Blue Economy champion,” he further added.

The head of state called on all the world leaders to be good partners and said he hopes they leave Egypt with enhanced hope and commitment to save the planet.

“Is COP a counting game (26, 27, 28…) or a real countdown to saving our planet? I pray that we leave Egypt with good decisions and pledges that will be followed by concrete actions instead of another set of empty promises,” he concluded.

The Sharm el-Sheikh climate conference, which opened yesterday, has the key aim of ensuring full implementation of the Paris Agreement of 2015.

In his opening address, the UN climate change executive secretary asked governments to focus on three critical areas at COP27. The first is a transformational shift to implementation of the Paris Agreement and putting negotiations into concrete actions.

The second is cementing progress on the critical workstreams of mitigation, adaptation, finance and loss and damage, while stepping up finance notably to tackle the impacts of climate change.

The third is enhancing the delivery of the principles of transparency and accountability throughout the UN climate change process.

The Egyptian COP27 Presidency has set out an ambitious vision for this COP that puts human needs at the heart of our global efforts to address climate change.

The Presidency intends to focus the world’s attention on key elements that address some of the most fundamental needs of people everywhere, including water security, food security, and health and energy security.

COP27 is taking place against the backdrop of inadequate ambition to curb greenhouse gas emissions.

According to the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, CO2 emissions need to be cut 45% by 2030, compared to 2010 levels to meet the central Paris Agreement goal of limiting temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of this century.

This is crucial to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, including more frequent and severe droughts, heatwaves and rainfall.

A report published by UN climate change ahead of COP27 shows that while countries are bending the curve of global greenhouse gas emissions downward, efforts remain insufficient to limit global temperature rise to 1.5 degrees Celsius by the end of the century.

Since COP26 in Glasgow, only 29 out of 194 countries came forward with tightened national plans.

COP27 is seeing the participation of more than 100 heads of state or government.

On Monday, the World Leaders Summit provided all heads of state or government with the opportunity to set the stage for conference.

Other key events include several ministerial discussions around current climate change efforts, including a round table on pre-2030 ambition and continued discussions on the global stocktake – a process for countries and stakeholders to see where they are collectively making progress towards meeting the goals of the Paris Agreement – and where they are not.

These discussions got underway at the Bonn climate change conference in June 2022 and will pick up where they left off at COP27. 

Patsy Canaya/press release from the UNFCCC