<< Climate Change is not an academic subject, it´s a matter of life and death.>>
– Henry Puna

In the early morning hours of the 18^th November 2017, the climate change COP 23 in Bonn came to an end after two weeks of negotiations, discussions and debates. The conference didn’t result in tremendous progress but met the overall expectations. Progress in implementing the Paris Agreement was achieved and next steps towards the coal phase-out were undertaken. Bonn was a necessary step on the way to Katowice next year where the members of the parties will come together again.

One main outcome of COP 23 consists of the further elaboration of the Paris Agreement’s Rule Book. Clear and consistent standards were needed regarding measuring and reporting CO₂ emissions as well as advances in climate protection on the national level within all participating nations. Aiming for the prevention or at least for slowing down the global heating, a draft of around 200 pages was presented. This document will be finalized and adopted at COP 24.

Despite the disappointing German position concerning the withdrawal from coal use, the initiation of the global “Powering Past Coal Alliance” was a great step towards a coal free future. Under leadership of Canada and the UK, more than two dozen countries, provinces, states and cities agreed on the phasing-out of the climate killer within the next decades. Germany might follow in 2018. Its role as a financial supporter of climate protection is very important but others took over political leadership.

Contrasting Americas official position, positive signals came from other US representatives including civil society members, companies, states and cities: “We are still in!” – a clear message and support to keep the spirit of Paris alive in Bonn.

Further achievements are the adoption of the Gender Action Plan, the development of the Local Communities and Indigenous Peoples Platform and the launch of the Ocean Pathway Partnership. In order to promote and stimulate the process of inclusive, participatory and transparent dialogue, the Talanoa Dialogue was initiated. This facilitative exchange encourages action in climate mitigation by bringing together science, industry and the civil society.

Apart from the negotiation processes in the Bula (Fijian for “hello”) Zone, the organization of the climate conference in Bonn in two zones, also provided room and opportunities for showcasing projects and examples of implementation. Countries, industry and civil society presented a wide spectrum of climate action solutions in hundreds of events in the Bonn Zone.

The COP 23 was characterized by the shared general consensus to get active in climate policy. That is a strong signal but a lot of work remains until more groundbreaking decisions will have to be made in Poland next year. From our perspective as scientists, the statement of His Excellency Mr. Henry Puna, Prime Minister of Cook Islands, should provide motivation and be seen as a mandate: “Climate Change is not an academic subject, it´s a matter of life and death.”

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“It’s the first Presidency Open Dialogue at the COP. It’s not a side event…today, we will not negotiate, we will talk to each other and we will listen to each other…. there would be good experiences to share. It’s about contributing to solutions.”
– COP 23 President Frank Bainimarama

Today, COP23 President Frank Bainimarama encouraged an open and honest dialogue during the opening of the first-ever Presidency’s Open Dialog at the COP.  Following his welcoming remarks, the secretary of the UNFCCC, Executive Secretary Patricia Espinosa, highlighted and expressed appreciation of this first dialogue, because we “all share the same emergency of  implementing the Paris agreement” and, consequently, such dialogue “is crucial to advancing the discussion….it requires the participation of everyone.” She reaffirmed the determination of the UNFCCC secretariat to support such dialogue in the hope that all parties will propose solutions that can feed our common agenda.

“We all share the same emergency of  implementing the Paris agreement.” – UNFCCC Executive Secretary Patricia Espinosa

The Presidency’s Open Dialogue, which offers a unique opportunity for parties and NGO constituencies to directly interact with each other on concrete issues of the negotiation process, was extensively discussed in May 2017 at the forty-sixth session of the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI), where it was in FCCC/SBI/2017/7  §119 that “(…) any outcomes of such a dialogue should have persuasive value only, respecting the Party-driven nature of the UNFCCC process; (…).”

This first Presidency’s Open Dialog was held under the Chatham House Rule, meaning that participants are free to use the information received, but neither the identity nor the affiliation of the speaker(s), nor that of any other participant, may be revealed. The first part of the dialogue focusing on NDC (nationally-determined contributions) enhancement and implementation, was guided by three main questions:

1) How can Parties and non-Party stakeholders (NPS) collaborate with each other on enhancing and implementing NDCs?
2) How can NDCs be improved?
3) How can NPS best actively contribute and feed into the Talanoa dialogue in 2018 both directly and indirectly?

For around one hour, the floor was given to Parties and non-Party stakeholders to tell their national stories and give their point of view concerning the aforementioned questions.

Following this roundtable discussion (and in the spirit of the Chatham House Rule) the recommendations of the Parties and NPS were given. Listed below are a few critical points:

1) Human rights and Gender as a key priority in the NDCs
2) Better development of the financial aspects of the NDCs
3) Revised mitigation targets as a result of the Talanoa Dialogue in 2018
4) More collaboration among Parties, technology transfer, education, and capacity building
5) Inclusion of the traditional and local knowledge in the dialogue

Lastly, Parties and NPS expressed their desire to have such open, fair,  equitable, creative, and constructive dialogue on a regular basis every year, delivering the outcome in the form of a press release or communication.

In the second part of this Dialogue, the focus was on enhancing admitted observer access to and participation in formal meetings. During roundtable discussion, Parties and NPS proposed possible solutions to further increase opportunities for admitted observer organizations to make interventions in plenaries.

Three key attributes: Attendance, discussion, and next year’s dialog.

At the end of the day, three keys attributes were proposed by the Chair of the SBI for a successful dialogue: attendance, discussion and the question of if the future presidency of the COP will hold the dialog next year.

The first Presidency’s Open Dialog ended with a Fijian ceremony during which Kava, a traditional drink, was offered to all participants by the Fijian delegation.

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After yesterday’s touching opening ceremony, which was enriched by performances by children and indigenous Fijian people as well as motivating speeches, the second day of the United Nations Climate Change Conference 2017 continued with the central agenda: preparing the implementation of the Paris Agreement.

First, some good news: observers are generally welcome in most of the sessions and the Fijian COP presidency seeks an open dialogue with non-parties to the convention, as their contributions will be crucial to achieving the climate target set in the Paris Agreement.

“We are all in the same boat.” – COP president Frank Bainimarama

The statements given during the first two conference days emphasized the urgency of our situation and called out for solidarity as well as effective, efficient, and immediate climate actions.

This year’s natural disasters, like South Asian monsoons or hurricanes in the Caribbean, have demonstrated that humanity is already facing impacts of climate change. In one of the side events, a Fijian woman narrated on how the Pacific small island states are suffering from the consequences of the anthropogenic greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions which they themselves did not cause. For that reason, Frank Bainimarama, the newly elected COP president, stressed that: “We are all in the same boat.”

This metaphor is visualized in the World Conference Center in the form of a Fijian canoe.

“We need to have a collective response to loss and damage, especially for these developing countries.”
– Timor-Leste delegate

In one of the negotiations, the Palestinian delegate underlined this moral attitude by stating: “No one should be left behind”; this sentiment is supported by the least developed countries’ (LDCs) representative.

 “Climate change, if we do not act immediately […], there will be no return.”
– Ambassador Aziz Mekouar

A recently published report by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) explains how urgent the demanded joint climate action is. 2017 will be among the three hottest years on record, even though we are no longer witnessing El Niño conditions. The temperatures in January to September were 1.1°C warmer than the 1880-1900 average.

Even more alarming, our recent efforts have not been sufficient. According to a UN Environment report the pledges made in the Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) only fulfill one-third of the Paris Agreement target and would lead to 2 to 3°C warming in comparison to pre-industrial temperatures. Petteri Taalas from the WMO warns that time is very limited to change our behavior.

I leave the second day at COP23 overwhelmed by the amount of people attending this conference and the common will to combat climate change. I hope that within the upcoming days, the delegates will find consensus on how to implement and finance the ambitious goal that they agreed upon in Paris, 2015.

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In 1992, during the Earth summit in Rio de Janeiro, a 12 year old girl gave a speech “for all the generation to come,” telling the present leaders:

“ We are your own children.
You are deciding what kind of world we will grow up in …
Are we even on your list of priorities? “

Similarly, today’s opening ceremony started with a procession of kids with signs that read: “Save the world”. They performed a song entitled “I am an island”, stressing our connectedness.

The exiting COP president gave the first speech, underlying the cost of not acting and how ambition, solidarity, and action are the principles the COPs are based upon. The priority, he said, are the young people–and history will remember us for what will be able to deliver.

The new COP23 Fijian president was then given the seat, and as is tradition, a kava ceremony was performed and offered to the Minister of Environment, Barbara Hendricks.

As observers, we were not permitted to enter the open ceremony, but we watched it by screen in a room close by. Despite the fact that today’s attendance was lower than expected, the rooms and the halls felt filled with people (with women and men apparently equally represented) from all ethnic groups.

I participated in different press briefings, which bitterly discussed the delusion of the USA’s withdrawal. Despite this, US cities, municipalities and citizens are still acting and supporting the Paris Agreement. The power of change is in all of us.

In the final speech I attended, a young girl, together with other children, filed a lawsuit against Trump to reduce the carbon input, asking:

“… not to leave a mess for young people to clean up.”

She stressed again that the work being done here is for the future generations.

I came out of this first day of meeting motivated to engage more for our planet’s future, both as a “young research” and, maybe even moreso, as a woman.

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