2nd South-South Cooperation on Climate Change Forum
Paris, 6 December 2015 – Against the backdrop of the COP21 meeting in Paris, the United Nations Office for South-South Cooperation (UNOSSC) participated in the Second South-South Cooperation on Climate Change (SSCCC) Forum. The theme of the Forum was “from political commitment to action”.
Mr. Jorge Chediek, Director of UNOSSC, was the lead panelist on a multi-stakeholder panel discussion focused on discussing enabling conditions and implementation mechanisms to facilitate South-South cooperation (SSC) in climate change mitigation.
“The UN strongly believes that South-South and triangular cooperation will be a key modality for addressing climate change,” Mr. Chediek said. “COP21 provides an opportune moment to enshrine the importance of these partnerships as an integral part of the future climate portfolio”.
With more than 100 participants, including government representatives, and principals of UN agencies and other international organisations, the SSCCC Forum promoted South-South collaboration as an integral part of the future climate architecture.
In his opening remarks, Minister Zhenghua Xie, China Special Representative for Climate Change, emphasized the important complementarities of South-South cooperation to North-South cooperation and stressed the solidarity of the Global South against climate change.
“South-South cooperation is emerging as a key element of the global response to climate change, said Mr. Ibrahim Thiaw, Deputy Executive Director of the United Nations Environment Programme (UNEP). “Many emerging economies are moving to the frontline of international climate policy, taking a lead in defining and implementing low-carbon, climate-resilient and sustainable development pathways.”
In his remarks, Mr. Hongbo Wu, UN Under-Secretary-General for Economic and Social Affairs, noted a few key areas where South-South Cooperation could play a key role, including knowledge generation and knowledge sharing, technology transfer of sustainable energy sources and access to climate data. He stressed the United Nations readiness to build a wider and broader global partnership with the Global South.
Ministers and high-level government representatives from Costa Rica, India, Mauritania, Mongolia, Nepal and Switzerland shared their views and experiences on the role of South-South cooperation on climate change, and called for inclusion of a South-South dimension in all current and future initiatives and funding mechanisms under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC).
UNOSSC, mandated by the General Assembly to promote, coordinate, and support South-South and triangular cooperation, has a vitally important role to play in creating the enabling conditions and implementation mechanisms for such partnerships to flourish. The Office has already developed a number of concrete mechanisms to support UN agencies, Member States, and other stakeholders in undertaking South-South climate change initiatives, for example:
- The Office recently launched the Maritime-Continental Silk Road (MCSR) Cities Alliance, in partnership with the China International Centre for Economic and Technical Exchanges. The Alliance provides a forum for leaders from cities along the ancient silk roads to meet and interact, coordinate policies, develop research partnerships, and share best practices.
- Since 2009, UNOSSC has operated a global, multi-stakeholder mechanism to support the transfer of climate-change related technology, policy, practice, research, and financing between countries of the Global South.
- Most recently, UNOSSC was invited to join the Secretariat of the UN Inter-Agency Task Team on Science, Technology and Innovation, and its associated system-wide Technology Facilitation Mechanism.
During the discussion, Mr. Chediek outlined the renewed emphasis that the UN system has placed on SSC in recent years. He noted that these partnerships are now included in the strategic plans of many UN agencies including UNEP, UNDP, UNIDO, and FAO.
Mr. Chediek also took the opportunity to reiterate the Secretary-General’s commendation of China’s leadership in addressing climate change. He applauded the recent commitments of US$3.1 billion to the “China South-South Climate Fund” and US$6 million to the Executive Office of the Secretary General for climate change related-projects.
Other participants at the day-long Forum called for the establishment of new mechanisms for action, such as a platform for promoting South-South cooperation on climate change. It was proposed that the SSCCC Forum could serve as a standing policy interface for this platform by providing a means for ongoing dialogue and engagement with policy-makers and the policy process.
The Forum was co-sponsored by the National Development and Reform Commission of China (NDRC) and UNEP, and was supported by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), the Chinese Academy of Sciences, United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), World Wide Fund for Nature (WWF), and the INTASAVE-CARIBSAVE Group. It was organized by the UNEP-International Ecosystem Management Partnership (UNEP-IEMP).