Christian World Service welcomes the Government’s commitment to provide climate aid to support some of the countries most vulnerable to climate change.

The Government announced a $1.3 billion commitment over the next four years, of which at least 50 percent will be invested in the Pacific. The announcement was made ahead of critical United Nations’ climate negotiations in Glasgow next month.

Government funds will support clean energy projects, stronger construction, protection from droughts, floods and new pests, and respond to sea-level rise and storm surges.

“We are greatly relieved to see this firm commitment from our government to do its fair share at the global level.  Giving Pacific and other nations more resources to better protect their people from the harmful effects of climate change, is an important step at this critical time.  The poorest countries did not create climate change and should not have to carry its cost.  The climate crisis is the biggest issue we face,” says Murray Overton, National Director.

Ahead of COP26 (Conference of the Parties), CWS affirms the words of our partner the Pacific Conference of Churches, “We plead with the international community, gathered at COP26, to take speedy, responsible and shared action to safeguard, restore and heal our wounded humanity and the home entrusted to our stewardship.

“We appeal to everyone on this planet to join us on this common journey, knowing well that what we can achieve depends not only on opportunities and resources, but also on hope, courage, solidarity and goodwill.”

In its August report, the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) showed the unequivocal link of rising temperatures with human activity, and predicts a temperature rise across all regions of at least 1.5 degrees in the next decades.  Any further delay could make the situation unmanageable in many countries.

CWS has campaigned for a doubling of climate finance as part of Big Hearts, Connected World along with Anglican Advocacy of the Wellington Diocese, Oxfam and World Vision.  In addition the campaign asked the government to increase Official Development Assistance from 0.27% to 0.7% of Gross National Income.

Thank you to everyone who signed our petition, or wrote letters or spoke to MPs about the campaign.

Oxfam, which has undertaken the research for the campaign, says NZ$800 million of this is new and additional aid money.  At $325 million a year, it is at the lower end of what Oxfam calculated as New Zealand’s fair share of the US$100 billion goal.

October 18, 2021