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Thank you Co-Chairmen.
It is good to have this chance to get together
and many thanks to the Secretary-General for
organising the event and to both of you, for
leading our discussions.
I have just one main point to make so I shall be
fairly brief.
We have had many meetings this year about
climate change and, like other countries, we are
getting very worried about it and how it can
affect our future.
The last major meeting we went to was earlier
this month at the APEC Summit in Sydney and we
came away with two clear impressions.
The first was a good one.
The leaders there were very concerned both about
climate change itself and about what we are
discussing here - “adaptation” or, to put it
another way, “what we are going to do about it?”
APEC came up with a strong Declaration, very
clear, well thought-out, and not too technical.
That was very good but the other impression we
had was not so encouraging. We got a feeling
that we were lacking a lot back home -
resources, ideas and basic understanding.
By that, I do not mean at Government Level. We
have done what we can by legislation. We have a
longstanding conservation policy and we have
done a great deal to protect our environment.
That, however, does not solve our biggest
problem - getting more understanding and
awareness among our people.
That is not surprising, of course. Climate
change is very complex and sometimes very
confusing but, even so, we badly need our people
to become involved in finding solutions and that
is much easier said than done.
To put it simply, our people do not know enough
about the subject and they need to learn it very
quickly indeed because it gives them knowledge
and, from that, they developed understanding and
then, in the end, everyone is involved.
In that way, we find the ideas we need and the
best approach.
So that is what we are working on at the moment,
co-chairmen, not just in schools but also in
trying to build up confidence in every sector:
public, private, and, above all, young people.
That is what I think is really meant by
“adaptation” and that is where we need help.
So we would certainly welcome any we can receive
from outside experts, especially if they can
teach us new skills and share their modern
technology.
So to sum up, Co-Chairmen, we certainly want to
adapt but it has to be a joint effort and the
biggest need we have is to get the people at
home fully on our side.
That means outside help.
After all, there are no big countries and small
countries in this.
We’re all in it together.
That is the point I wish to make, Co-Chairmen.
It may not sound like a very big one but my
country has less than four hundred thousand
people and I assure you that we need every one
of them fully aware and able to take part in our
efforts to deal with climate change.
So I am very pleased to have this opportunity to
talk about this at the biggest meeting we have
ever had on climate change.
Thank you very much and my very best wishes to
all our fellow members in their own efforts to
address this very serious problem. |
