Amplifying Pacific voices

Pacific voices need to be heard loud and clear, to ensure the world’s response to the climate crisis reflects the concerns – and hard-won resilience – of the Blue Pacific Continent.

An image of Samoa’s Prime Minister, Afioga Fiame Naomi Mataafa, standing at a podium addressing an unseen audience. . — Samoa’s Prime Minister, Afioga Fiame Naomi Mataafa, addresses the 2022 UN climate summit. Getty Images.

Sharing the Pacific climate change experience means actively supporting representatives from diverse and distant small island states to reach key international meetings, as well as building technical evidence and public understanding of the Pacific reality.

This is the focus of the $4.5 million Pacific Voice activity. One of our key partners in this work is the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP).

SPREP Director-General Mr Sefanaia Nawadra says the focus is on securing the future of our Pacific communities, and “ensuring the Pacific’s voice is heard and considered as we work towards the needed global action to address climate change”.

An image showing the audience at the annual UN climate conference..

Pavilion fono for story-telling

A key focus is maintaining a strong Pacific presence at the annual UN climate conference. In November 2022 in Sharm el-Sheikh, Egypt, SPREP designed and delivered a welcoming space for Pacific advocacy and information-sharing.

Seventy-five side events were hosted across the fortnight in the Moana Blue Pacific Pavilion, and also live-streamed to the world.

The real world accounts of Pacific experiences and action on climate change demonstrated our region’s climate leadership – as communities who have already developed and tested innovative ways of addressing climate change impacts.

A screengrab of a video, with a Pacific atoll visible. Closed captioning reads: 'Investing in the management of invasive species'.. — From a video presentation about the Pacific Regional Invasive Species Management Support Service.

Cut-through campaigns

At the same time, two major communication campaigns took the Pacific issues beyond conference corridors to wider audiences.

SPREP’s ‘survival tips from the Pacific’(external link) social media campaign provided powerful Pacific stories to light up the “1.5 to stay alive” slogan that echoed through COP27.

The two campaigns were delivered online for COP27, with the Mana Moana Pasifika Voices 2022(external link) also featuring on screen at the Pavilion throughout the COP. This collection of artistic video works gathered from around Te Moana-nui-a-Kiwa “provide offerings of wisdom and insight for a new generation and audience to see, hear and understand the interconnected relationship of Pacific Island people with the earth, sky and sea”, says curator Audrey Brown-Pereira. “A journey of words and art that will let you feel the spirit of resilience that transcends borders.”

An image of a woman standing in front of the ocean. — Environmentalist and youth activist, Okalani Mariner, presents ‘Remember Us’, a call to action for Pacific youth to carry the ancestors’ wisdom to fight for our ocean and environment, for present and future generations. Mana Moana Pasifika Voices 2022.

Pacific Voice beyond COP

Part of ensuring the Pacific is influential in the global climate context is providing support to small island developing states to meet their commitments under the Paris Agreement.

The Pacific Voice work includes support for developing and updating greenhouse gas inventories in Pacific nations, and funding research on the consistency of countries’ finance flows with their climate plans. That research by Overseas Development Institute (ODI) will provide new evidence from small island developing states to feed into the global stocktake on finance to support the long-term temperature goal under the Paris Agreement.