The Director General Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) Kosi Latu says the region has no choice but to keep fighting for climate justice.
Latu said COP26 in Glasgow delivered an outcome document filled with more pledges and promises without the necessary policies and actions needed to deliver on them.
He said he is nevertheless proud of the Pacific's unified voice at this year's COP which he said was one of the most difficult for the region to participate in with many countries not making it to Glasgow.
Kosi Latu, Director-General of the Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme (SPREP) Photo: SPREP
Asked if a greater Pacific presence would have made a difference to the outcome Kosi Latu said he would like to think so but he really doesn't think it would have.
"But we can't stop. You know you've got to keep fighting. And let's just hope in Egypt next year that we don't keep seeing all these pledges and promises, we have got to see some real action.
That is what I would like to see. And so I am afraid to say that if that doesn't happen then we have got to be prepared for some very serious climate impacts," he said.
Window on 1.5 degree future closing
Latu said the window is fast closing on the need to limit the increase in global average temperatures to 1.5 degrees above pre-industrial levels.
The goal, set at COP21 in Paris in 2015, aimed to significantly reduce the risks and impacts of climate change.
But Latu said at every COP the world's largest carbon emitters have failed to meet this commitment, and this year was no different.
"For me its disappointing. Yes we do have a number of decisions that have come out particularly with the paris agreement rulebook pretty much agreed to. But until we see real action to phase out coal and all kinds of fossil fuel. This doesn't bode well for the Pacific."
SPREP members who attended COP26 with the Secretary General of the Pacific Islands Forum, Henry Puna. Photo: SPREP
He said if the world doesn't start phasing out coal and fossil fuels in the next few years, it needs to prepare for some dangerous climate change impacts.
Latu said next year at COP27 in Egypt industrialised nations need to start walking the talk.
"If that doesn't happen then we have got to be prepared for some really serious climate impacts. And you know that's just it I am not trying to be a prophet of doom that is what the science is saying.
This is what I can't understand. This is what the science is saying, unequivocally, it is the actions of man. that is causing all of this."
