27 September 2018: The EU, France, Australia, and New Zealand launched a Pacific initiative for biodiversity, climate change, and resilience. The initiative will focus strategically on the intrinsically interconnected areas of biodiversity and climate change.

The 21 million Euro Joint Pacific Initiative for Biodiversity, Climate Change and Resilience was launched during the One Planet Summit in New York, US, one year after it was announced by French President Emmanual Macron at the 2017 edition of the Summit. The EU and France are contributing 10 million Euros each, with an additional one million Euros coming from New Zealand and Australia. The initiative also welcomes contributions from other donors.

The initiative aims to build an international coalition to catalyze and streamline funding for climate action and biodiversity protection.

The joint communique by the four partners mentions that the initiative translates into concrete action their commitment to the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development and the Aichi Biodiversity Targets, complemented by the new European Consensus on Development, the Sendai Framework on Disaster Risk Reduction (DRR), and the Paris Agreement on climate change. Noting that these international agreements set global climate efforts on a new course, providing the international community “with an unprecedented opportunity for progress,” the communique links the initiative with SDGs 13 (climate action), 14 (life below water), 15 (life on land), 3 (good health and well-being), and 17 (partnerships for the Goals).

The communique further explains that the project embraces “the twin goals” of climate action and biodiversity protection, with the initiative seeking to build an international coalition to catalyze and streamline funding in these areas. By pooling resources and coordinating actions, it aims to help the Pacific region adapt to the effects of climate change, protect biodiversity, and increase resilience.

More specifically, the initiative will finance projects in areas such as climate change adaptation and mitigation, ocean governance (including sustainable fisheries and aquaculture), and the environment (including waste management, biodiversity and eco-tourism).

The initiative is linked to the Pacific-EU Marine Partnership (PEUMP) programme launched by the EU, Sweden, and the Pacific Islands Forum Secretariat (PIFS) at the Our Ocean Conference in Malta, in October 2017. [European Commission Press Release] [Joint Communique] [Pacific-European Union Marine Partnership]