State Secretary Kravik’s remarks at Pacific Islands Leaders Forum

Honorable Leaders of the Pacific Islands Forum, Excellencies, ladies and gentlemen.

Special thank you to the leaders and people of the extraordinarily friendly and beautiful Islands of Kingdom of Tonga.

We are extremely honored to be here to discuss implementation of the 2050 Strategy for the Blue Pacific Continent.

The pacific islands states are, like Norway, at the forefront of the climate crises. Earlier today I visited parts of the Island hit by the tsunami in 2022. I also visited some of the new villages established to accommodate the people that were displaced. I’m extremely impressed by Tonga’s resilience and ability to adapt. But it is also a stark reminder that climate change is real with actual consequences for real people.

Norway and the Pacific Islands are bound together by the oceans. Fundamentally, we are all seafaring states, with the oceans embedded in our culture. As large ocean nations, we face common challenges and have common interests.

The theme (of this conference): Transformative Resilient Pasifiki: Build Better Now”, highlights the need for climate action, concrete measures, and urgency.

As a dialogue partner, I am glad to have this opportunity to learn more about the Pacific’s challenges, priorities and options for future action. It is important for me to stress this particular point: I am primarily here to listen and to learn and, obviously, to share my own country’s experiences, and to build partnerships for collective action.  

It is notable to travel across half the globe and meet with leaders and countries whose priorities are so aligned with those of my own country.

Norway and the Pacific share a deep commitment to international law, especially the law of the sea and multilateralism. We believe in finding sustainable solutions across regions through collaboration and mutual respect. The Pacific Islands and Norway have stood together in advancing important developments such as the BBNJ treaty, the WTO Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies and implementation of the SDGs.

A core priority for Norway is sustainable management of the oceans. We are as committed as you are for a swift entry into force of the BBNJ agreement and the WTO Agreement on Fisheries Subsidies. We are working diligently to ensure effective measures to address overcapacity and overfishing in the follow-up agreement on Fisheries Subsidies.

As co-chairs of the High-Level Panel for a Sustainable Ocean Economy, Norway and Palau are working together with 16 world leaders, incl. Fiji and Australia, towards managing 100 % of the world’s oceans sustainably.

We welcome the recent launch of the “Unlocking Blue Pacific Prosperity Initiative” - in line with the panel's vision for better management of the ocean.

On IUU fishing, Norway, in partnership with the UNDP and others, launched the Blue Justice Initiative five years ago, to support the Copenhagen Declaration. Norway contributes with ocean surveillance capabilities by sharing satellite data from five Norwegian satellites, free of charge, to all states involved in the initiative. We encourage all PIF members to join the initiative. 

Like Norway, the Pacific States are in a particularly vulnerable situation regarding plastic marine pollution. Together with Rwanda, Norway co-chairs the High Ambition Coalition to End Plastic Pollution. We know that combating plastic pollution is a high priority for the Pacific Islands. We encourage you to participate actively as we enter into the final stages of the negotiations. Please also consider joining the High Ambition Coalition. The credibility and legitimacy the Pacific Island States can bring to such processes cannot be overstated.

Let me also take this opportunity to congratulate Tonga on the launch of the roadmap to phase out single use of plastics (Side-event on Monday).

Your excellencies, if you allow me, I will share a few examples on how Norway is contributing to funding new initiatives and programs.

Investing in renewable energy and climate resilience is crucial. That is why Norway recently decided to double our climate financing, already among the highest in the world. We are currently the seventh largest donor to the Green Climate Fund, from which Small Island developing states will receive 1,6 billion USD.  

Norway is also one of the largest donors to the UN Central Emergency Response Fund (around 10 %), which has been instrumental in financing responses to recent crises like we saw in Tonga in 2022, but also in Fiji, Vanuatu, PNG and Solomon Islands.

The new fund for loss and damage, established at the last COP, represents an important development. As a board member, Norway is working actively to ensure that the fund will benefit developing countries, and especially small island states, which, through no fault of their own, are particularly vulnerable to the effects of climate change. Norway’s PM recently announced that Norway will provide 27 million USD to the fund.

Finally, on education, an important theme this conference. The Norway-Pacific Ocean-Climate Scholarship Programme (N-POC) has handed out 19PhD-scholarships in the nexus between Ocean and climate. It is a cooperation between the University of the South Pacific (USP) and the University of Bergen in Norway. It is program in the Pacific, for the Pacific, developing local knowledge that can help tackle the effects of climate change.

Your excellencies,

Norway stands ready to further engage with PIF, in building a new decade of partnerships and progress, and in supporting your journey, toward resilient prosperity and sustainable development.

I thank you.